You own it all

As a child, everything, and I mean everything, is permitted because responsibility for your acts of omission and commission are borne by those responsible for you. It is rare for a child to be held responsible for horrible things. The child might get a spanking or a scolding, but ultimately, the responsibility for the child's deeds and misdeeds lies with someone else: parents, caregivers, teachers, the lot. The Christian bible says to put away childish things when one becomes a man. That includes putting away childish tantrums.

In the same spirit, Steve Jobs had a rule: the janitor could make excuses for why he did a bad job. The vice president of the company could not; the vice president owned all the mistake of his subordinates. The same is true of presidents of countries. A presidency that is defined by excuses, tantrums and blame-shifting is a failed presidency no matter how many paper achievements its boosters and propagandists can point to.

The rise of the Jubilation was propagated on the promise of the corporatisation of the executive branch of government, with technocrats setting the pace on getting things done. It has not worked out quite as promised. The majority of the technocrats have floundered. Their achievements have been stellar in only one area: the out of control looting of public funds. Many decisions have been serious head-scratchers, inexplicable to an extent that even their proponents have no idea what the decisions were intended to achieve in the first place. 10,000MW of electricity? Check. But why? 10,000km of new tarmac? Check? But why? 66 BRT buses for Nairobi? Check. But why?

Amidst all this, with the metronomic piling on of failure after failure after failure, one thing remains constant: Furious President... Every month, one thing or another will lead to a newspaper headline with the legend: President Furious. And the question is always: Why? The president doesn't get the luxury of saying that his hands are tied, that he is helpless, that he doesn't know what to do. Not in Kenya. Not with a mandate the size of his. What is so difficult about sending packing the laggards in the Cabinet? What is so difficult about saying no to bad ideas, like pink lane marking on highways? At that level, regardless of "he is surrounded by bad advisors" stories, no excuses matter. You own the mistakes of your subordinates. They mess up, you take the blame. If you want it to stop, become, in effect, the janitor, and let someone else shoulder the burden of being the boss of bosses.