Wambua Sammy
13 November 2009
opinion
Where positive results had guaranteed it, it would have been in order for President Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga to fly politicians -- using your taxes -- to Mombasa where, it seems they have the best political superglue.
Although it is more slippery than the Michukian liver, the bonding business is both desirable and objectionable. Desirable in that the cabinet may finally see the sense in fighting in peace and getting to do some work, finally. Objectionable in that they didn't have to have it in Mombasa now that the Anglo Leasers are demanding their pound of flesh.
Isn't it possible to bond on the Nyayo National Stadium football pitch in the comfort of white plastic chairs with parliamentary staff providing outside catering? If that's un-VIP what about the KICC plenary hall? More importantly, this bonding thing could backfire badly on you. If these people speak with one voice, it follows that they will eat with one mouth. Very scary.
Fellow citizens, our five-star hotels, national grain reserves, cemeteries and potential oilfields are relatively safe when politicians are backstabbing one another, plotting and counterplotting.
By the look of things, this state of war will not be buried in the pearly beaches of the Indian Ocean: A second machungwa-and-ndizi ordeal, this time round featuring a non-imperial presidency and a prime minister with proper fangs and claws, is in the pipeline, you know. Too bad considering that administrative and constituency border gerrymandering is already throwing pili-pili into the mix.
Any ISO champion will tell you that getting it right in the first instance and making it a standard procedure cuts losses of time and ultimately money. The rectification of avoidable errors is double or even multiple investment without a corresponding output -- in other words, wastage.
Maybe it's time we applied this management technique to fix our messy politics. Agenda 4, the talk in the lips of genuine and pseudo-reformers, is designed to ensure that the 2008 post-election bloodbath doesn't recur. But does it address the real cause of the violence? I say no.
The madness had very little to do with landlessness or unemployment. Certain people messed up with the election and hell broke loose. In dealing with the effect, we are trying to create jobs, plan to distribute land and have dissolved a disgraced electoral commission.
Laudable initiatives -- only that this is what governments are supposed to do, meaning ours has been sleeping on the job. The plain truth is that we have not dealt with the principal cause of political violence -- the knowledge by certain people that they can steal elections, or be used to do so, and get away with it.
It's called impunity, and the only way to minimise it (these things can never be eliminated) is making it disproportionately expensive in relation to the gains. To prevent a civil war in this country, draconian electoral laws must be made and ruthlessly applied.
Any officer, politician or private citizen found guilty of fraudulently altering electoral results should be imprisoned for a minimum of 30 years with no option of a fine.
The big fish at whose behest the fellow would be breaking the law should get 50 years with the possibility of a fine, which he would gleefully consider a business expense, and issue a banker's cheque. This and similar draconian measures are a small price to pay in the interest of democracy, stability and their attendant benefits.
The last time I met him, the affable head of the Privatisation Commission, Mr Solomon Kitungu, advised me to take a certain herbal mixture, after which I became a picture of health. Since then I haven't seen my high school and college-mate.
I will soon look for this fine economist to explain to me why we must sell a chunk of our only sea port, National Bank of Kenya, Consolidated Bank and Kenya Wine Agencies in the name of privatisation. More so, when they are swimming in cash. I thought the structural adjustment thinking was fatally flowed, dead and long buried.
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