Top news items in major Kenyan media outlets

The following are news in Kenyan media outlets on Tuesday.

-- President Uhuru Kenyatta is the most popular candidate if elections were held today, a new poll showed Monday.

With a preference of 47 per cent from all Kenyans across 42 counties, President Kenyatta would still win the elections if they were held today, according to the poll by Ipsos Synovate. This figure doubles when it narrows down to political alignments as 87 per cent of his Jubilee party backers confessed they would vote in the incumbent leader. His closest competitor Raila Odinga has the support of 73 percent from his National Super Alliance followers. (The Standard)

-- Examination candidates in private primary and secondary schools have been exempted from paying for the national tests beginning this year. They join their colleagues in public schools who started enjoying the waiver last year in a scheme by the government to ease the financial burden for parents, making education accessible and affordable. (Daily Nation)

-- The High Court has stopped the Communications Authority of Kenya from setting up a system to spy on Kenyans' mobile phones after an activist challenged the decision. The activist argued there is no proper legal framework backing such a development and in the absence of a data protection law, nothing stops anyone from abusing the personal information. (The Star)

-- The negotiations to end the lectures' strike collapsed after the government failed to accept the dons' demands, union officials said Monday. They said the government was not open in the negotiations process and thus learning remained paralyzed at universities. (People Daily)

-- The second batch of trainees in a China funded railway engineering degree scholarship program are set to leave for a Chinese university as Kenya seeks to build its own pool of local experts to run the standard gauge railway once its commissioned. (Business Daily) Endit