I need a nap

What our country needs is a benevolent dictator with a clear mission of making Kenya great. He should appoint judges, order hanging of the corrupt and oversee a clean-up of our systems. -- Ndindi Nyoro (Kiharu, Jubilee Party of Kenya)

A key phrase in the oath or affirmation of a member of parliament, to which Mr Nyoro would have subscribed when he was elected as a member of the National Assembly, states,

...that I will obey, respect, uphold, preserve, protect and defend this Constitution of the Republic of Kenya...

The Constitution, which he has sworn or undertaken to obey, respect, uphold, preserve, protect and defend, states in the preamble that the people of Kenya recognise "the aspirations of all Kenyans for a government based on the essential values of human rights, equality, freedom, democracy, social justice ad the rule of law", which may be incongruous with Mr Nyoro's vision of a benevolent dictator who will "order the hanging of the corrupt".

The Constitution also states that "any attempt to establish a government otherwise than in compliance with this Constitution is unlawful, which may not jive too well with Mr Nyoro's fantasies of benevolence from a dictator who "must be given a free hand to make things right on our behalf", completely ignoring the provisions of Article 10 on the values and principles of national governance, of which the rule of law, democracy and participation of the people are very hard to miss.

Mr Nyoro is an apt example of the shocking discovery that very smart people can be incredibly stupid, their stupidity having nothing to do with their successes in academia or business or politics, or all three as is the case with Mr Nyoro. Stupid people are capable of great academic, professional and political success, as has been shown by Boris Johnson, the UK foreign affairs minister and Dr Ben Carson, the US secretary of housing and urban development. These two have taken stupidity to heights never seen before. Mr Nyoro is about to surpass them.

As with those who have recently discovered the virtues of being ruled by a dictator, their motivation for this craving for an iron rod and an iron fist stem from the desire for great material wealth and overt signs of "development" -- superhighways, megadams, speedy railways -- the so-called "real deliverables" against which all benevolent dictators measure themselves. Democratic markers such as social justice, human rights, freedom of choice and freedom of speech are "expensive and clearly not working" as is plain to see. Many parliamentarians from the Jubilation have discovered that they want and need to be ruled by an iron-fisted iron-rod-wielding dictator who will check his worst impulses and instincts through the application of benevolence in pursuit of the national goal of "development".

These parliamentarians have forgotten the core of the message in the oath they swore when they were elected to Parliament. They have betrayed their oaths to obey, respect, uphold, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution. And all because they don't like the way the Opposition has used the Bill of Rights to advance its agenda. In the Jubilation's horrified gaze, "opposition leaders can misuse freedoms and make pronouncements that are likely to cause ruin and chaos is proof that we are disorderly." They fervently would like to get rid of the Opposition leaders. But that would cause even greater chaos and ruin. So, they want their beloved benevolent dictator as a counter-power center. Sometimes this level of stupidity is so overwhelming to contemplate that I need a nap afterwards. I need a nap.