Award-winning Kenyan musician Tetu Shani has been trying to find new grooves in the time of COVID-19.
Shani who is known for his upbeat blend of indie rock, Afro-pop and folkloric rhythms, was hit hard when the coronavirus pandemic decimated his live performance income stream.
The COVID-19 crisis also had an impact on his creativity, his agent said.
“It’s very hard to be creative when experiencing such pressures on income. Frustration affects production and Tetu started to create music for himself rather than for an audience,” said Silalei Shani.
In April the rising star released a music video of his latest lockdown tune, “Always Feelin’ This Groove”.
Since then, he, like many other artists, musicians, actors, and performers have had to find new ways to supplement their income. But how?
The Kenyan government released a $1 million stimulus package dedicated to local artists, including musicians. But this is not enough, some say, wanting the government to have a longer-term plan in place.
A recent survey conducted by the HEVA Fund, Africa’s first dedicated finance, business support and knowledge facility for creative industries, underscored the financial impact of COVID-19 on creative businesses in Kenya.
In the survey, 58% of the respondents estimated their income losses to be “severe” and an additional 26% “moderate to severe”.
This is a blow to Kenya’s emerging creative industries, which, according to the latest available data from 2013, exports creative goods to the value of at $40.9 million and imports $195 million worth of creative goods, the latest UNCTAD Creative Economy Outlook outlines.
As the COVID-19 crisis deepens, the artists are flocking to both well-known and emerging platforms to eke out a living. And while digital solutions cannot replace the value and beauty of a live show, they are helping the artists survive.
This trend is giving fresh impetus to e-commerce channels and platforms for creatives. It has led the government to request UNCTAD to help address key e-commerce gaps limiting the uptake of digital solutions.
“COVID19 has seen many creatives turn to digital platforms and technologies to connect with audiences and consumers. They are also looking for ways to monetise the technology,” said UNCTAD’s creative economy programme head, Marisa Henderson.
“Given the important role of the digital creative services for creative industries, it’s crucial that countries ready themselves for the ‘new normal’ and adopt digital strategies in line with their development needs.”
An e-commerce policy solution
Kenya was among the top five African performers in the UNCTAD B2C e-commerce index 2019. The country’s 2019 Digital Economy Blueprint outlines the government’s commitment to using disruptive technology to help it leapfrog.
To turn the blueprint into action, the Communications Authority of Kenya requested UNCTAD to help it formulate a national e-commerce strategy. This will include an action plan with recommendations for targeted policy interventions.
“More needs to be done to allow home-grown digital platforms in Africa to stay profitable and for the digital economy to become inclusive and sustainable. Kenya has made significant progress in building a digital ecosystem,” said Shamika N. Sirimanne, UNCTAD’s technology and logistics director.
“The COVID-19 crisis has encouraged the creative industry to make full use of the potential offered by digital platforms to market and sell creative content online via e-commerce,” she added.
But the uptake of digital platforms has unveiled underlying challenges in the creative industry sector in Kenya, according to businesses surveyed by UNCTAD.
These include the collection of fees and royalties for artists, various copyright and intellectual property challenges, privacy and personal data protection rules, illegal downloads, piracy, and counterfeiting. Added to this is the limited scalability of locally developed digital products.
Artists’ lives deeply affected by the pandemic
Atemi Oyungu, a popular Kenyan singer and songwriter well known for her afro-soul productions, was stranded in the United States as global lockdowns came into force and prevented her return to Kenya.
“I’ve been living on my own resources and have not been able to generate an income without a keyboard,” she said.
Oyungu added: “I’ve also been missing collaboration with fellow musicians who’ve returned to their villages where internet connectivity is weak. We also face other constraints, like the time difference, so I haven’t been able to create and perform.”
She also highlighted the toll of COVID-19 on creativity. “It’s a tough period for live musicians who cannot benefit from real shows and interactions with fans to get inspired.”
Digital platforms useful for survival, but scale is key
For both Oyungu and Shani, a revamped presence on social media has been critical for keeping them afloat.
Shani embraced digital platforms to turn what would have been live performance income into digital income. He has been using livestreaming platform DundaLive.
DundaLive allows e-payments for streamed content and a tip line, using the popular M-Pesa mobile money solution and PayPal for followers outside Kenya.
