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When he first moved to Japan last year, Rupert Wingfield-Hayes was confounded at every practically every corner by the armies of men tasked with directing pedestrians and cars around Tokyo. The workers with red sticks are at every construction or road-building site, and sometimes they even outnumber the actual workers. Their presence may be more about creating jobs than ensuring safety, but our correspondent wonders whether that’s preventing much needed changes in the Japanese economy.

From Kenya, Richard Hamilton sent us a dispatch looking ahead to next month’s election – and looking back to a trip he took 20 years ago. Last time Kenyans went to the polls, the result was violence. More than 1,000 people were killed. Now with a bold but fragile prosperity taking hold, will the next ballot cause more conflict, or usher in a new peace?

Presenter: Pascale Harter
Producer: Mike Wendling