When one listens to some of the Cabinet Secretaries, one may be mistaken for thinking that new institutions are being established to undertake heretofore functions that have never been performed by Government. In one remarkable screed in the Daily Nation tabloid, there are these astonishing paragraphs:
The Kenya Association of Manufacturers (KAM) in a communique to its members on Friday said it would push for talks with the government regarding its plans to set up the Kenya National Trading Corporation (KNTC).
KNTC will be funded by Afreximbank and will enable the company to guarantee sufficient importation of key commodities including grains, processed edible oils and fertilizers.
Had the various editors who allowed the story to be published checked, they would have discovered that the Kenya National Trading Corporation, which is a State Corporation in the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Livestock Development, was incorporated in 1965. It is mandated to act as a procurement agent for the Government and to participate in the promotion of wholesale and retail trade in order to strengthen the supply chain of essential products. But the Daily Nation tabloid would have you believe, based on statements by the Cabinet Secretary, that a new KNTC is being established and that it will be financed by the African Export-Import Bank (Afriexim Bank). (The less said about the appalling journalistic standards of Kenya's tabloids, the better.)
These kinds of missteps now characterise a large swathe of the Cabinet. The Cabinet Secretary for Health, for example, appears unaware of long-standing public health policies regarding sexual and reproductive health especially among teenagers. The ball had been set rolling with the initial announcements by the Deputy President regarding the re-introduction of the shamba system (Plantation Establishment for Livelihood Improvement Scheme) without taking into account the reasons why the scheme had failed or what the current policies in agriculture and forestry, under two separate ministries, entailed.
The Cabinet Secretary for Interior and national Administration, and his counterpart in the Defence Ministry, jumped the gun regarding the deployment of the Kenya Defence Forces in "bandit-prone areas" to quell "cattle-rustling". The obligation to seek the approval of Parliament appears to have caught them by surprise they worked overtime to find constitutional and legal justifications for why such approval was not required. They persuaded few.
Governing, at the best of times, is difficult. It is doubly so when one is dealing with a fractious political coalition wedded to patronage and graft. But it is nigh on impossible to do when you are faced with drought and famine, violent lawlessness in remote regions, an underperforming economy that is sluggish after sharp pandemic downturns, a demographic bulge that is plagued with chronic underemployment and unemployment, and a balance of payments scenario that has no positive outlook for at least five to ten years. So it needs a deft hand to ensure that the messaging by members of the Cabinet is consistent and somewhat intelligent.
No magic wand will fix the structural defects of government. All one can do is make incremental improvements in the hope that his programmes will survive political challenge, parliamentary scrutiny and public criticism. Scarce funds will have to be allocated and relocated in order to achieve the greatest good for the greatest number in the shortest time possible. In order to achieve this, the national political leadership cannot be competing with each other to make ever more reckless stamens about their dockets, leave alone others' dockets. It is instructive, for example, that they are no longer singing the praises of weekly Cabinet meetings, because the current policy incoherence is an indictment of the worth of those meetings.
The window to make meaningful changes from how the Jubilation governed is fast closing. If the new regime is not careful, it will carry over the worst instincts from the former Government, including a penchant for public relations gimmickry to camouflage poor decision-making and inconsistent implementation of public policies.
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