We are monsters

This is not a fact but a sense of what I believe must have made it easier to turn men into monsters. European "explorers" saw themselves in a romantic light as adventurers off to discover new, savage lands, and to pacify them for King, Queen or Country. Kenya commemorates one such explorer in Malindi: the Vasco Da Gama pillar is proof that the great Portuguese explorer made landfall on Kenya's coast.

Some of those European explorers settled in what would eventually become Kenya. Their descendants are living off the "investments" made by them in land, businesses and the like. But it is in land that the legacy of European settlement and colonialism in Kenya that Kenyans experience the most impact. Some of those settlers took native brides and many of their children are the most ardent supporters of the status quo that prevails in Kenya today over land.

Land defines Kenyans in every way. It is the foundation for Kenyans' most intractable quarrels. It is the basis for political organisation. It is the foundation of the great wealth held by church and church-affiliated organisations. It separates the ordinary Kenyan from his political leaders. It defines success or failure in business. It is the basis for violence between ethnic communities, such as what is happening in the "border" between Meru and Isiolo. Yet any discussion around land simply covers up the fact that much of it is held by settlers' descendants and that their apologists have every interest in keeping the discussion from exploring what benefits may be had if this land is redistributed among the landless and the land hungry.

There are Kenyans who have murdered fellow Kenyans because of land, sometimes in political quarrels over which they had no control, sometimes because it was a vital part in their business successes and ;sometimes because they were keeping a family tradition alive of murdering native Kenyans for their land. The beneficiaries of [colonial land policies include church and church-affiliated organisations; after all, the Catholic Church in Kenya or the Anglican Church would not be such substantial landowners if it wasn't for the favourable land policies of the colonial government towards their land ownership at the expense of native Kenyans.

Since Independence, land has been the constant element in all our problems. It has been the weapon that the post-colonial colonialist apologists have used to divide and rule us. It has been used to entice us to feats of great cruelty. Yet it remains cruelly misunderstood even by the neo-colonialists among us. This misunderstanding means that it is easy to misdirect Kenyans to concentrating on everything else other than land in understanding why their country remains underdeveloped, fifty years after independence whereas other similar countries are powering ahead. We are monsters because we do not understand our land history and we will remain monsters unless we do.

Corruption: par for the course

Is Kenya in a crisis? To hear the government's mouthpieces, the country is not in crisis. To hear the sour grapes of the Minority Party, the economy is in the shitter and the tourists will not visit. The facts, however, are mixed. The cash crisis facing the government is based on statistics that are heavily contested by both sides. But to my mind, the cash crisis is not an existential one; while it will make life more difficult for more Kenyans, it is not a sufficient enough reason to say that the country is in a crisis. Kenyans have, after all, always faced tough economic times, especially when t comes to accessing credit from finance institutions.

Some bishops of the Church of Rome suggest that the political talk is a grave risk. They forget that poisonous political talk is a staple of Kenya's particular brand of multiparty politics. Since 1990, the politics of Kenya has been poisoned with ethnic hatred fomented on all sides and, during elections, turned into ethnicised violence by one against the other. 2007/2008 witnessed what could happen when poisonous political talk was taken too far, but it only differed in degree from the ;elections violence of 1992 and 1997.

The fundamentals of Kenya remain as they always have. Political corruption might appear to be rampant, but it is no different from that which prevailed during the KANU era or the Anglo-Leasing era. Public tenders continue to be awarded to well-connected Kenyans; tax receipts continue to fluctuate between good and catastrophic; youth unemployment remains high; industrial action, especially in the public sector, remains common; political "realignment" remains a fact of multipartyism. There may be a new government in power, relatively speaking, but the situation n Kenya has not changed all that much. Kenya is not in crisis; Kenya goes about its affairs as it has always done.

What is new, though, is the total lack of cohesion among the opposition parties, whether they are represented in parliament or in the NGO sector. The ruling coalition has somehow managed to encourage opposition in many diverse areas, splitting the united opposition into disjointed, disparate bands without a common purpose, a common narrative or a common leader. This, I believe, has created the impression that Kenya is in a crisis because different voices are complaining about different things at the same time.

The only true crisis in Kenya is the one which has persisted for decades: corruption. No matter how much distracting takes place - online and off - the only true crisis remains that of the corruption that engulfs the public sector. It colours everything, from the crisis in education to the crisis in healthcare to the crisis in development to the crisis in transport to the cash crisis in government and so on and so forth. Without the existence of public officials with their hands in the public cookie jar, the so-called crises in Kenya would not exist. The lip service paid to eradicating corruption is being exposed, every day, for the empty talk of the unimaginative.

