Nairobi Senator Jonhson Sakaja has tabled a new Bill before the Senate seeking to promote tech-based innovations and entrepreneurship in the country.
According to the Senator, most start-ups in the country are not recognized and barely receive protection from the government.
Sakaja hopes the bill would help create the link between academia, innovators and global investors who he hopes can receive special tax breaks.
"The biggest challenge with start-ups is that they are not recognized and given protection. We want to create a nexus between academia and investors. We want to give them tax breaks," sats Senator Sakaja.
In the Bill, the Senator proposes the creation of an additional business registration filter that picks tech innovations to facilitate their patenting and ease their pursuit for state support.
Read More
He observes that most brilliant innovations fail to materialize and some collapse due to lack of proper organization from the development stage.
"We want to be able to protect these businesses. If you are not organized, you can't be recognized by the government. Many people have great innovations but they are not patented," says Sakaja.
Former Trade Minister Amb. Phylis Kandie finds Senator Sakaja's move to be timely intervention to job creation efforts post the Covid-19 pandemic.
"It is a timely intervention, especially as a response to post Covid-19 disruption, inevitable digital future labour markets and to attract investors. This should unleash a new wave of innovation, technological skills and more importantly a competitive digital economy," says Wakhungu.
A number of tech-startup owners have however raised red flags on the bill citing lack of involvement. Senator Sakaja called on those seeking to make contributions to the bill to visit his website.