Livestreaming has a merit, but it is not without challenges. “It’s difficult to get attention because of the oversaturation in the market, marked by a significant rise in live performers moving online,” Shani said. “Electricity and internet connectivity issues can also frustrate the streaming experience.”
Other platforms have also been helping Kenyan musicians.
Revenue streams generated by music aggregators, such as YouTube or Spotify, and in particular the Kenyan platform Mdundo, have helped mitigate pandemic-related losses, through the download of artists’ music tunes and ringtones for mobile phones.
Mdundo, which is expanding its presence in 15 African countries, featuring more than 60,000 African artists, reaches more than 5 million active users, 22% of whom are from Kenya.
“Music downloads have been rising steadily with a 26% uptick in 2020’s second quarter on the first quarter’s 33 million downloads,” said Wanjiku Koinange, Mdundo’s chief operating officer, who added that COVID-19 was also changing the way creative content is being produced.
Artists relying on digital platforms for income during the crisis have become more productive, she said. But profitability for both African producers and the platforms requires time and scale.
Digital platforms give lifeline to Kenya’s creatives amid COVID-19
Easy auditing
Tilahun Girma is a finance consultant at I Xcel Financial, Management and IT Consultation Company. I Xcel is a licensed company from Ethiopian Management Institute and works on consulting companies on financial and management issues, line up financial systems and also consult on International Financial Reporting Standard /IFRS/ system for organizations.
Tilahun has a long time experience on the banking sector and is a member of Accounting and Audit Board of Ethiopia and ACCA. Capital talked to him about the implementation of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) and other financial issues. Excerpts;
Capital: Can you please tell us about I Xcel?
Tilahun Girma: It has been three years since I Xcel has been founded using my personal license. In the last three years we have been doing different kinds of consulting services to companies in building up different kinds of finance systems and IFRS. I Xcel has been also giving different kinds of trainings on IFRS for the private sector by cooperating with the chambers of commerce’s. And recently we have developed a system that can support IFRS because one of the challenge companies are facing in applying the IFRS is how to facilitate the system. Therefore we have developed a software that can simplify the system of financial reporting using IFRS and Peachtree which is an accounting application for small and medium-sized businesses.
Capital: How do you see the use and practice of IFRS in Ethiopia?
Tilahun: IFRS in Ethiopia was officially adopted in 2014 through the enactment of proclamation and establishment of Ethiopian Audit Board. However in my assumption there are a lot of defects in applying the system. Starting from the beginning it lacks preparedness before the enactment of the proclamation.
One of the reasons is there is a lack of experienced and trained man power on the IFRS system and lack of technology. I don’t think there were more than 600 certificated accountants and the number of accountants specialized in IFRS is very low.
We have to teach our accountants the real IFRS system and at the same time we have to include it in our curriculum. Our students are still training by the old accounting system /general accounting system/ rather than the new system that the market needs.
Such kind of things should have been done before practicing the system directly. For example if you see the US they did not officially apply the system however they have included it in their education curriculum.
The other thing I notice is lack of technology. As a nation Ethiopia lacks reliable IT system suppliers that can support the financial sector. For example mostly companies uses the old Peachtree accounting application but then again most of them do not directly bought it from the source. They rather illegally cracked the system because it is expensive.
So at all there was no readiness in the technology and experience before the enactment of the proclamation.
Capital: What is your organization doing to close the wide gap?
Tilahun: We give trainings to the staff of different organizations on IFRS, but when they went back to their organizations they get to the old same system which is the Peachtree and this system is not compatible with the IFRS. Most organizations work their financial report on Microsoft Excel. So there is no system to exercise.
So to help this based on my experience I planned to develop a software that can support the practice of the system. In the last one year I was developing and testing the system to fill the gap that can coordinate with Peachtree system.
Our system will enable companies to do their financial report by Microsoft Excel using Peachtree. Then they can transfer it to IFRS standard by following simple steps.
Since I am a financial expert I hired IT experts so that I defined requirements based on my experience so that they can develop the software.
Currently our software has got the quality certificate from the Ministry of Innovation and Technology and about four companies have started to use it. Beside this system can help the experts what we trained.
It has been registered in the Ministry of Innovation and Technology and they gave us positive feedback including the Minister Abreham Belay. So currently to commercialize the system we are hiring and training experts.
Capital: What is the price for the product?
Tilahun: Such kinds of locally made technologies help to save foreign currency.