Few Kenyans are convinced that corruption can be reduced or eradicated. Most Kenyans, especially most Kenyans employed in white collar jobs, wish they were in the same position as Cabinet Secretaries, Principal Secretaries or heads of procurement. Many of them wish to be appointed to boards of parastatals or as the parastatals' CEOs. Few of them have faith any longer n the anti-corruption strategy of their government and have come to the rational conclusion that sooner or later, their time to eat must come too and they would be fools not to do as those who have gone before them have done.

It is now acceptable in polite company to flaunt ill-gotten wealth, to boast of connections in government and to ignore the pain and suffering wrought by corrupt public officials. After all, those in pain, suffering from depredation, have no one to blame but themselves for not being hardworking enough to amass the fabulous wealth it is now popular to flaunt. If you do not own a Lamborghini or a Ferrari or a mansion in Karen or Kitisuru or a holiday home in Malindi, it is your fault because you do not have the balls to take chances when they present themselves.

Kenyans are quite tolerant, once you ignore their political intolerance or their religious hypocrisies, and their tolerance has been stretched to the limit. The hope that this tolerance will be stretched forever is the only thing that keeps the graft gravy train running. Those in power, those stealing from Kenyans, hope that Kenyans will do absolutely nothing about the graft because Kenyans want inn on the graft. They may be right. After all, for Kenyans used to getting robbed blind by their own religious leaders in the name of God, being robbed by their political and business leaders is just par for the course.

The army and civilian works

An army (from Latin arma "arms, weapons" via Old French armée, "armed" (feminine)) is a fighting force that fights primarily on land. ~ Wikipedia

Armies are usually characterised by their discipline, enforced through their hierarchies and the troops' obedience of the chain of command. Their distinct nature usually attracts them to the performance of non-core functions, such as when they are called out during national disasters such as earthquakes or floods. The manner in which they carry out civilian operations during periods of emergency usually commend them to politicians for use in other civilian roles, such as road construction and the like.

These, it must be remembered, are not the core roles of the army. The core role of the army is as a fighting force. The reason for the discipline and organisation of an army is to fight. The civilian works they engage in are temporary, meant to ensure that the skills the army possesses do not atrophy and can be applied in real-world situations without actually having to go to war. Thus, it is fit and proper to employ the army sometimes in times of civil emergency, but not all of the time.

In Kenya, because of the corrupted and atrophied civilian institutions, there are those who suggest that the army should be incorporated fully in civilian matters. That would be a mistake. The army is disciplined and has received accolades when it has participated in UN peace-keeping missions or assisted the civilian leadership during natural disasters. But when it has participated, or indeed become the principal institution, in policing, the army has not been well received. It has been hated for that.

The history of the army in policing operations has been abysmal. The Shifta War, the Wagalla Massacre, the West Pokot pacification and the Mt Elgon anti-SLDF operation come to mind; the army was accused of human rights violations that have never ever been resolved. Therefore, there must be a balance between when the army should be called out to perform civilian functions and when it should not, the balance being tipped towards the latter.

As a fighting force, the army should be able to operate under all conditions. Natural disasters give the army an opportunity to put its training to practical use. Therefore, by all means let the army repair roads and bridges after a landslide or a flood; but do not turn the army into a road-builder or constructor of bridges because it will do so without disobeying the civilian leadership. That might blunt the army's fighting preparedness, and blunt it discipline. Especially in Kenya where infrastructure projects are riddled with corruption, engaging the army as the principle contractor could corrupt its institutions and make it worthless as a fighting force.

The solution to infrastructure development is not more army discipline but better designs of the projects themselves to reduce waste, delay, corruption and cost. Since the construction of the largely useless Turkwell Gorge Dam, major civilian infrastructure projects have gotten bigger and more corrupt, making billionaires where none existed because of the corruption. JM Kariuki's retort about ten millionaires and ten million poor people has become true in ways that he couldn't predict, largely because of the corruption in public infrastructure problems. This is not the cesspool to drop the army into.

Army chiefs Kianga and Tonje espoused the best qualities of the army; I hope that General Mwathethe will restore the army's reputation that has somewhat been tarnished under General Karangi's tenure. The image of soldiers engaged in corrupt acts should be erased. Keeping it out of general road construction or bridge-building will be a very good first step. Whether this will happen depends on how strong-willed General Mwathethe will be in the face of political demands from men and women who have never served in uniform.

Nothing to do with God

One of the most fascinating things about the average - what a loaded word: average - US citizen is how they can be a mix of exceptional intelligence and incredible ignorance at the same time. The world mocked George W Bush for his seeming buffoonish nature; yet, Bush 43 was a twice-elected President of the United States and a twice-elected governor of the State of Texas, one of the most competitive political positions in the United States. George W may have taken the US to war on false pretences, but anyone who still believes that Dubya was a fool is living in a fool's paradise.

