Mombasa County News

It was 6pm when an unusual rainbow-colored boat, made of recycled plastic waste and discarded flip-flops gathered from beaches and roadsides, dropped anchor off the beach at Mtwapa, near Kenya's coastal city of Mombasa.The 9-meter-long dhow, "The Flipflopi", was sailing south along East Africa's coast to raise awareness of the threat plastics pose to the oceans, said chief boat-builder and captain Ali Skanda.Beaches and marine ecosystems have been badly affected by plastics, Skanda said…

Proposals by a local authority to impose new taxes on cargo at Kenya's main port has drawn opposition from the government and shippers, saying it will hike import prices and make the east African trade hub less competitive. The government, keen to see off emerging competition from regional rivals, has been striving to improve efficiency at Mombasa port, the congested gateway that serves Kenya and landlocked states such as South Sudan, Uganda and Rwanda. Customs reforms and other steps have cut transit times and costs, but government officials and shippers say such gains could be undermined if the local authority succeeds in imposing extra taxes using revenue-raising and other powers granted to Kenya's regions under a 2010 constitution.

Kenyan police said on Friday they shot and killed two armed men suspected of planning an attack on a ferry in the port city of Mombasa after one of them tried to hurl a grenade at approaching police. Mombasa and the coastal region has been struck by a series of attacks that have killed dozens of people in recent months. The worst shootings have been on the north coast, but Mombasa has been hit by several bomb attacks. Somalia's al Shabaab Islamist group has claimed many attacks, but the government has blamed some of the north coast raids on local political networks, leaving many Kenyans confused about who is responsible and angry at security failures.