One of the things is when you install a system there is always a cost but it should not be higher than the benefit. Since we are an organization working for profit we supply it based on our cost. However we are trying to make it as affordable and available for organizations as possible. The software was developed considering small businesses.
I was planning to present it to the Accounting and Audit Board that controls over the financial report. It was better if the board have seen it to get support as well as to subsidize it to make it available for the mass. But currently our price is based on the capacity of the organization and data.
Also our plan is to sell it to accounting firms, there are more than 1,500 accounting firms and 130 auditors in the country.
Venezuela’s confiscated billions
There comes a time when shooting around in circles just hits walls, bullets splinter off sidewalks, and shatter a window here and there. But people are in safety. They watch from a distance and with self-assurance.
Venezuela has received five tankers from Iran loaded with hydrocarbons – petrol gas, additives – shipped through a totally United States-militarized Caribbean Sea, amidst warnings of attacks and retaliations – and as usual, sanctions ’no end’. How much more sanctions can a country get?
Peter Koenig, an economist and geopolitical analyst argued that there is an immune system, called sovereignty and fearlessness – confidence and dignity. Knowing your rights. That’s what makes the whole difference. Granted, the tankers were escorted by the Venezuelan Navy and Air Force; especially through Venezuelan waters. And they made it undisturbed to the port of El Palito, a small Venezuelan port run by Venezuela’s state oil company PDVSA. The American shooting didn’t take place and the event was not televised.
According to Peter Koenig, another aggression against Venezuelan sovereignty is the Bank of England’s withholding totally illegally some US$ 1.2 billion worth of Venezuelan gold, deposited voluntarily by Venezuela in times of trust, as part of Venezuela’s reserve funds. With oil prices collapsed, Venezuela decided to use part of her gold reserves to purchase medication and food to counter the disastrous corona effects.
Peter Koenig noted that Venezuela has a sovereign right to claim these funds without any explanation or justification. The Bank of England refused, claiming the Government of Nicolas Maduro was not the legitimate government recognized by the UK. Can you imagine if any government decides to confiscate funds from another government, because they don’t like its leadership?
In this case, Venezuela explained that the money is needed to buy food and medication to counter the nefarious effects of COVID-19. The UN, intervening on behalf of Venezuela, has requested the Bank of England to return the money. That gesture or action by the UN is in itself is an act of ‘independence’ by the UN against the United States, for whom the UN otherwise does the bidding. But to no avail. The Bank of England didn’t release the Venezuelan-owned gold. As a compromise, Venezuela suggested that the funds be handed over to UNDP (United Nations Development Program) which would buy vital food and medication for Venezuela.
Peter Koenig further stressed that already at the end of 2018, Venezuelan Finance Minister Simon Zerpa and Venezuelan Central Bank President Calixto Ortega, travelled to London to demand that Venezuela be allowed to take the gold back to Venezuela. In January 2019, the Bank of England refused the request. All it said publicly was that it did not comment on customer relationships. However, the real reason was clear.
Richard Gotte, author of a book entitled “Hugo Chavez and the Bolivarian Revolution” stated that the United States-trained and self-proclaimed, United States supported Juan Guaido, an Assembly member, who was never elected – who never faced a presidential election – asked UK that the gold was not returned to the legitimate Maduro Government which United States, the UK and other EU members, out of the blue and without any legal reasons declared illegitimate. What a world! Imagine that some 40 or 50 countries in the world would decide that Donald Trump and Angela Merkel were illegitimately in their high offices. Well, you laugh. It would never happen.
According to Richard Gotte, under pressure from United States, and her own neofascist government, the UK and her central bank didn’t budge. The case was brought on May 14, 2020, to a Court in London. A Venezuela-favorable judgement is however unlikely. The case will then go to the International Court of Justice in The Hague. Will the ICJ have enough backbone to decide against the United States? That remains to be seen. It would be another sign that President Trump’s last trumps are gone.
On yet another account, the Trump Administration has seized all Venezuelan assets in the United States, including in 2018, the refinery and gas station network (CUTCO), in a further attempt to hurt their self-made archenemy, socialist Venezuela. CITCO’s assets in the United States, are estimated at about 8 billion dollars, plus about 30 billion dollars of annual revenues. CITCO covers about 10% of the United States domestic gasoline market. Overall Venezuelan assets confiscated, or more accurately described as stolen, in the United States and overseas are estimated at about 50 to 70 billion dollars.