It is how someone can build a billion-dollar real estate empire and still behave as if he has never been outside of his native New York or pioneer cutting edge neurosurgery while still believing that the Great Pyramids of Giza are the biblical grain storage silos built by Joseph for the Pharaoh when the Pharaoh had a dream-vision about seven years of famine. It is how a Yale and Harvard graduate can spout nonsense about the national debt or the national deficit when trying to persuade his fellow senators that it is a good thing if the federal government does not function at all until his juvenile demands are met, the equivalent of "I will hold my breath until you do as I say" gambit.

For a rich and powerful nation, full of intelligent and innovative people, the United States has a surprisingly large number of people with disturbing quirks seeking high public office - and winning. But closer home, we have never been surprised at the large number of people with disturbing quirks who have sought and won high public office. This is entirely normal to us. It is why the promotion of voodoo economics, fuzzy maths, scientific arguments of doubtful merit, misogynistic justifications for discrimination and plain ignorance as righteousness do not arouse the displeasure of the people, and why liars, charlatans, murderers, thieves and philanderers receive our adulation and votes.

Some have been asking, in jest I am sure, what we did to God to deserve the government that we have; I believe that they are asking the wrong question. Our fate, even for those of faith amongst us, lies not in the hands of an Almighty Deity, but in ours. We may pay homage to "Almighty God" in the preamble to our constitution - echoing the US Declaration of Independence - but so far as I can recall, Almighty God has never been on a ballot, has never been an accounting officer in the Government of Kenya, nor has He ever deigned it necessary to have a face-to-heart-to-heart with the peoples of Kenya. How smart people acknowledged an imaginary friend in the constitution defies logic.

It is this cop out, that events are beyond our control, that events are in the hands of an unknowable all-powerful supreme being, that we are at the mercy of "fate", that leads the men and women we elect and appoint to govern our nation to lead hypocritical prayer breakfasts or rallies to solve very human problems, and to rely on hope and faith to straighten out our public finances. When these fail, they lie and distort the truth to hide the true state of affairs from us. And when that fails, they accuse us of being saboteurs and seditionists out to foment trouble for the rest of the country, slandering the country in the foreign press, being in the pay of foreign powers, and refusing to believe in the power of our absolute exceptionalism. I other words they want us to follow them into their land of fantasy, ignore the facts that stare us in the face, and hope for the best. I don't know which is more tragic: that they will not admit to being lost or that they think we haven't noticed.

This is the Information Age in which the digital tools at our fingertips - literally at our fingertips - have proven to be truly inconvenient for the men and women who govern us. Errors are committed every now and then, but by and large we are better informed than we were a decade ago. The age of the Official Secrets Act is coming to a close and there is little they can hide from us; because of the inherent iniquities and inequities of their arrangements, someone in their inner or outer circles is always going to be disgruntled and malcontented and that which they try to hide will be revealed by the disgruntled and malcontented. The digital media will guarantee that these revelations will travel far and wide. 

The digital tools at our disposal today are the equivalent of the sunlight banishing the shadows of secrecy. They can try and tell us - lie to us - that the revelations about the expenses at the Ministry of Devolution and Planning were accidental; they shouldn't expect us to believe them. This is not the United States and we are not the instinctively anti-information Ben Carson, Donald Trump or Ted Cruz. One day soon our rage will overcome our fear and then they will truly fear us.

The wrong message

I will buy the cruel accusation that the Ministry of Devolution, in its wisdom - after all, "youth" - paid for a twenty-five thousand shillings condom dispenser. The million-shilling TV and the piano too aren't as outlandish you would think. I draw the line at the sex toys. It is the sex toys that almost persuades me that there is a cruel attempt to smear the Ministry, its Cabinet Secretary and its staff with mud. It is an indictment of the Jubilee Way that there was hesitation before the fierce defenders of the Cabinet Secretary and her people deigned to come to her defense - a slight hesitation, but hesitation nonetheless.

I though the establishment of the PSCU was meant to drive the messaging agenda of the State, not react to scurrilous accusations about pianos, prophylactic dispensers or sex toys. That experiment, sadly, has run its course. The PSCU has consistently been late to the party, putting their foot in it whenever they got the chance, never missing an opportunity to muck things up right royally. It might be the attempt to shoe-horn a political operation into the staid corridors of the Office of the President's Protocol Department, where careers go to die, that has made the PSCU experiment the nightmare it has become. The Devolution Ministry fiasco is the PSCU at its absolute incompetent worst.

