Columnists
Globalised digital activism a threat to competitiveness of Kenya’s ICT
Tuesday July 04 2023
The Employment Court has dismissed an application by Meta seeking to strike out a petition filed by 260 content moderators. FILE PHOTO | SHUTTERSTOCK
Recent media reports suggest that several cases have been filed in Kenyan courts against multinationals and big tech companies.
Indeed, because of the country’s comparatively progressive Judiciary, such cases have even been filed against alleged violations that took place outside Kenya, notably in Ethiopia.
While I am not remotely opposed to civil action, my bigger concern is that this emerging trend of globalised activism threatens to entrench the digital divide, which is already big in Africa, even further.
It is no secret that Africa leads in digital illiteracy and access, with most people unlikely to be on-boarded in their lifetime.
This is partly caused by poor digital infrastructure, low public investments in ICT, unsupportive policy and regulatory environment and, lately, out-of-context activism.
In Kenya, for instance, out-of-context activism manifests when stakeholders including the government, tech companies, civil society groups and unions talk at each other instead of striving for common ground that would enhance digital inclusion.
It is no secret that the majority of Kenyans in rural areas and informal urban settlements are still largely digitally excluded save for intermittent social media presence.
Kenya’s Digital Economy Blueprint speaks to this divide and identifies practical strategies to solve it.
The current nature of the international supply chain means that various components of a product are produced in different countries and assembled elsewhere.
In the digital space, for example, this manifests in what is now called business process outsourcing (BPOs). This means that companies develop partnerships, mostly overseas, in strategic, countries for supply chain reasons.
In the tech world, this would include outsourcing components like customer care, data development and content moderation. In the textile industry, this would include aspects like manufacturing plants amongst others.
The main benefit of this model is that it allows enhanced business opportunities outside a company’s domicile. It is in this context that we should be all concerned about this emerging trend of globalised digital activism.
As presently designed, it paints Kenya as a haven for human rights violations by technology firms.
Dr Komolo is a law scholar and practising advocate. [email protected]