Raul Gallegos, in his book entitled “Crude Nation” argued that Venezuela’s strength of resistance and self-determination is extraordinary. It is the recipe for success and for overcoming western detraction and influence. This autonomy and Iran’s undisturbed solidarity and sovereign action to help Venezuela with oil tankers despite the United States threats, are signals to the world that the United States’ empire is crumbling.
Or, as Andre Vltchek pointedly says in his article about the brutal police murder of Mr. George Floyd, “The World Cannot Breathe!” Squashed by the U.S. – A Country Built on Genocide and Slavery: Now more and more people can finally see what few of us have been repeating for years: The entire world has its neck squashed by the U.S. boot. The entire world “cannot breathe”! And the entire world has to fight for its right to be able to breathe!”
Raul Gallegos stressed that the worldwide corona-lockdown and the social and economic calamity of uncountable unemployment, famine and misery, unheard of in human history, is unwittingly inciting billions of victims worldwide into an important awakening, of which the masters behind this nonsensical lockdown, behind the power and control thirst – the Gates, Rockefellers, Rothschilds, Et Al, are possibly not aware of.
Raul Gallegos further noted that these unrests will likely gain their own dynamic, as the wave spreads to Europe and possibly also to the Global South. While the generous financiers of “Antifa and Black Lives Matter”, supported by the Ford Foundation and Soros, and other protest organizations may have as a clear objective, namely the outright “Militarization of the West”, the dynamics of an awakened people may potentially derail this diabolical project and ring in a new set of societal values.
Rory Carroll, author of a book entitled “Comandante” stated that, the resisting forces and perseverance of the people of Venezuela, Cuba, Iran, let alone, Russia and China, have magical power. Never mind the physical losses of stolen assets, of economic sanctions, of attempted humiliation by the neoliberal western alliance breaching contracts and agreements at will, i.e. the Iran Nuclear Deal, several disarmament agreements with Russia, and more, the new wave of spiritual and universal consciousness gains, far outpace these losses.
The forces of Light may overcome the Darkness which has engulfed humanity over the last 5,000 years, laying the foundation for a new society with values of equality and peace for a common future for mankind.
Financial reporting proclamation under revision
The financial reporting proclamation is under revision aiming to divide the regulatory and capacity building duties of the Accounting and Auditing Board of Ethiopia (AABE). AABE also introduced a new scheme to achieve the International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) implementation, which was expected to be attained in the last budget year.
Hikmet Abdella, Chair of AABE, told Capital that the proclamation is under revision to form separate entity for the formation of an institute that would be engaged in capacity building and technology development.
She remembered that when the 2014 Financial Reporting Proclamation no. 847/2014 was drafted it divided the regulatory (AABE) but it was annulled on the ratification and included the formation of the institute under the regulatory body.
“The responsibility is very wide and the board of AABE has accepted the separation of the institute,” Eyob Tekalign, State Minister and Board of AABE, said.
Capacity building of accountants and developing accounting software would be the responsibility of the institute, according to the State Minister.
He said that the board has identified one of the gaps for achieving the IFRS implementation is giving more responsibility for AABE. “It will focus on the regulatory and implementation of the IFRS under the new change,” he added.
One of the major challenges for the implementation of IFRS is lack of sufficient professionals particularly chartered accountants that are very limited even compared with peer countries in the region, according to the sector experts.
The institute would have a mission to fill this gap and even expand the chartered accountants. According to Hikmet, in Ethiopia there are about 500 accountants and may be half of them are on other duties or out of the country, “when we see the number of certified chartered accountants in Kenya or Tanzania they are in thousands, which is a big difference even compared with the number of population of Ethiopia.”
In the new change of the implementation of IFRS, AABE will follow another approach and divide companies and entities based on their responsibilities and capacities.
According to Hikmet, the existing proclamation sets out financial reporting frameworks applicable to different reporting entities and mandated AABE with the responsibility of regulating the accountancy profession.
In line with the proclamation, reporting entities were categorized in into such as reporting entities that use full IFRSs by public interest; IFRS for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS) by charities and societies that should be implemented in five years.
Now the Board has approved new time revisions for the implementation with two timeframe. Based on the new scheme public interest enterprises (PIEs) will apply fully by 2023 and others by 2024.