The reason why everyone reviled the Grand Coalition Cabinet was because of the poisoned air engendered by the crass buffoonish behavior of the Principal's acolytes, hangers-on and armies of ass-kissing minions. We were done with, so we thought; the Jubilee arrangement was built on solid foundations. After all, these principals have had a long and intimate relationship that goes back to when the one was a gauche politician picked out from the obscurity of staggering wealth to stand for election and the other was a hard-charging assistant minister making a name for himself in Baba Moi's kleptocracy. They stood ana kwa ana in 2002 when presidential ambitions lay shattered in the aftermath of the NARC landslide.

The PSCU was the wool we would pull over the people's eyes, showing them nothing about the accommodations and compromises that make any coalition a fraught affair, and in this coalition the accommodations and compromises have come at a great cost for one than for the other. This has made all the PSCU attempts to shape the narrative come a cropper, especially in the online sphere. While most of the retweet-happy crowd simply doesn't care for the facts, so long as the facts are ex, there is a growing coalition of the ones described as woke, and they are no longer taking things at face value.

Every government, no matter how popular, eventually loses legitimacy. This ones has come rather fast. The efforts to control the narrative will fail because there are simply to many "condom dispenser" stories coming out of its ministries for he narrative to be controllable. The least they can hope for is that the disappointment does not turn into anger and a resolute decision to look for leadership elsewhere, including, horror of horrors, in the shockingly inept opposition. The Jubilee has an adept online operation; it has a completely inept political messaging operation. If you are still in doubt, watch the Cabinet Secretary deny for the last time that she has no hand, no hand at all, in the purchases of condom dispensers.

Before it is too late

First, you people, she does not approve every single price list cooked up by those people in procurement. Second, there's a PS with the most massive chip on his shoulder feeling a little put out that it is his sticky fingers all over the financial system of the Ministry. Third, you people have been on her case ever since Dr Nelson Githinji became NYS head-honcho, got a 20 billion shillings rise in appropriations, expanded its recruitment and became the hottest political football since Raila Odinga set up the Efficiency Monitoring Unit. Finally, what is it with you people and this anti-feminist obsession? Don't you want a smart, talented and capable woman to prosper in what is very much a man's world?

That is the sum and substance of the defence. Pity. It refuses to acknowledge the sheer politics of it all. It is not every day that a ministry gets the personal protection of the head of government; when it does, everyone knows that sink or swim, that ministry is the flagship ministry and the fortunes of the government will be built or dashed by its success or failure. But that is not the case with the Ministry of Devolution and Planning.

Jubilee seems to have several flagship programmes underway at the same time: the SGR, the Galana Irrigation Scheme; LAPSSET; Huduma Centres; Safaricom surveillance; the Roads Annuity Scheme; an expanded NYS. There is no rhyme or reason to what constitutes a flagship project anymore. Mwai Kibaki had three that stood out: free primary education; roads; Vision 2013. We are yet, almost three years in, to find out what project coheres the Jubilee administration.

What has been certain is that it has lurched from one catastrophe to another, most of the catastrophes traced back to Cabinet Secretaries and their praise-singing minions. Security became a byword for incompetence under a much unloved Cabinet Secretary before the arrival of the less gaffe-riddled Nkaissery. Much has improved since. It worked once; perhaps when it comes to the stewardship of the economy and the elimination of grand graft from key ministries, a new team will make the difference.

No one wants to admit that they made a mistake. But that is a luxury a head of government can ill-afford. She may be competent, capable and intelligent. She may have spearheaded the successful transformation of moribund programmes or departments. But any hope that the head of state will ride out the storms this Cabinet Secretary has wrought are overly optimistic. Mwai Kibaki dumped Mwiraria, an ally and  competent finance minister. In that is a lesson for this regime. It is unclear whether this lesson will be learnt before it is too late.

Uncivil tongue

If a person behaves, in my opinion, foolishly, stupidly, idiotically or like an imbecile or a moron, and I say so to his face, if he feels sufficiently aggrieved by my characaterisation of his behaviour, he should sue me for damages. But if I characterise him and his community as fools, stupid, idiots, morons or imbeciles, and declare that it is those characteristics that are to blame for whatever ails his community or that they should be grounds to commit some extreme atrocity against them, then the full force of the Government of Kenya should be brought to bear against me.

Kenya, luckily, is not the land of the free nor the home of the brave, and the First Amendment does not apply here. It's text reads, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances." Johnson Muthama, George Aladwa, William Kabogo and Moses Kuria have recently helped concentrate the minds of Kenyans on what it means to insult and use abusive language against an individual or commit hate speech against an ethnic community.

