I really would like to know the thinking behind the suggested ICT bill coming up in a parliament near you.

Ati we have a board of gov't appointees, old geezers, and guys who have never seen a laptop deciding who can and should not practise as an IT professional. Worse, they don't even say what IT professional means.

To say that I'm mad is an understatement. First we had the security bill, now we have a bill that states that if you don't have a license from the gov't you can not do anything IT related.

Yaani even the current CS does not have sort of license of whatever kind to practise with this ambigous radioactive law.

Worse, Bill Gates having not cleared university would never have started Microsoft. That other fellow from Apple would not have existed. Paypal, Tesla, yaani even Uber would need their owners to be licensed by the gov't of Kenya.

Let me say this with fear, this law is worse than the security law. Simply because it shall effectively kill any innovation from the young guys and gals coding in the cyber. They won't be allowed to get jobs unless they have a license. What?!!!

Ati you get a degree from a university in Kenya where the lecturer does not even own a laptop.

Madness I tell you madness.

I'm saying this knowing fully well that I qualify based on the draft. Actually more qualified with legit papers from international bodies than the fellows who came with this one.

But never ever in my career have I ever been asked for my license, my papers etc worldwide. I have never even considered that as a reason to hire anyone.

Hii ni Kenya tu.

Here's the link to the bill

http://kenyalaw.org/kl/f...titioners_Bill_2016.pdf

Please note the wholesome defination of ICT at the very beginning.

"Information Communication Technology (ICT)"
means technologies employed in collecting, storing,
processing, using or sending out information and include
those involving the use of computers, mobile apparatus or
any telecommunication system;

If you think you are safe, the think again. Even bloggers will have to get a license. If you work at the tweeterer for your company, that license shall be mandatory.

If this is not the very definition of far reaching depending on who hates you.

When did government laws start establishing monopolies



For those in the IT field, can you please advise us newbies who the hell the Information Communication Technology Association of Kenya is?

Their very website makes me wonder how authoritative they really are in IT matters. Who are the founders, who are the members, elections etc?

Why are they so important that they are included in a law when we have other associations competing in the same field?

I don't know what to say about this. Afadhali tuendelee na hii kazi yetu hapa tu.

Yes and to do IT stuff you have to have a recognized degree or diploma.

eeisshh and you can see their definition of IT stuff. Even my mother does IT stuff with that definition.

I don't know what to tell the digital government. There can be no monopoly of the information age. That's the very reason its called the information age.

Digital my foot. Do they know how many young Kenyans went digital straight from their bedrooms? Even the hacker with 2pm gang started in his bedroom not an institution of lower learning.

This draft may be a prompt for civil disobedience and rebellion. Some, like me would gladly die than suffer this kind of tyranny that the drafters would like to introduce.

The draft may radicalize so many of us, and given that we have so many youth, the government may be calling for conflict for a long time to come.

Let me give at least one reason for this: everything is going digital and ICT intensive, so will a citizen need a government license to exercise his/her rights? In this bill the government will be subverting the constitution and hence citizens must resist such attempts vigorously!