Roberto Di Matteo Finally Appointed Chelsea Manager.

Roberto Di Matteo has finally been hired as Chelsea manager on a two year contract. He had previously been serving on a caretaker role after Andre Villas Boas was fired. In his short stint at Stamford Bridge, Di Matteo brought Chelsea two cups among them their most valued, the UEFA Champions league. 

"Roberto's quality was clear for all to see when he galvanized the squad last season and helped the club make history, and the owner and board are very pleased he will be continuing his good work," Chelsea's chief executive, Ron Gourlay, told the club's official website. "We all believed he was a young coach with much to offer when we first asked him to take charge of team affairs in March and the manner in which he worked with us, the players and all the staff, and the success that followed, made him the clear choice when it came to selecting the person to take us forward in the seasons to come.

"We will be working closely with Roberto in the weeks ahead, some exciting signings have already been made and Roberto has had input into those. Although he has set the bar very high in the short time he has been in charge, we know that Roberto is the right man to lead Chelsea onto further success."

Di Matteo expressed his excitement over his appointment but chose to focus more on next season.

"I'm obviously delighted to have been appointed as manager and first team coach," he said. "We all achieved incredible success last season that made history for this great club. Our aim is to continue building on that and I'm already planning and looking forward to the squad's return for preseason."

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Mariga's Brother May Be Headed To The English Premier League.

Kenyan footballer, Victor Wanyama, is emerging as a transfer target for several English Premier League clubs. The Celtic midfielder is reportedly on the radar of Liverpool, Stoke and QPR. According to The Scottish Daily, the three clubs value the player at around 8 million pounds (KSh 1.05 billion). His current club, Celtic, however value the player at 14 million pounds (KSh 1.84 billion).The player is reportedly enthusiastic about the prospects of playing in the EPL.

“Wanyama, who played for his country last night as they lost 1-0 to Namibia in a World Cup qualifier, told friends on Friday he wants to quit Celtic and move to the Premiership,”read the article

Of the three, QPR seem to be the most serious with reports that they are ready to offload their captain, Joey Barton, and launch a bid for the Kenyan. Liverpool's new manager is an admirer of Mugubi and is also ready to launch a bid. 

If Mugubi manages to secure a signature with any English Premier League club, then he will be the first Kenyan, after his elder brother, McDonald Mariga failed to seal what looked like an imminent transfer to Manchester City two seasons ago.

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The Government Is Now Kenya Airways Largest Shareholder.

The government of Kenya is now the largest shareholder of Kenya Airways, following the just concluded rights issue. Kenya Airways raised 14.8 billion shillings, signifying 70 percent of the 20 billion they needed. The government's share holding rose from 23 percent to 29.8 percent. 

KLM which was the previous largest share holder was forced to scale down its shares, which would have seen them reach 33 percent, to just 26.73, a 0.73 increase from its previous 26 percent. 

“Whereas KLM subscribed for its full entitlement of new shares, its application was scaled back,” reads a press statement released on Friday. 

If the rights issue was fully subscribed, the shares before and after would have remained the same. Trading at the Nairobi Securities Exchange is expected to start on June 21, 2012.

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Mututho Wants To increase Drinking Age To 21.

Mututho has raised stirred fresh controversy when he proposed to raise the minimum drinking age from 18 to 21. The Naivasha mp said he has already finalized with the draft and has sent it to a legal team for fine tuning before he tables it on the house. 

“This proposal is based on research in the United States, which shows that people who start drinking below the age of 18 are more susceptible to alcoholism than those above the age of 21,” Mututho said. 

East African Breweries Limited has maintained that though it does not oppose regulation, laws should not be used to kick any one out of business.

“Regulation is good if it ensures that legitimate businesses thrive. I don’t believe Parliament will be interested in just passing punitive laws to stifle businesses,” EABL group chief executive officer Seni Adetu said. 

Mututho is perhaps guided by the fact that even after his controversial law was passed, people have continued to die of illicit brews. His previous law reduced the drinking hours considerably. We will wait to see if his new proposal sees the light of day.

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Parliament's Hi Tech Chamber Is Ready.

The new debating chambers in Parliament, which cost  the  taxpayer  Sh949  million  in refurbishment,  will  be  inaugurated  on  Tuesday next week, House  Speaker Kenneth Marende
has said. In a special dispatch to the  House, Mr Marende said that  President Kibaki would preside over the much-awaited  inauguration ahead of the  maiden sitting in the House in which MPs are scheduled to  listen to the equivalent of the Budget Speech come Thursday, June 14 (next week). 

“All members are requested to attend and be seated in the new chamber by 10am,” Mr Marende said.

The refurbishment began on April 6, 2010, and was scheduled to take one year, but it is 15 months overdue.Yesterday, the engineers behind the facelift of the August House were putting the final  touches,  fixing the seats and unwrapping the polythene packages into which micro-phones had been packed. The last batch of the 352 seats, built by the Kenya Prisons Department, were delivered and installed yesterday. The seats are automatically  adjustable and have an electronic device for when the MPs need to vote. All the changes are geared at pushing the MPs to work faster without any excuses for legislative mediocrity.

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Government Urged To Zero Rate CCTV Equipment.

The government has been urged to zero rate CCTV equipment. This comes just days before the ambitious project to install smart CCTV cameras around Nairobi is rolled out.

“They should be zero-rated. That way, they will be affordable because these are very expensive,” the chairman of the Nairobi Central Business District Association (NCBDA) Timothy Muriuki said.

The NCBDA chairman was speaking at an exhibition of private companies offering CCTV service.

Parliament has proposed a budget of Sh1.2 billion to be allocated for the CCTV installation around Nairobi. The cameras will be positioned at strategic areas around Nairobi where security threats are real. They are expected to have face recognition software, where by a person in police wanted list is identified anytime he is captured by any of the cameras. The cameras will also be used to identify traffic offenders.

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Dead Boy Wakes Up, Asks For Water, Then 'Dies Again'

A two year old Brazilian boy shocked relatives when he woke up from his coffin and requested for water. Hours after Kelvin Santos had been declared dead, and put in a coffin ready for burial, he sat up and said, 'Daddy, can I have some water?'. The relatives who had been grieving the whole night started screaming with jubilation. 

The boy's father, Antonio Santos, said: 'Everybody started to scream, we couldn't believe our eyes. Then we thought a miracle had taken place and our boy had come back to life. 'Then Kelvin just laid back down, the way he was. We couldn't wake him. He was dead again."

They rushed the boy to the hospital and the doctors checked on him again, confirming that he was indeed dead. The family ended up burying him in the evening. The father is convinced that his child 'death' was as a result of medical negligence and has vowed to sue.
'Fifteen minutes after rushing him away for resuscitation, they came and told me he was dead and handed me his body. Perhaps they didn't examine him properly. Dead people don't just wake up and talk. I'm determined to find out the truth.' He said.

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