Right or wrong, the political debate on ethnicity has revolved around three major ethnic groups; all others have received minor billing. It is these three, represented by the senior-most politicians in Kenya, whose fortunes are shaped by how they react to slurs directed at the these senior-most politicians. Moses Kuria set the tone, Johnson Muthama managed to top him, George Aladwa simply added fuel to a blazing bonfire and William Kabogo simply carried on from there. What was not in dispute is that tens of thousands of Kenyans were proud in the manner these four conducted themselves; "He defended us," they argued, "against that uncivilised man." Replace "uncivilised" with any other epithet and you will get a sense of what people have been programmed to think.

Muthama, et al, starkly expose the futility of trying to police what our leaders, including political leaders, say when the vast majority of the people see nothing illegitimate in our leaders' speeches. It is a most juvenile attitude towards speech and its impacts, but it is what we have. Many Kenyans seem to miss their high school days when they could speculate in salacious detail about the sexual proclivities of leaders among their peer groups. Messrs Kuria and Muthama are the apotheosis of this phenomenon, capturing the popular, but crass imaginations, of their core constituents, who will not sanction them for their intemperate speech. The National Police Service, the National Cohesion and Integration Commission, and the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions will have the devil of a time sustaining convictions that will receive the broad support of these constituencies.

For one, political institutions in Kenya, including the official organs of the State, have done very little to restore the boundaries of law and custom that defined them before they were bulldozed during the latter years of the first Kenyatta regime. Especially in the political party, there are few rules or regulations that confine political leaders withing acceptable social or moral boundaries. This paucity of control contributes to the sense of invincibility that engenders the loose and polarising speech among the politicians, and the support for such speech from their constituents. Because of that, when it comes to this kind of speech, the National Police, the NCIC and the DPP will be seen as illegitimate interlopers out to cut short the ambitions of an entire ethnic community the national stage.

Don't rock the Eurobond Boat

Article 10 prescribes the national values and principles of governance and how they bind public officials. Sub-Article (2)(c) states that (The national values and principles of governance include) good governance, integrity, transparency and accountability.

Integrity connotes honesty, strong morl values and moral uprightness. Transparency means that we have the right and the means to examine the process of decision making by our government. Accountability, finally, implies that when a decision is made and an act or omission done in pursuit of that decision, someone must be responsible for the decision, the act or the omission.

When it comes to the public finances of Kenya, there is a web of public institutions that have a lot to answer for: the National Treasury; Parliament; the Central Bank; the Kenya Revenue Authority; the Auditor-General; and the Controller of Budget. None of them has been able to adequately explain what happened when Kenya sold bonds in Europe in 2014. Despite all attempts to the contrary, we have been unable to ascertain for sure how much money was borrowed, for what that money was borrowed, whether it was ever employed for what it was borrowed, or who handled it and for how long.

The Cabinet Secretary, the Governor, the Commissioner-General, the Auditor-General, the Controller of Budget and the Chairpersons of parliamentary Finance committees have refused to take responsibility for providing the answers; instead, each institution has busily distance itself from the matter. Parliament has singularly failed to hold the Cabinet Secretary's and Governor's feet to the fire; was the money deposited in an account controlled by the Central Bank or wasn't it? Did the National Treasury use the money for "general budget support" or for "infrastructure?" We don know the answers to these or any other germane questions because Parliament has become as transparent as mud. It will nt be holding any member of the Executive to account over the Eurobond.

That does not absolve the Cabinet Secretary or the Governor. Neither has the liberty to treat the public finance of Kenya in such a cavalier manner. The billions borrowed abroad must e paid back, just as the billions borrowed before have been paid back. Promises were made regarding the fiscal effect of the borrowed billions by the Cabinet Secretary and the Presidency. None of those promises came to pass. Little of the money went to "infrastructure" and the amount that was invested in "general budgetary support" remains a mystery to this day. The cost of credit for the small business borrower or the individual has shot up to the mid-twenties and the cost of living has skyrocketed. The Eurobond has proven more trouble than it was worth.

At the heart of the confusion is the dispiriting idea that none of the men and women at the centre of the Eurobond saga care too much for the values or principles of Article 10. Nothing they have done since the $2.75 billion was borrowed demonstrates their commitment to the public good in any way. On that ground alone, they should all resign and for the misleading statements they have published about the Eurobond, they should all be prosecuted. But they won't. After all, the loudest whingers among us over this Eurobond saga, have no intention of rocking the boat too much that we don not get a piece of the action, right?

Sheer stupidity

I thought I was done. Evidently I wasn't.

