Journalism, film, and a room to talk.

In early 2025, after almost two years as the BBC's Africa Security Correspondent, Ian Wafula closed that chapter. He had covered conflicts in the DRC, Mozambique and Sudan, and fronted BBC's Focus on Africa. Before that: K24, KTN, and the Africa Fact Checker of the Year title in 2019 for his work on Factfinder.

What bothered him was the gap between the stories being told about Kenya — by institutions, by algorithms, by a handful of loud timelines — and the country people lived in.

"The questions that used to belong to newsrooms and parliaments now live on timelines. We wanted a room where they could be asked out loud, in front of each other."

The first edition opened in July 2025 at Baraza Media Lab, with former Chief Justice David Maraga in the hot seat and protest art from the June 25th demonstrations on the walls. Journalist & podcaster Ciru Muriuki opened the room. A spoken-word piece on police brutality followed. By the time the panel began, the auditorium was full.

The second edition, in September, turned to Kenya's femicide crisis with Njeri wa Migwi of Usikimye. It was produced alongside a red-shoe installation curated by Joy Wanga and Thayu Kilili of Creatives Garage — one shoe for each of the 99 women killed in 99 days at the end of 2024.

Since then the room has taken on Kenya's hustle economy, digital violence, and the civic responsibility of the country's most-followed creators. Every edition is a public document. Every edition is free. Every edition closes with a question the room takes home.

The through-line is simple: 2027 is coming, and Kenya is rewriting its civic life in public. Sauti Sessions exists to slow that conversation down long enough for it to mean something.