Vaṇakkam,
Victoria from Techpoint here,
- Twiga Foods to compensate staff $7,800 for unfair firing
- Nigeria’s taxman wants its cut from content creators
- AWS outage sends the Internet into chaos
Twiga Foods to compensate staff $7,800 for unfair firing
Twiga Foods is in the news again, and not for its bananas or tech play this time. The Kenyan B2B startup has been ordered to pay a former sales rep over KSh 1 million ($7,800) after the court ruled that his dismissal was unfair, per TechCabal. The decision came down virtually on October 9, with Justice Linnet Ndolo declaring that Twiga had no evidence to prove its “poor performance” claims against Maxton Duke Kibira.
Kibira, who joined the company back in 2015, told the court he’d been juggling unrealistic sales targets, forced overtime, and constant transfers. Things hit a low when Twiga allegedly deducted KES 426,000 ($3,298) from his salary, money the company claimed was for “unbanked cash.” The judge didn’t buy it, calling the deductions “unilateral” and unlawful. In short, Twiga was found guilty of punishing him twice: first by docking his pay and then by firing him.
Twiga, of course, said Kibira had been warned repeatedly and that the deductions were tied to unearned bonuses. But the court wasn’t convinced. Justice Ndolo said the company didn’t show a single shred of proof to back its claims or that it even tried to help Kibira improve. In the end, she awarded him six months’ pay plus a refund of the dodgy deductions, a total of KSh 1.026 million, with interest.
This move comes four months after the agritech quietly restructured, setting up a new holding company — internally called “newco” — after acquiring three FMCG distributors. It’s all part of its pivot to an “asset-light” model, which has reportedly cost over 300 employees their jobs.
Twiga’s transformation started after snapping up Jumra in Nairobi, Sojpar in Kisumu, and Raisons in Mombasa, a play to expand beyond fresh produce. Instead of running everything in-house, Twiga now wants to power these distributors with its software while outsourcing most operations. Out of 435 employees, roughly 319 were marked as “leaving.” The biggest hit came to supply chain roles: 267 gone. The new, leaner Twiga might be more efficient on paper, but at what human cost?
Nigeria’s taxman wants its cut from content creators
If you create content in Nigeria or plan to take it seriously next year, this one’s for you. And if your partner, friend, or even your “hater” is dreaming of going full-time into content creation in 2026, you might want to tap them, too. Because starting January 2026, many freelancers and remote workers in Nigeria will officially start paying taxes. Yeah, you read that right.
This is all thanks to the new Nigeria Tax Acts (NTA), which the government rolled out in June 2025. The idea? To widen the tax net and include every kind of earner — from 9–5 folks to remote workers, influencers, and freelancers — in Nigeria’s growing digital economy. Basically, if you make money and you’re in Nigeria, the government wants a slice.
Here’s how it works. The NTA says every resident in Nigeria will now be taxed on their worldwide income. Non-residents, on the other hand, will only be taxed on money earned from Nigeria. But who exactly is a “resident”? If you live here, have a permanent home, strong family or economic ties, or you’ve been physically present in Nigeria for up to 183 days within a year, congrats, you qualify.
In simple terms, if you spent more than half the year in Nigeria, you’re a tax resident. Taiwo Oyedele, Chairman of the Presidential Fiscal Reforms Committee, explained it best: “It means the country where you are tax resident has the first and priority right to collect your income tax.” But before you panic, if you live and work abroad, you’re safe. You don’t owe Nigeria tax on your foreign income.
Now to the juicy part: who actually gets to pay. If you earn ₦800,000 or less a year (after deductions), you’re exempt from paying personal income tax. Everyone else? You’ll pay depending on your earnings — up to 25% for high-income earners making over ₦50 million annually. But whether or not you owe anything, everyone still has to file their annual tax returns. That’s where you report your income and claim deductions or reliefs.
In short, the government wants everyone to declare how much they made, then decide who’s exempt. So, how do you even begin to file your taxes as a freelancer or creator? Don’t stress; Sarah has made it easier for you in her latest for Techpoint Africa here.
AWS outage sends the Internet into chaos
The Internet had one of those “everyone chill, it’s not your Wi-Fi” moments on Monday, October 20. Amazon Web Services (AWS) — yes, the cloud that powers half the Internet — went down for hours, and the ripple effect was wild. From Snapchat to Canva to Fortnite, apps just stopped working. Even Alexa and Prime Video took an unplanned nap.
The trouble started in AWS’s US-East-1 region in Virginia, one of its busiest hubs. A DNS resolution failure, basically a communication breakdown between servers, messed up the DynamoDB API endpoint, and everything hosted in that region started tumbling like dominoes. The irony? AWS is literally designed to prevent this kind of thing.
By mid-morning, Downdetector was lighting up like a Christmas tree. Users couldn’t log in, load pages, or even access Amazon’s own services. AWS engineers rushed in, working on what they called “multiple parallel paths” to fix it. After a few hours, they announced everything was back to normal, though some apps still lagged while the system caught up.
Now, here’s the thing: AWS isn’t just some tech company. It’s the Internet’s invisible engine. From fintech and entertainment to logistics and AI, millions of platforms depend on it. So, when one region breaks down, it’s like pulling the plug on an entire corner of the web.
African startups, thankfully, didn’t feel much of the shockwave. The outage was limited to the US-East-1 region, and as of press time, no major African business has reported downtime. A few Snapchat users in Nigeria said their app misbehaved for a bit, but that’s about it.
Still, if you’re building in Africa and relying on US-based cloud infrastructure, consider this your warning shot. The cloud may be big and fancy, but it’s not bulletproof. When AWS sneezes, the world catches a cold, and next time, Africa might not have its jacket on.
In case you missed it
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What I’m watching
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Opportunities
- SeamlessHR is hiring a Brand Specialist. Apply here.
- PalmPay is recruiting a Talent Development Manager. Apply here.
- Andela is looking for an Advocacy and Event Community Manager. Apply here.
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- TLP Advisory is surveying the listing potential of Nigerian venture-backed businesses on the NGX. Share your insights by completing this survey.
- Bolt is looking for a Senior General Manager in Nigeria and Ghana. Apply here.
- Standard Bank Group is looking for a Virtual Banker, Africa China Banking. Apply here.
- Fraud Analyst at Kuda Technologies. Apply here.
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Have a lovely Tuesday!
Victoria Fakiya for Techpoint Africa
