Category Archives: EABL

Corporates Loving Golf

Historically, golf has been considered to be a costly sport in Kenya with difficulty in accessing equipment kits and membership clubs to play at. But now golf is enjoying increased corporate attention and bank sponsorships in the post-covid period. Some of these initiatives had begun in the period before the shutdowns in 2020, but the increased need for individuals to exercise in open spaces boosted more interest in hiking, cycling, jogging, and golfing. Golf clubs were previously seen to be losing touch with young people, and many of the new initiatives are designed to turn this around. 

Some ongoing corporate golf partnerships are:  

  • Kenya has been a multiple winner of Africa’s Best Golf Destination at the annual World Travel Awards and the Kenya Tourism Board is keen on using golf to promote tourism both by local and international travelers. Golf is played year-round in Kenya and the country has easy connections to other tourism facilities. KTB cites a consultancy research report that golf travelers spend 2.5x more than leisure travelers and stay for longer periods 
  • Absa Kenya has a long-running sponsorship of the Kenya Open Golf tournament which, with the support of the Government that aims to boost tourism into the country, is known as the Magical Kenya Open and is part of the European Tour. The 2022 edition tournament was played in March at the Muthaiga Club and was won, for the first time, by a Chinese golfer, Ashun Wu.
  • This year, Kenya Airways joined as a corporate partner and had aircraft fly past over Muthaiga on two days of the tournament and, as an official sponsor offered discounted rates to golfers and fans while ferrying in PGA officials working at the tournament. 
  • NCBA has the NCBA Golf Series with ten tournaments around the country that was in Kitale last week and will next be in Kampala, Uganda.  In 2021, the series had 13  tournaments that attracted 1,700 golfers. Some juniors golfers who participated won qualification to two international events – the Rome Classic (Italy) and the Big Five (South Africa).  
  •  The Safaricom Golf Tour has received sponsorship of Kshs 100 million, for a 14-leg tournament that will involve outreach to local communities and make the sport more accessible – it will rope in corporate and amateur players, juniors (play on Sundays), caddies (compete on Mondays) at the different legs. It aims to find new talent for the sport, especially young golfers, and winners of different legs will feature at the finale at Vipingo Ridge in August. The Vipingo Ridge course was launched in 2010 and continues to host several leading international golf tournaments. 
  • Also on the European Tour is the Magical Kenya Ladies Open which is played at the Vipingo course. The Kenya Tourism Board (KTB) is the main sponsor of the tournament which this year featured 90 golfers from 25 countries. The tournament also got a Kshs 20 million sponsorship from Safaricom’s M-Pesa who held a junior golf clinic.
  • Crown Paints and Prime Bank are part sponsors of the US Kids Foundation golf series along with Safaricom and NCBA. The three-year program will be run through the Junior Golf Foundation (JGF) to promote golf development through the training of up to 40 coaches across the country and supports local golf tours to introduce more young people to the sport. It has held events at Limuru and Muthaiga and will have more at Karen and Royal (Nairobi) all leading to a finale at the Muthaiga Golf Club in May 2022.
  • Kenya Ports Authority will have tournaments in different cities of its operations – Nairobi, Mombasa, Kisumu. 
  • The Tannahill Shield one of the largest amateur golf tournaments in the country is ongoing at the Royal Nairobi Golf Club this Easter Weekend. It is sponsored by Jamii Telecom, Rentco and Chipper Cash, a remittance company. 
  • In 2021, Absa Kenya sponsored the Savannah Tour Classic a new event created for the European tour in the recovery from Covid and was staged ahead of the Kenya Open. 
  • The Johnnie Walker Classic golf series resumed after eight years, sponsored by EABL’s The Johnnie Walker Classic golf series resumed after eight years, sponsored by EABL’s Kenya Breweries. “Road to Gleneagles” will have amateur and professional golfers compete at 20 clubs across the country ahead of the finale in May 2022 where the winning team will receive an all-expenses-paid trip to play at the Gleneagles in Scotland which is one of the top golf courses in the world. For the professionals, participation will help them to improve their competitiveness for the European tour events played in Kenya. 
  • Insurance companies including ICEA and Liberty (a Stanbic affiliate) also support golf as do other companies in the sector. 
  • EDIT: Amateur golfers are invited to enter the Race to Vipingo Ridge by registering and submitting scores achieved during “club nights” at their home clubs between 18 April and the end of June for a chance to win a chance to play in the finals at Vipingo Ridge, with their transport and accommodation careered for. Note, there is an entry fee for the qualifying rounds.
  • EDIT: NMG has the Nation Classic Golf Series again for 2022.
  • EDIT: I&M Bank has an offer to pay 95% of the membership fee for its customers eligible to join VetLab Sports Club, a popular golf club in Nairobi.

