Godhood and service.

I'm going to dwell on this service-delivery topic for a while. Have you ever had your balls fettled by a tough-as-nails Administration Police officer? It is not what it looks like on TV. Dear God, it is not!  APs spend a great many hours firing their G3 rifles. This has made their hands as far removed from tender as they could get without turning into concrete slabs. When they pat you down, it is like you are being slapped in your naughty places with cast-iron paddles. It is not cool. At all.

When it comes to "sensitive" public buildings, that is the experience of the members of the public. They may not get a physical pat down, but they certainly get a psychological one. Public buildings are not designed to serve the people; that is why we have Huduma Centres. They are designed to cow them, browbeat them and, when that fails, humiliate them. It is why they never, ever have clean drinking water, clean toilets or comfortable chairs for those seeking audience with the mandarin at the top. (About the drinking water, aren't you just ashamed every time you see bigwigs on a dais being served Dasani or Keringet simply because their water company can't be trusted to pipe clean drinking water to one and all?)

Public buildings are a reflection of the men in charge in those buildings. They are the psychological profile of the man in charge. They are pretty accurate too. When you look at Harambee House, for example, tell me you don't see the paranoia and narcissism it engenders in its ostentatious security arrangements and the humongous, big red-and-blue sign out front that grandiosely declares "Office of the President". When you look at Harambee House Annexe, tell me you don't see the narcissistic preening and they-are-out-to-get-me paranoia behind its seven-hundred-million-shilling refurbishment-cum-security "upgrading". Parliament Buildings has not one, not two, not three but four separate security zones at which every non-VIP is subjected to scrutiny designed to make one feel small, insignificant and an interloper.

A full 747 KLM flight will have a very small population of First Class and Business Class passengers; the majority will be those flying in cattle class. They will do it with stoicism; after all you pay for what you get. At Schiphol, you will marvel at how accommodations are made for those sequestered in cattle class. I know I was floored. More lines for them too. Many, many chairs for them to lounge in. And complete, unfettered access to drinking fountains and suspiciously clean toilets. T1-A, JKIA, in contrast, is another hostile public building where the ones who travel economy are lumped with indignities and humiliations, while those travelling First or Business Class can almost begin to resent the noses pressed so closely and intimately to their nethers. (At the Mombasa airport I was amazed at the filthy two-by-four piece of carpet reserved by KQ for those flying Premier Class. Ukubwa lazima uonekane, sivyo?)

Contrast this with the only CEO I have ever met, though, disappointingly for me, he will never remember me. He runs a major construction company. Its annual returns make Henry Rotich and John Njiraini very, very happy. I am not sure he has a secretary or a security detail, though the contracts he handles are the equivalent of a small dictatorship's GDP. There is little ostentatious fawning when he gets to work at seven in the morning; the pantomime that accompanies my boss's arrival is quite the sight to behold. And his office building is fit for purpose. Oh, and the drinking water is fit for drinking out of the tap.

We have fetishised those who should be providing leadership in service to the people. We have persuaded them that their goal was to attain god-like greatness, not Jesuit-like service to the people. They demonstrate their godhood with ostentation and intricate security measures - for themselves. Whether the people they serve, or the people who serve under them, get what they need is not the point. He has made it. He has his six secretaries, six bodyguards, carpetted corner office suite, private toilet and ex-Nakumatt water dispenser with a massive Keringet bottle. What does he care that his minions make do with no water, filthy toilets and cracking linoleum floors? And to hell with those people who want t bother him with their demands and needs. He is sorted. The rest of you can sort yourselves out as best you can.