Monday, December 30, 2013

Parting Shots, 2013

New dawn for Kenya happened this year and with it came new expectations or are we still striving to achieve that has been elusive these past fifty years?
The youngest heads of state, in our history, were elected just as the nation was unwrapping a new constitutional dispensation and with the double offering, the nation started with a heightened sense of optimism. In the past fifty years we have shown disdain and mistrust of our electoral processes and the last one we held was no different. It left nearly half the population feeling that all was not well and I guess that is the way with all competitive scenarios where a winner and loser have to be declared. None the less, we have to work hard and improve some simple systems that let us down- like electronic data transmission. This in a region that prides itself of being the in the vanguard of mobile transactions in the whole world.
When we first raised the national flag fifty years ago we aimed at eradicating poverty, disease and ignorance. As soon as the flag started flapping in the winds of hope, jubilation and expectation, we lapsed back into complacency and learnt to live with these three yokes round our necks. Fifty years down the line, we are still treading on the wine-press with them and other serious ones added onto our necks. We have added, among others; corruption, ethnic mistrust, social imbalance, and generalized ineptitude in affairs of state. This time around our huddles are higher and too close together- we have a different constitutional format with new aspects to be implemented, tested, evaluated, modified, implemented again and so on. The room for error and failure is wide and expansive but the spirit of benevolence which is encompassed by the whole nation militates and mitigates for success. Let us all ride this wave optimism for the sake of us, Kenya.

Needed are whistle blowers and mandatory reporters to keep the powers that be on their toes. The likes of Assange of the wikileaks fame, the gentleman of ‘Transparency International’ of the “Our Turn To Eat” fame, have always come under criticism which most of the times have been wrong. Millions of innocent people have suffered through the years because of unethical, questionable and many times criminal activities by people in power and others placed in positions of public service. Like these whistle-blowers, we need to be bold and balanced and call out our own who go astray. We need to acknowledge that we are the very people who elect the corrupt politicians, we are the the ones who suffer when the politicians only focus on their own selfish needs in parliament- like inflating the government wage bill or meddling with devolution of resources. We have broken our own record (money value) of national intrigues for three administrations in only nine months of Jubilee reign. We need us (whistle blowers) more than ever.

There is need to de-link the day-to-day running of state affairs from the politics of the day. Politicians are contract personnel, contracted only for a period while state administration is an on-going, operation that stops at nothing, be it elections or high water. National development is part of administration and not a politician's project. Contracts entered into for developmental projects ought to be independent of the political powers that be, they ought to be guided by the supreme law of the land and not the whims of some politician who could be as temporary as an electoral period. It is simply disgusting to read of power plays within the administrative corridors between big companies fighting to position themselves for lucrative projects that may have already been assigned to other companies that get sidelined when we change our elected politicians.

A look at the Kenya Railways, failed to manage its business,at a time when it had a near monopoly in the freight haulage sector, as much as this may have been the doing of a different quasi-criminal cartel in a different political outfit, fact remains that this corporation has been abused once and the sudden 're-animation' of a de-facto 'transportation ghost', resurfacing to dip its bonny fingers into the public coffers for a grab of several hundred billions of shillings is simply stinky. A derelict cash-cow that has been re-invented to provide a conduit for more asset-stripping?

So, how come the outfit that ran on generational change, youth recognition and ‘kubadilisha namna ya uongozi’ platform cannot find new blood to fill the state parastatals’ chief officers? They started with hiccups at the get-go when they recycled some die-hard politicians into the supposedly technocratic government ministries and nine months down the line, they are fetching them from retirement. The world over, politicians have the unwritten code of conduct of rewarding loyalty with all sorts of freebies and mostly it’s positions of influence that is dished out. This however doesn’t make it right and it is my humble submission that if they had to do this, then they should have employed some sort ‘sophistication’. We are witnessing a lot of ‘analog-ness’ in a supposedly ‘digital’ outfit. I put it that the group that most needs to be rewarded is the rank and file voter and the only way to reward them is being- or being seen to be- sensitive to their wishes. However difficult it is to please the masses, don’t ignore the wisdom of the masses. Wanjiku and Otonglo just need to be assured that they are being listened to.

The media has been put on the pedestal and found wanting. Though they rank high in the public list of trusted entities, they are still very wanting. They still churn out half investigative and speculative news leaving the consumer to do their own analysis- in these categories, omit ‘Jicho Pevu’ and a few others. Anchors and reporters never seek opinion from ‘experts’ or ‘analysts’ from specific fields but instead fall for the loudest or most ‘outlandish’ by-stander or spectator around for a description of the events, the ignorance of the interviewee notwithstanding. One recently explained how a bus collided with a truck, he had the details up to the point where he had the ‘verbal’ chalk outline of the vehicles involved - ‘lori ikapinduka ikachora saba’…This accident had occurred at an isolated section of the highway and in the dead of the night. And why don’t they read the items in a soft naturally flowing tone, without necessarily having to emphasize a syllable or a word here and there? We would still believe them?

The clergy? Well, these were mostly missing in action.

As we discussed and promulgated the present constitution, the feeling was right and the spirits were high. Kenyans had finally taken the opportunity to own their own destiny. They had finally triumphed in the second liberation. This year ends however, with dark clouds hanging above us, strong hurricane winds blowing in our direction and streaks of lightning lighting the fearful skies. Signs of a people just about to be overrun by phantoms they have created themselves. We are so helpless against our own politicians that they have no motivation whatsoever to consider our plight. We have to grab Kenya back from them. We need to steer our nation in our direction of choosing. We should be holding the steering wheel or the rudder of this vessel Kenya.

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