ESG requirements for Nairobi companies

The Nairobi Securities Exchange (NSE) has launched an environmental, social and governance (ESG) disclosures guidance manual for listed companies on the Nairobi Securities Exchange. 

The guidance was developed with the Global Reporting Institute (GRI) as a proactive initiative by the NSE ahead of more formal rules expected from the Capital Markets Authority (CMA). The NSE is the fourth exchange on the continent after Egypt Nigeria and Botswana to publish guidelines.

NSE board member Isis Nyong’o said 50% of exchanges worldwide have published guidelines, and there are moves to make disclosures mandatory rather than voluntary and companies will soon not be able to attract foreign funding without ESG disclosures. She said that after a grace period, the NSE will also require companies to report annually on ESG.

The guide lists benefits of ESG reporting as more effective capital allocation, access to new sources of financing from sustainability-conscious investors such as DFI’s and P/E funds, more efficiency, better regulatory compliance and better supply chains.

ESG reports are to be prepared following the GRI standards. Companies are advised to recruit ESG champions from across their organization, familiarize their teams with the ESG reporting requirements, provide resources, raise awareness, and develop management plans. They are also to map out and engage with stakeholders – both low-influence such as customers and suppliers, along with the high0influence ones who are regulators and investors.

Companies are to publish their ESG reports and seek external assurance from third-parties to enhance credibility and accuracy and can also integrate their ESG reporting with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) they have prioritized – whether they are in banking, investment, manufacturing, agriculture, energy & petroleum, construction, commercial & services, insurance, or telecommunications sectors.

For banks, the Kenya Bankers Association has already produced sustainable finance principles for the industry while the Central Bank has developed guides on climate risk management. Some ESG areas that banks could report on are: 

  • General measures including; governance, strategy, ethics, stakeholder engagement, business models, risk management & controls.
  • Economic measures including; financial return versus economic viability, community investments and taxes. 
  • Social measures including; working conditions, financial products information to customers, consumer protection, inclusivity, political funding, and cyber security.
  • Environmental measures including; materials sourcing, emissions, energy-choice, waste management, electronic waste management, and environmental impact assessments. 

It is expected that adhering to the ESG reporting approach can be used to meet the reporting requirements of the CMA’s corporate governance code for listed companies. Currently, ESG, as measured by sustainability reports, is largely the preserve of larger institutions including Safaricom, Bamburi (parent is Lafarge), East African Breweries (parent is Diageo) and Absa, KCB, Cooperative and Stanbic banks.

The NSE plans to have more training and capacity building sessions about the ESG guide manual which can be downloaded from their website.

Kenya’s Money in the Past: Kenneth Matiba

“Aiming High” is an autobiography of Kenneth Matiba that covers his life as a civil servant, businessman, farmer, corporate leader, member of parliament, cabinet minister, and presidential candidate.

It’s also a good business book that’s well written and detailed.

