rememberthegoat

It’s no use pretending otherwise, the eclipse was a terrible disappointment. Everybody gathered at Allia Bay had invested a lot of time, effort, and in many cases a large amount of money, to be in the right place at the right time to see the full solar eclipse or (as I now know to call it) totality. None of us did. A sandstorm, on the leading edge of a lot of cloud and wind but very little rain, swept across the flat volcanic land. It swept across all of us peering skyward in Allia Bay and ... Continue Reading

It’s been two months since the fighting that left many dead in Moyale, there has been little news from the town since and you’d be forgiven for thinking that the problems had been solved and that people had moved on with their lives. Sadly that is not how things are. In my last visit there, a few weeks ago, the town was trouble free but the tension was all too obvious even to an outsider like me. Moyale has a lot in common with Isiolo. A small pastoralist town (though Isiolo is not so small ... Continue Reading

Poverty and inequity make oil protests inevitable in Turkana, unless both government and oil companies take great care to support local communities in the early stages of exploration and extraction. Putting aside for a moment all other issues, legitimate or otherwise, that surround oil exploration in Turkana there is a fundamental problem that has not been sufficiently addressed. That problem is a perception of inequality arising from extreme poverty and marginalisation and, in the broadest ... Continue Reading