There something wimp-ish about this county government. They have a word for it in California. It's not a particularly nice one, but it sums up this county's government rather tetchily. When it comes to its particular forms of failure, this county fails particularly spectacularly at being a government. Even in the middle of an Aladwa, Majiwa, Wathika or Magic Mike mayorship, this city recognised that it lived or died by how well the CBD treated people.

This county government simply doesn't get it. I don't know if Aladwa et al had a cavalcade that drove them, sirens blaring, bodyguards gun-toting, from place to place in the busy service of the government, but I do know that I do not remember them being this stupidly tone deaf about things that make a CBD a CBD.

I don't know what bargain this county government has struck with the 2 watts in the Ministry of Interior, but the fact that pedestrians are becoming quite adept at dodging nduthis, recklessly driven taxicabs and even more recklessly hauled crates of Coca-cola because pavements have become "security zones" leads me to conclude that the bargain must be that the county government will lower its pants and bend over, and the Interior Ministry will decide whether or not to use KY jelly. It stinks, this arrangement, because it privileges the protection gates and fences over the safety of people who contribute to the vibrancy of this city.

The big brains over at City Hall have lost my respect and my vote. Pretty soon they will lose my desire to help by paying my rates. Machakos may not be Valhalla, but it is a damn sight better for trying to sort out the little people first. Nairobi just bullies and bullies and bullies, and it does so in concert with the jackbooted 2 watts in Harambee House.  No wonder even its head spends more time overseas or in Luo Nyanza; who would want to look over a catastrophic failure of leadership like his? Who?

Have you been to Nakuru lately? It isn't Seattle, but that place is coming up and coming up fast. But the places that intellectuals in charge (Machakos is not an anomaly; anyone who thinks he is an intellectual needs a very big dictionary) have turned out to be shit. Some intellectual fought for a fifty million shilling "city" gate. Fifty million! I know we have a tendency towards the grandiose, but that is utterly stupid. It pales in significance, though, to another tower of intellect who spent a hundred thousand apiece on mudwalled houses that he didn't even have the courtesy to have whitewashed when he went to "officially" inaugurate them.

But my guy can count among his signature accomplishments the gate he "unveiled" at the KICC a few days before the Barack arrived. How can anyone so smart makes such stupid unforced errors? And have you seen that thing? It is one of the ugliest things you will ever encounter. It feels as if the devil and Omar El Bashir decided to commission Robert Mugabe to build something for the late Mobutu Sese-Seko. That thing is hideous. And there are official photos of my guy inaugurating this. I hope those photos follow him to his grave.

I have given up on him ever sorting out the garbage that never quite seems to get collected. I have given up on him ever sorting out the scofflaws of the matatu "industry." I have given up that he will ever mark our roads properly. I don't think he has a clue about what to do with the traffic lights. But, Lord forguive me, this man has been a frequent visitor to world capitals. Even the two-bit third world ones have one thing in common: you don't, ever, force pedestrians onto busy roads. Ever. Not even to keep a government fence or gate safe. That is just sheer stupidity. But he has. What did we do to our gods to deserve him?

It's been too long.

It's been a while since I picked on him. Here goes.

What do they teach you people in management grad school? How to piss of your staff? How to piss off your key "stakeholders"? I mean, why go through the headache of a headache to get a PhD, an MBA or two and a couple of bachelor degrees and then operate as if you you phoned in all those credentials from the hostel or something? I really don't get it.

I am a frequent user of Jogoo Road - which all regular users of Jogoo Road hate because it has Umoinner and Embasava and Forward Travellers and Mwamba and Pinpoint and no road markings - and I am developing a special hatred for the person who came up with the idea to install constantly-flashing speed cameras. I think it He Who Should Be Ashamed, but I am not sure; his serikali is so opaque.

Anyway, in Washington, D.C., and those kinds of places, speeding is frowned on by city hall types because it is city hall types who hire policemen who enforce the Highway Code. Nairobi, is not Washington. He Who Should Be Ashamed does not have a police force. So exactly how was he going to go chasing after speeders, even if the roads are his, without a police force? We already know that the traffic lights and traffic cameras are not synchronised. We remain sceptical about the "central control room" where all the camera feeds are recorded, stored and analysed.

What annoys me is that these speed cameras with their flashing lights are always flashing, whether traffic is proceeding at a crawl or an Umoinner is trying to qualify for the 2015 Abu Dhabi Formula 1 Grand Prix. Are these cameras and the their flashes calibrated to capture cars traveling at 1 kmph? Seems like it. Which is just incredibly stupid. Does this government want Nairobi to become a walking city or something?

