Page 50 - Ramco JO SACCOStar _Vol 50.indd

OPINION

Kshs. 200 Kenya | Ushs. 5,600 Uganda | Tshs. 3,600 Tanzania required more resources to be allocated, which the management
gladly agreed to.
Issue 46. JANUARY - APRIL 2019
However, to ensure sustainability, Okati and I decided to
LSEAGCACLORsEPFUOSRHMFSOR introduce a commercial component which involved creating
BAOOSNSTESHYEEAANR TSIC-COORUE-NCTAERRDFEIT partnerships that involved selling advertising space in the
SACCO STAR.
WEAITCHC SFTRDOACPUATDORTNER
TAME By 2000 when KUSCCO moved its headquarters to its present
Upper Hill home, SACCO Star had acquired significant editorial
NEWFSOARCTCIOSinvests in I.T to deepen financial inclusion clout and advertisement portfolio that brought insufficient
PMWAlSAauAgnadteCnnreniuCantceegnOydsSySBteAooagtrCuonyerCkgairfOneiobngcaobDonurrivctadeetnshsrcisehmfifoljepioresrussgerwsewnseniiitvteyhhertanToFeatiinwHonagnopnsam.crzieoaodllOeuGtcwutrs’nosewrsthhip revenue to sustainably meet the cost of production.
ISSN 2522-3232
Following the efforts made to popularize the co-operative
In two days, the co-operative movement was hurriedly called movement as a platform for mobilizing savings, many
upon to step in to fill the void left by the commercial banks— Mr cooperatives and SACCOs managed to realize huge saving
Bango and other co-operative movement chief executives were portfolios, gained from the expanded membership courtesy of
summoned to Treasury and told to assemble their assets and the popularization campaign spearheaded by KUSCCO.
troops and ordered to hit the ground with a brief to go to the
rural areas, establish the needs of small savers and offer them Many SACCOs had enough resources and found it easy to buy
viable solutions. advertising space in the SACCO Star, aware that they would reap
reciprocal benefits in the form of marketing their services to
Everywhere Mr Bango and his team of managers went, the attract more members.
SACCO STAR crew of writers and photographers accompanied
them to capture the efforts to popularize KUSCCO services as an SACCOs found it prudent to introduce new products to serve
alternative to the services of the then out-of-reach commercial their members better, and SACCO Star became the ideal platform
banks. to advertise those services.

To cope with the new demand, the SACCO STAR team sought The surge in SACCO Star advertisements caused ripples in
for more manpower in the form of reporters and writers. One the newspaper market. The big boys of the industry like Daily
such writer was Nyang’ori Ohenjo—freshly minted from Egerton Nation and Standard soon realised that there was something
University. He was rugged but efficient. happening at Coffee Plaza—they wanted a piece of the pie and
soon plunged into the advertising market for SACCOs.
In six months, the SACCO Star had been transformed from an in-
house newsletter to the leading newspaper for the co-operative However, some of the SACCOs that developed strong
movement. partnerships with SACCO Star included Kenya Bankers SACCO,
Wanandege SACCO, Harambee SACCO, Wakulima SACCO and
Omondi Okati and I were given leeway by Mr Mudibo to adopt a Mwalimu SACCO.
robust editorial policy that would transform SACCO STAR into the
authoritative media platform for the co-operative movement. Courtesy of their partnership with SACCO Star, these giant
SACCOs managed to expand their common bond and thereby
As a fully-fledged newspaper, with the support of KUSCCO attract a huge number of new members.
management, we started traversing the country to talk to co-
operators, capturing their voices and concerns. Kenya Bankers SACCO and Wanandege SACCO, particularly,
proved to be robust SACCOs at the time, mobilizing huge savings
In doing so, we created a significant demand for SACCO STAR with excellent management systems.
thus expanding its circulation. And with increased demand
and expanded circulation, the cost of production shot up. This And when it was realized that the co-operative movement had
mobilized huge savings that were lying idle in their accounts at
the Cooperative Bank, the commercial banks that had pulled the
rug from small savers suddenly started paying attention—they
started luring the SACCOs to bank with them so that they could
have a share of the huge deposits in the form of savings that the
cooperators had mobilized.

With FOSA, SACCOs started offering quasi-banking services to
their members, especially those in the rural areas, and SACCO
Star is proud to be part of this journey of transformation of the
co-operative movement in Kenya.

48 | SACCO Star Magazine