Let's Emancipate Ourselves from Mental Slavery

I am a very disappointed Kenyan. Disappointed in the sense of no appointment. My resumes are lying in every dustbin in offices around Kenya. I have been applying for almost any job that can 'fall under my jurisdiction'. My CV must be the most read around those swinging-office-chair offices in our beloved nation. Even in places that ask for qualifications that I have the upper hand in, I have received no feedback. I am indeed disappointed. I have gotten to the point of being suicidal. I have applied for a part-time writer, full-time writer, teacher, clerk, name them.

There is one problem that I have been facing as an individual, and I guess many like me face. In a Third World nation like Kenya. The employers would rather employ expatriates and leave their own citizenry suffering with unemployment. That is just one of the things they look for. Those of us who were not lucky enough to be born outside this country then never get the jobs. Another thing is Work Experience. This term sounds to my ears, and to many others, like any of Hitler's speeches to any Jew. Employers in Kenya are just so ridiculous. They probably think that at the University there is a course-unit called Experience. Some employers are so ridiculous as to ask for even more than ten-years' experience. If I had to have ten-years' experience I would be unemployable because I would actually ask for a lot of money from that fellow. Such employers who ask for that experience are not realistic. Where in the hell would you have been to be walking with ten-years' experience? What about those who graduate every year?

This leaves the young graduates with nothing to do except get employed under the worst conditions, since they lack that very important course-unit in their transcript called Experience. These are the same people who end up robbing your money since only experience disqualified them from getting that job. A youth is dangerous enough (see what happened in the Middle East). An educated youth is one you do not want to talk about. I have a proposal for the government: could they please establish an institution where one can go for further studies to do Experience. Everyday that I browse the web, the print media for jobs, I always end up smiling. Because I am always very qualified indeed but the ten-years' experience is what I usually lack. Now, if there is no institution for teaching experience then where in the hell will I get it? The most amusing part of those job adverts is that no matter the post they are employing in you will get the experience part.

In the developed world, fresh graduates do not go through what their counterparts in the developing world go through. This leads to brain drain. The very restless inexperienced job seekers cross the seas to go to those places that do not employ on experience but on qualification. Anyone with the academic papers qualifies for a job, experience is just one way that Third World employers use as an excuse for nepotism. If my uncle got fired in a certain department, I advertise for a job that only he can qualify. Likewise, those who might have applied and do not get that job are always left thinking that may be it was the experience part that let me down, or may be it was this and that.

Another funny thing about employers in the Third World is how they consider your education background, no matter the job. The “minimum qualifications” like they usually call them are nothing close to minimum. A teacher of English and Literature minimum qualifications may be as follows (as posted in the advert):

• Should have lived in a native speaking country.
• At least seven-years' work experience in a similar environment.
• Should speak with at least a neutral accent, if cannot speak with a native one.
• A bachelors degree in education with certificates in ESL or TESOL or TEFL.
• A post-graduate diploma in any other related course will be an added advantage.
• Should have knowledge of the British curriculum.
• etc. etc.

Those are just the “minimum qualifications” FYI. I guess they always call them so because if they had to write the “maximum qualifications” it would fill a whole Third World newspaper page, which costs money. Sometimes I look at those qualifications and wonder if there are people who qualify for those posts. And why the hell should I have knowledge of the British curriculum? I live in the Third World for Chrissakes! A bachelors degree with education is just enough to be a teacher. I do not want to be the most qualified teacher in the world! And what hurts is that they sometimes include this very neo-colonialist post script after the “minimum qualifications”:

If you are a native speaker of English (British, American, Australian, Canadian, White South African) you qualify automatically, as long as you have any relevant certificate in teaching.

When will the Third World “emancipate [them]selves from mental slavery”? When will we learn to love our own? I might be more qualified than that dude in the streets of London who only has a certificate in “any relevant field” but I will not get the job because they prefer foreign. Foreign is good.

I need a job soon. Otherwise I am feeling very suicidal. I spent a fortune on my education and I feel like it was all wasted. Though I have not yet graduated, the graduation ceremony being in November, I feel like I should be employed already!