Excerpts:

Scaling Farming Ventures

  • While exporting beans to Europe, he faced freight challenges. East African Airways (EAA) had no cargo and when BOAC planes landed in Nairobi from South Africa, they were always full. Cargo was doubled booked and often not loaded at Embakasi airport and later thrown away. He decided to start a cargo airline in 1967 and registered African international airways and invited John Michuki and Charles Njonjo to join. At the time EAA’s problem was that Uganda was not remitting revenue and it was serving uneconomic routes in Tanzania. He got the authority to operate a cargo charter flew an old Britannia plane that was on sale for £65,000 to Nairobi to inspect with Michuki and Njonjo. But unhappy EAA staff reported back and the Tanzania Standard had a headline about how Kenya was helping three capitalists to destroy EAA. Michuki and Matiba were PS’s and Njonjo was AG and they decided not to sign the purchase agreement and the plane was flown back to England.
  • Craziest venture: In 1975 during a potato shortage in England, tried to export 6,000 tons. Rounded up all potatoes in Meru and with 290 trucks got them to Mombasa. Managed to load one ship with 1,600 and later another with 1,700. The second broke down, and by the time it reached potato was rotten and the ship was diverted for special cleaning.

Making Transitions

  • Only after he resigned from the government was he able to safeguard his independence through personal business dealings.
  • Radio announcements about cabinet reshuffles were a feature as far back as 1965. He heard he had been transferred from the Ministry of Home Affairs to the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Cooperatives. There was no proper handover and he felt it was wrong to shuffle civil servants (PS) like happened with ministers.

Corporate Life

  • In 1968 he planned to retire as PS and gave a one-year notice. He asked Geoffrey Kariithi to wait till President Kenyatta was in a good mood before telling him. When Kenyatta realized this he asked who authorized Matiba to leave the government and Kariithi reminded him it was he. Matiba later made up – he was arranging for his son Raymond and John Michuki’s two sons to be circumcised and Kenyatta asked that he also rope in his two sons, Uhuru and Muhoho.
  • After he left the government, he had five job offers and chose Kenya Breweries.
  • He refused to become the Chairman of Anglo Kenya investments without equity, so he was offered 26% and he paid for that.

Hoteling & Real Estate

  • Acquired Brunners hotel in 1974, a hotel in the middle of town, that was listed on the Nairobi Stock Exchange. The Brunner family had 65% and Marcel Brunner and his son Derek continued to run it and helped Matiba with Jadini later on. But they closed it in 1978. It had an old interior and its 120 beds could not support the needed renovations. They sold the building in June 1982 and Fedha Towers was later built on the site.
  • George Robinson bought 10 acres in Karen, improved and sold it to buy the Mackinnon Building opposite New Stanley for £50,000.
  • Matiba scouted Jadini Hotel in 1967 which was on sale in £54,000 and recommended Robinson buy it. They sold MacKinnon at a profit and bought Jadini and another 10 acres in Karen.
  • Bought Dacca Road houses in Nairobi West in 1969 and sold them in 1971.
  • They developed Golf Course housing estate but later gave up housing to concentrate on hotels and schools.
  • When Robinson died, Matiba negotiated to purchase his stake and took over Jadini. He had to rush to complete construction and open for tourists while facing down hostile old staff and management.
  • Michael Betrano, a new manager, rescued Jadini when it had 7.5% occupancy in March 1973 and put it on the world map. He later hired Christopher Mogidell who took it further.
  • In 1978, built Africana Sea Lodge in six months and in 1984 built, the 400-bed Safari Beach in 10 months that was opened in 1986.

Tourism Sector

  • Seasonal airlines: For KTDC, Matiba chaired the struggling Air Kenya which only did business from December to March and July to September when tourists visited. It was idle rest of the year and utilization was never above 50%.
  • Difficult Ministers: Tourism Minister Elijah Mwangale saw hotels as swindlers who did nothing but cheat Kenyans out of the foreign exchange. Matiba also held his tongue when Maina Wanjigi set a target of a million hotel beds which he correctly saw as unrealistic as the industry could not build 100,000 beds a year.
  • Matiba argued that tourism was the cheapest for Kenya to earn foreign exchange. To earn $100, you need to invest $40, and gets a net of $60 while to earn $100 from coffee, it costs $68.

