We recently had Communications Commission of Kenya successfully push the mobile service providers to switch-off all fake phones in Kenya. That was a great initiative to secure our country against terrorism, lawlessness, political violence and other crimes that could be carried through mobile phones. It was not an easy move as we saw the deadline extended more than once due to the technicalities involved but I thank Kenyans for cooperating. However, a lot more needs to be done even on other sectors. We still have a lot more fake products getting into our country such as clothes, batteries, television sets and many others. If we need to keep our market fruitful, less polluted, and more productive, we must get rid of them too.

The big problem is that most of us are not able to tell the difference between a fake product and an original one. The government needs to do more to protect its citizens from being cheated. Standardization and import policies will need to be enhanced to provide tough rules guiding what and how items get to our market. Kenyans need to be assured that the products they’re buying are genuine. Whether it’s software, hardware, music, videos, clothes, food stuffs or any other kind of product it needs to be safe for use in Kenya. We need to love ourselves, embrace the right and follow the necessary policies while obtaining products from countries such as China which is well known to have flocked our market with fake products before. China actually manufacturers genuine products and not all their products are fake. Most electronics used in US including mobile phones are made in China. So we should blame our government for not setting strict rules on imports. Kenyans deserve the best quality products and we should not open our doors to black markets. Our country is not a testing ground for such products. We’re not a dump site but a country that’s looking forward to vision 2030 and bigger dreams.