Stories to Watch: 🇰🇪Kenya Finance Bill, 🇿🇦South African Stocks Rise

Kenya’s Finance Bill Protests. Are companies ready for new media?

One of the big stories this week is on the protests in Kenya over the new finance bill. An interesting element about the protests is how much of a role new media has played. Here’s a report from Semafor that sheds more light.

“Mainstream media coverage of the youth-led protests in Kenya is being overshadowed by protesters’ use of social media to shape narratives about the finance bill they oppose through shared videos, photos, memes and live streams.

TikTok and X have become the go-to platforms for many Kenyans looking to keep up with the protests, reflecting the composition of the movement itself. The protests so far have featured mostly Gen Z and millennial protesters in a country with relatively high internet access rates and widespread smartphone usage. Notably, around 75% of Kenya’s population is under 35 years of age, and the median age is 19.”

It is clear that new media forms like TikTok, Twitter, and others have effectively driven mass action in political advocacy. Will that also start to spread into the corporate space?

In 2020, we saw a glimpse of that when retail pharmacy giant, Clicks, went viral after posting an ad campaign that was deemed racist. Here is a bit of the background from a post from News24.

The backlash started on Friday when a Clicks advert which classified different types of hair started trending. In the advert were pictures of four women: two black and two white.

The advert classified the two black women's hair as, "dry and damaged" and "frizzy and dull", while the two white women's hair were classified as "fine and flat hair" as well as "normal hair".

Miss Universe Zozi Tunzi and other Twitter users felt it was disrespectful to the black community.

The backlash was so steep that it even got Julius Malema and EFF to threaten to close Clicks for a week.

Naturally, the Clicks CEO had to issue a lengthy apology and make some concessions before life moved on.

This hasn’t yet happened as much in other African markets, but with more young people on new media, the likelihood of a company misstep or a boycott going viral is only increasing.

How ready are companies for this reality?

Stocks in South Africa are flying

Stocks in South Africa have risen sharply since the announcement of the Government of National Unity. Here is an extract from a story by the Financial Times.

The Johannesburg Stock Exchange rose 1.2 per cent on Wednesday, after surging 3.5 per cent on Tuesday, as investors reacted positively to the prospect of an African National Congress-led government tempered by what they regard as the practical influence of the DA.

The South African rand rose as high as R17.9 against the dollar, clawing back its losses after last month’s election, when the ANC’s dismal showing raised fears it might form a coalition with radical breakaway parties.

The surge in stock prices in South Africa highlights that the owners of capital still distrust most of the major political parties, except the Democratic Alliance, which many see as safeguarding the interests of “White Monopoly Capital.”

This creates some tension. In the short term, capital will flood into South Africa, but what happens in the next election cycle if the Democratic Alliance is not part of the ruling government?

Will the rand and stocks collapse? If that’s a possibility then how do you think through investment horizons?

Whatever happens, I suspect the next year will be very strong for the rand and stocks. I also expect there to be a few interest rate cuts starting in November, and this report from Reuters suggests that most economists see things the same.

“Eight of 20 economists forecast a quarter-point cut in November, seven predicted a 50-basis-point move, two saw a 75-basis-point cut, while three expected no change.”

With rates likely to go down, this will be welcome news for sectors like the property market, which has been depressed over the last few years.

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