Sports involvement

  • Matiba decided to form Kenya Breweries Football Club in 1970 and have all staff stop playing for other teams. They entered the poorly-run Kenya Football Association league that had a lot of frustration. Matiba later formed the Kenya Football Federation to run a 12-team Kenya Football League exclusively as a company that the Sports Minister could not interfere with and invited other clubs to join and though KFA refused to recognize them. But after Gor Mahia agreed to join, other teams followed. All they wanted was to play soccer and entertain fans, not represent Kenya. They were not deterred by a suspension by the KFA and went ahead to draw a league for Nairobi Mombasa Nakuru Kisumu, book and pay for the stadiums on Saturday and Sunday for a year.
  • Clubs got more from gate takings, tickets were printed by security firms which club representatives checked at gates, and complimentary tickets were abolished. While prices went up, they got more fans to come after they eliminated stone-throwing. They ensured clubs showed up ahead of time for matches for inspection and eliminated match delays sometimes caused by witchdoctors and superstitions.
  • In his first year chairing KFF and KFL, Kenya won three East African cups.
  • Matiba was an avid sportsman who climbed Mount Everest when he was a Cabinet Minister.

Giving Back.

  • Matiba worked with Bishop Sospeter Magua who wanted to make the church self-sustaining with permanent income through investments, and not be weak financially by staying dependent on unpredictable charity donations. They organized for three districts – Muranga, Kiambu and Nyeri – to contribute. President Moi chaired the first harambee in Muranga where Kshs 1 million was raised, Mwai Kibaki chaired the next one in Kiambu and Njonjo was invited for the third in Nyeri. They bought a 7-acre plot in Loresho and one acre on Kayahwe Road to build maisonettes. But Bishop Magua died in a road accident in 1982. Is Bishop Magua Centre, home of the first iHub, named after him?
  • Embori farm in Timau was put up for sale in 1977 for Kshs 34 million and Robert Wilson, the European farmer selling it, did not want it to go to a cooperative or large group, preferring it should go to individuals or a public company. Matiba persuaded him that it could remain intact and not be subdivided. The seller also wanted Kshs 20 million of the amount in foreign exchange and Matiba asked Kenyatta who authorized the Central Bank to release this sum which was, the largest amount of forex ever given to purchase a farm. Meanwhile. a cabinet minister who wanted the farm tried to scuttle the deal. Matiba did a prospectus for Kiharu residents that yielded Kshs 6 million from 10,000 shareholders. After taking over, they sold wheat to KFA and barley to Kenya Breweries to meet the interest on overdraft for seven years but the farm did not generate enough to pay back the bank loan and shareholders are not willing to pay more. So Matiba next pushed them to sell some land to local residents, with a bank offering 50% finance and keep the balance for the farm, but after a year, only a handful took the offer. The farm still runs well today.

Business and politics

  • After 3.5 years as MP, he was appointed a Minister of Culture and Social Services in September 1983. He was the Chairman of Kenya Breweries and he made a personal decision to resign and was succeeded by Bryan Hobson. At the time, Alliance had seven hotels and four schools.
  • Matiba resigned from the cabinet in December 1988. After he quit he has no passport and went about his businesses quietly, but Moi never forgot. When he got his passport back in 1989, he made a trip to Rwanda for the wedding of the daughter of President Habyarimana in July 1989. Then in February 1990, he was invited back to Rwanda to explain how that country could expand its tourism and he took five experts from the Alliance group with him. But as soon as he came back, special branch officers started looking for him for interrogation after the death of Minister Robert Ouko.
  • Concern about leadership. The Kenya majority has lost the concept of servanthood. Leaders aspire not to serve citizens but themselves. Many spend only two hours in their offices making personal telephone calls and the rest of their time on their business.

Business Advice

  • The biggest problem African businesses face is a lack of accounting.
  • Africans also treated businesses as hobbies and entrust them to ignorant family members.
  • Business people try to do too much – being butchers, curio sellers and textile dealers all at the same time instead of concentrating on one line.


Matiba was detained in July 1990. The book dwells on his medical treatment after he was poisoned in detention and his preparation to run for the Presidency in 1992 where he came second. It does not go into his later tribulations with banks and businesses that halted the corporate empire he had built. Kenneth Matiba died in April 2018.

Knight Frank on High Net Worth Kenyans – HNWIs

Knight Frank has released its report on wealthy Kenyans or HNWIs (high-net-worth individuals)  whose number and wealth grew in 2018, which was considered a difficult year for the country with the increased cost of living, credit shortage, and post-election economic slowdown.

