The government, through the Kenya Copyright Board, is reviewing the country’s copyright laws to keep up with the demands of the current online environment, Kenya Copyright Board (KECOBO) Deputy Director Sharon Chahale Wata has said.
Speaking in Siaya town on Tuesday, Wata said the Kenya Copyright Bill (amendment), 2026, seeks to align the protection of intellectual property with the 2010 constitution and ensure that the country’s creatives are properly protected against exploitation.
Wata, who is the Deputy Executive Director in charge of Training and Research, said the bill, which is currently undergoing public participation, provides wide protection on the online environment and seeks to, among other things, expand the mandate of the copyright tribunal.
“The 2010 Constitution specifically provides for protection of intellectual property, and so we also want to keep up with the laws of the land,” she said and urged Kenyans to visit the KECOBO website and give their comments on the bill.
The director said the board was committed to enforcing copyright laws so that Kenyan innovators could get value for their work and urged anybody whose work had been infringed upon to contact the organization for redress.
Addressing the occasion, KECOBO’s Head of Human Resources, Ketty Arucy, challenged Kenyan content creators to observe national values while generating content.
Arucy stressed the need for the content creators to come up with materials that would promote peace and unity instead of content that glorifies social ills.
She further called on the content creators to manage their incomes well and invest wisely.
Siaya County’s Arts and Creative Economy docket representative Faith Otieno hailed the board for its efforts to protect the talents of the youth.
Otieno said that the County Government of Siaya no longer takes the creative economy as a side activity, as it contributes to entrepreneurship, employment, and the promotion of tourism, sports, and arts.
Creatives who attended the occasion described the forum as a godsend, with David Marenya saying that he had previously lost creative artworks to people who registered them outside the country.
“I am a beneficiary of KECOBO. Through the board, I have been able to register 15 copyrights,” said Marenya.
Millicent Atieno and Geoffrey Oduor encouraged young creatives to come out and register their work with KECOBO
By Philip Onyango
