A Very Modest Proposal to the Government

Kenya is a country in East Africa that has, like many other democracies, faced its hard times. We have had a dictator, Moi; a founding father that was never much appreciated, Kenyatta, and I also hold the same opinion that yes he was a founding father but the very people who made him what he was continued to suffer after he was president. He amassed wealth that you can only imagine. His family is rumoured to own land the equivalent of some provinces in Kenya, and it is not only him but many others. The Mau Mau, who fought for that independence, continued, and still do, to languish in poverty. And we have had a modern day hero, Kibaki. The Kenyan economy has grown significantly under Kibaki's watch. We now boast of having one of the best banks in the world, Equity, which, if you do not know, serves over six million customers making it one of its kind south of the desert. Back when I was still the same size as our goat I never knew what a bank is, and that was the Moi days. Banks were for the filthy rich. Interests charged then were enough to exhaust your money in two days, if you belonged to a background like mine and my whole family tree. Mama told me that it was even prohibited for poor people to go near a bank for they were mistaken to be bank robbers, and yes there were many in those days. Nowadays, everybody owns a ATM card, thanks to Equity. Safaricom's M-Pesa was a thriller, so to say. It thrilled the world coming from a third world country to beat Western Union in terms of transactions. Kenya is literally a paradise, though we are not there yet. The roads that were tarmacked during colonial days and the Kenyatta days served Moi's twenty-four year rule. When Kibaki came in, Kenyans realised that uh! Roads are supposed to be tarmacked! We have overpasses and underpasses that we thought were supposed to exist only in South Africa. All I am saying is that the current government under the watch of the one and only, has made gigantic progress.

But, in the same government, I am made to understand that the Parliament, the Judiciary, and the Executive; form the government. I wonder why the general population, which to me is so vital, is not included. So, this government has some people who continuously eat our money. Then later on they come with excuses, or fake budgets on how they spent that money. What has prompted me to speak my mind is the recent scandal about the Kazi kwa Vijana money. That Swahili phrase stands for an initiative that was started to employ (kazi means employment) the youth (vijana), and “kwa” means “to”. One honourable member, like they like being referred to, though they cannot pronounce “honourable” itself correctly – and I guess they are honourable too in their deeds of stealing Kenyan money. Well, one of those fellows said that they spent 700 or 900 million (I forget the figure, not being used to hearing such money being mentioned, leave alone spent); that they spent that amount to fuel government vehicles that went around the country inspecting the initiative, which I must say was a phantom project. I heard that in the news and I said, Christ!

The reason I was surprised is that I have never heard of fuel/gas costing that much. It means that they imported all the oil in Nigeria. That was too much. And at the time Kenya was experiencing the drought of the century, they were too busy inspecting their “projects”. Sometimes I wish that when they were all in parliament an earthquake sent from heaven hits just that house and they all perish. We would mourn them for real. Condolences from world leaders who are friends of Kenya would flow in and we would have a month of national mourning. Our flags would fly at quarter mast. But the happiest thing about that would be that we would get to elect a new government, in all senses of this term, which we hope would be more responsible. Though I praised Kibaki before, so many scams have come and been let go in his era. I wish he had that charisma of his plus an iron, no, iron is too hard. Aluminium is fine. If he had such a hand and convicted those involved in the scams himself we would be a prosperous country. Africa does not need a democracy like the one practised in Kenya. Kenya is way too democratic. We need an iron fist for other politicians to fear because they are the ones that ruin our great country. If only Kibaki had a little bit of what we see in the first lady, no one would be corrupt.

I am African and so when I tell a story I might “wander” off but it is with intentions. My aim was to give the government a proposal which I am quite sure they will like. When Uhuru Kenyatta was going to read his first budget, he used a VW Passat, which according to the experts consumes less than its Benz counterpart. That was good. Then the budget after that he walked. That was good. The only question that remains is if he still walks around when it is necessary to do so, or if he got rid of his Benzes and bought Passats. By the way you can never meet politicians in Nairobi because they are always ferried in Benzes with deafening sirens, they are always in a hurry to go steal our money whenever the IMF sends some. Actually, my proposal is that the government bans those type of cars in Kenya, except for private individuals who are not in politics, and opens a school of riding where they are taught how to ride bicycles and motorcycles. They can use these to move around Nairobi because ironically, that is just as far as they usually move, even if their constituencies are thousands of miles away. This will be a great favour to our economy because bikes and motorbikes are cheap to maintain, plus they can never spend close to a billion on fuel even if they were transporting our honourable ministers to the moon for they do love exotic tours. This move would also reduce traffic incidents because these bikes would not have sirens. That would mean more peace in our roads where all would be equal. After that Kenya will prosper. Britain has prospered as it has because it had monarchs who were dictatorial. These laid down the foundations for their future. Kenya can do the same.