According to the Knight Frank Wealth Report, the number of Kenyan HNWIs, with net worths, excluding their primary homes, of over $1 million (Kshs 100 million) grew by 306 to reach 9,482 individual. It noted that there were also 82 “ultra-wealthy” individuals, with net worths of Kshs 3 billion, residing in Nairobi.

Some characteristics of the group of dollar millionaires (which also draws from an Attitudes Survey by Knight Frank, among other reports):

  • Home ownership: First and second homes make up 45% of their wealth. Kenyan HNWI’s own an average of 2.7 homes, while those in South Africa own an average of four homes.
  • 18% of HNWI’s bought new homes in 2018 in the country, and 8% bought homes abroad,. 22% plan to buy new homes in the country this year with the drop in luxury home prices and unfavourable economy in Kenya last year considered a good opportunity for property investments. 39% own investment properties in Kenya and 22% have investment properties overseas. 
  • Investment Portfolios: 25% of HNWI investments are in equities (company shares), 22% for properties that earn income, 22% in cash and 20% in bonds. Just 3% goes to private equity – and this has been a sore point for upcoming young companies who have to turn overseas to get equity funding.  
  • Local Preferences:  The report notes that governments around the world are targeting global wealth, and 24% of the ultra-wealthy Kenyans have second passports or dual nationalities but only 9% are considering emigrating with an indicated preference for the UK, Canada and the USA. Half of them educate their children overseas for primary and secondary school and 65% of them send their children overseas for university education. 

  • HNWI’s allocated 3% of their wealth to luxury investments such as arts, wine and classic cars, among other collectables, with the majority collecting cars and jewellery followed by art and furniture. Whiskey and Chinese ceramics also feature, while gold gets 1%.  The Report mentions that EABL has a mini mentorship program to woo more Kenyans to invest in collectible whiskies. 
  • Generational Wealth: Transferring wealth is still a delicate matter among Kenya’s rich, with only 43% of respondents to the Attitudes Survey saying their clients have robust succession plans in place to pass their wealth to the next generation. 

EABL: Beer, Taxes, Innovations, Tanzania.

EABL released their financial results for their 2018 year to June this week. It was a tale of two halves with flat growth in the first half of the year which coincided with Kenya ’s prolonged electioneering period and which affected sales of its products such as Senator lager, an affordable beer brand.  But the second half of the year (January to June 2018) saw a more business-friendly environment and more money in consumers pockets.

EABL ended the year with 5% revenue growth to Kshs 73.5 billion and the star of the show for the company in 2017 was Tanzania which saw 41% growth, mainly driven by Serengeti Lite beer. Also, special innovations that contributed 22% to the results is one of the best performances in the world. At EABL, Tanzania’ grew to account for 11% of revenue while Kenya’s was 73%, and Uganda was at 16%.  Capital expenditure was Kshs 13 billion, up from the 5 billion the year before and Kshs 7.8 billion was due to the Kisumu plant which is expected to be opened later in 2018. While overall profit before tax for EABL was Kshs 11.7 billion, a decline of 12% from the year, the company will pay out the same Kshs 7.50 per share dividend to shareholders.

The EABL managers spoke of innovating to reach the 1 million consumers who attain the legal drinking age (18) every year in Kenya – and investment in existing brands, and rolling out new brands to win over changing customers tastes. They also made some excise tax savings in Uganda by moving some  Tusker and Guinness production there while in Kenya, EABL’s profit was weighed down by a Kshs 2 billion one-off provision for taxes that significantly reduced their final result. They said a stable tax environment would enable the company to generate more taxes for governments without causing consumers to pay more.  

Also that by doing more local production of beer and spirits at Ruaraka in Nairobi, at Tanzania, Uganda and soon at the new line at Kisumu has allowed them to bring global brands into countries and produce and offer them at local prices. In the 2019 financial year, they will commercialise the Kisumu brewery which will also benefit 15,000 farmers and generate over 100,000 direct and indirect jobs in the production and distribution chain of Senator beer from Kisumu.