I don't know what kind of traffic strategy the big brains of this county government have, but whatever it is, it isn't working. Matatus are permanently parked at junctions, roundabouts, stages, bus stops, bus termini, everywhere. Roads remain spectacularly unmarked. County askaris remain woefully undertrained, uncouth, violent, vicious, sweat-stinking and hilariously incompetent. And all the while those ridiculous speed cameras keep on flashing. I wonder how many MBAs it takes to get things this fouled up.

Moral regeneration? Fix the family.

I

When I was ten, against my better judgment, I accepted my fathers diktat and took catechism at my church. I hated the catechism tutor. She was a joyless scold who snapped every time we failed to memorise one of her pet bible verses. It was one of the most dispiriting, irreligious experiences of my life. It is a wonder I did not up and quit the faith there and then. But despite that experience, I was inculcated with certain values and mores that I still hold fast to, despite my natural rebellious inclination: thrift, honesty, hard work, fidelity, humility, love and patience.

I don't think I ever pinched my mother's coins after I was baptised, with Uncle "Casper" standing as my godfather. I always made a point of telling her - after the fact, of course - that I had taken her coins and indulged myself in some those tooth-rotting candies that cost ten cents. She appreciated my honesty so much that instead of five strokes of the cane, she only gave me four.

The germane part of this personal history is that some of the values I hold fast to were instilled in me by my parents; some others by my church - Sunday school, really - and still some others by the frightening triumvirate of Mrs Mboya, Mrs Ogolla and Ms Jane at my school. It is possible that I am not holding fast enough to them, but even if my bosses were to launch a full-fledged forensic lifestyle audit, they would indict me for sure for not fiddling with my expense account, for not fudging my performance appraisal reports and definitely, for not claiming mileage - never mind I am yet to become a proud member of the motoring classes.

When I was ten, these institutions functioned to fashion me into a somewhat respected and valued member of my community. I will ignore the troubling manner in which some of my pastors fawned over Baba Moi whenever he attended service with us; when Unzele Methusellah Unzele preached, it reaffirmed everything I thought my church should be: welcoming, kind, accommodation, honest and true. 

Ms Jane is the only one who truly terrified me; Mrs Mboya only when she was at the end of her tether because of a natural mulishness regarding certain requirements; Mrs Ogolla the least of all because her massive hands were so spongy that when she slapped you on your back she didn't so much as cause you pain as drive the wind from your lungs. I loved them dearly and I miss the many moments when they taught me valuable life lessons.

II

Nowadays, the church - not mine, though - is not so much a market as a tenderpreneur's brothel with everyone, from the Bishop to the pickpocket lurking in the second-to-last pew, with their hand in someone's pocket. I will resist this terrible urge to demonstrate how that indictment mirrors the "prayer" rallies that have confirmed the sullied nature of the church. Schools have become dens of violence and vice, teachers too overworked to do for children what Mrs Ogolla, Mrs Mboya and Ms Jane did for me.

But it's the changes in the family and home that have had the most profound effect on an individual's moral compass. Most two-parent families are two-income families, with both parents working outside the home. They must compete against other two-parent families. Their children see them only briefly in the morning or in the evening; weekends and family holidays do not seem to make up for this. Unless parents are willing to part with a large share of their double-income, the chances that they will employ a qualified helper who, if not exactly love their children, will not resent them enough to sabotage their moral growth are slim. Couple with unsupervised hours in front of one kind of screen or another from which "entertainment" of doubtful value will be blasted at them, it is a wonder that not more children are getting arrested in bars or nightclubs.

If you want to regenerate the moral values of this nation, fix the family. Make it easier for parents to spend quality time with their children and in the institutions that their children come into contact with on a regular basis: the church and the school. We can attempt to censor the fare available to children, but if the parents are unavailable to their children to remind them what is right and what is not and to patiently explain the difference between the two, all is lost. Even in single-parent homes, the parent must have the opportunity to raise their child. But if you force parents into moral compromises on even mundane matters of little fiscal consequence, unless they have an iron constitution, sooner or later they will inculcate the art of moral relativism and their children will have the moral elasticity of Lucifer. Moral regeneration? Fix the family, fix the nation.

Tom Cruise Dance as Les Grossman in Tropic Thunder - Extended - Music: G...

Funniest shit I ever saw.

A $1.84b lesson

The CEO of the Volkswagen Group resigned recently after it was demonstrably proven that his company had lied for years about the emissions' tests of the company's cars. Then Volkwagen began a process of recalling cars from North America, Europe and other key markets such as India, Japan and Brazil that had been sold on the basis of those emissions' tests. That may be as many as 11 million cars recalled by the car maker. It is no surprise that it lost 1.84 billion dollars in its third financial quarter.

