eBay founder plans to give thousands of Kenyans free income for 12 years

Pierre Omidyar, the billionaire founder of giant online shopping website eBay, is set to donate a daily income to some 26,000 poor people living in 200 rural villages in Kenya for a period of 12 years.

According to the Business Insider website, Mr. Omidyar will donate the money to the charity GiveDirectly, which is part of the Omidyar Network, as an experiment to see if giving people free money can help alleviate poverty, improve the economic standing of poor people and generally help them lead a better life.

Explaining the importance of the programme, the french-born Iranian-American entrepreneur  said: 'Even though we know that cash transfers in developing countries help reduce poverty and improve outcomes for families, these have not been tested on a long-term basis or with a universal beneficiary pool.'

A Report also has it that the programme has already kicked off in one village and it intends to give selected people Sh75 a day for a period of 12 years.