We still need to know how and why a venerable German manufacturer lied and cheated on something that would eventually be discovered. But once the scandal was exposed, even if he was pushed, the CEO resigned in disgrace. If he had any designs on a career in the public service or politics, he can kiss that career goodbye. I do not recall Angela Merkel or members of her Cabinet intervening in the affair, though they will be definitely interested in the outcome of the investigations and whether or not the Volkswagen Group will be paying billions of dollars in fines.

In Kenya, to say the least, things are less stringent. Two banks have been placed under supervision by the Central Bank of Kenya in the last one year. Not one CEO has resigned. No one is talking about mega-fines for the manner in which the banks have played with depositors' funds. The opacity behind the banks' supervision does not engender trust that we will ever know the truth about our so-called second tier banks. Ever. Or why they collapse. Speculation, on the other hand which is our stock in trade, will keep us intrigued, shifting focus away from the sclerotic institutions meant to keep our funds safe when we place them in the custody of banks.

But that is not even the worst thing about the sclerosis in regulatory institutions. Do you recall the last time there was a small flood in South C that stranded children - and their driver - in a school bus all night? That happened to be one of the few schools with a serviceable school bus. The vast majority of school buses are death traps. These vehicles are not built with the safety of schoolchildren in mind; they are built with an eye to gouge an extra few shillings from parents. What stands out is that the rapacious National Transport and Safety Authority, the Government of Nairobi City County and the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology are in see-no-evil-hear-no-evil mode and these death traps are still on the road.

I will be shocked if the Cabinet Secretary, His Principal Secretary, the Director-General of the NTSA, the Ministry's head of children's safety (if there is one) and the inspectors meant to keep an eye on things resign. No one resigns in Kenya. No one expects anyone to resign in Kenya. The VW scandal may be vastly larger compared to the scandal of child safety on our roads, but I submit to you that the lives of children are vastly more valuable than the $1.84 billion that VW lost this quarter. Therefore, CS Kaimenyi, PS Kipsang', D-G Meja and their colleagues best get their asses in gear if they will not resign. It's the least they can do.

Guns

The USA is already talking about guns. It is always talking about guns. Remember this from Boston Public?

Harry Senate: Anyone I suppose could contribute to a shelter or help the needy, but it takes a true American to dedicate himself to firearms. And you know what? We need people like you. Our country's getting a bad rep just because we kill each other. Well, that's manly... shooting people. United States, this is were men live. Australia — all their stupid bragging about how tough they are in the outback. They get about... 15 gun homicides a year. What the hell is that? We get ten thousand. The Japanese are even more pathetic. In 1999, for kids between 15 and 19, they didn't have one handgun murder, not one! We had over five thousand! Our teenagers are tough, but it can't happen unless we get the guns out there into their hands. And for that we need committed, good people like all of you. Look at these idiots in Washington who think it's wrong for teenagers to have assault rifles. And the stupid Democrats think we should have ten-day waiting periods. What happens if you need to kill somebody today? Next thing the government will try to crack down on incest and we won't be able to breed future NRA members. I mean, we are talking about the toothless illiterates that make this country great. This is America. Get a gun!

~ Season 1, Episode 7

Help them decompress

If your father is a thug, young man, you have no excuse of being the pussy in your family that wants to preach the word of god. If your mother makes a living shaking her moneymaker some place near Mtwapa, young man, wiggle it till the randy Germans make it rain. That, good people, is the sum and substance of being led by example. In Swahili, I believe, it is restated as mtoto wa nyoka ni nyoka. And it is utter horseshit.

There was two-week period recently when about a thousand of Kenya's parents lived a nightmare. Their sprogs had gotten themselves in a bit of a pickle with the odious forces of law and order, carousing, merrymaking, fornicating and intoxicating with a licentiousness that stirred even Kenya's blase news-media to reporting the events as news. I think it was a nightmare for the parents because it was broadcast for all the world to see, not because their kids were in the middle of Caligulan excesses. Few "modern" parents give two shits that their kids carouse, merrymake, fornicate and intoxicate; indeed, many parents actively encourage these things on their teen and pre-teen munsters.

Oh, don't you dare deny it! I have seen you with my naked eyes dragging you impressionable sprogs to restaurants that seem to serve very little food, encourage the consumption of copious quantities of intoxicating libations, and are patronised by the most hedonistically unrestrained members of the fat wallet classes you can find. No...no...the playpens with the bouncy castles and the disinterested bar-nannies do not count as places for nurturing the "spirit of play" in your little ones.

I am not a prude. Far from it. But I cannot for the life of me understand why people are freaking out over what are the modern equivalent of high jinks by our children. The pressure we put them under is immense. They must be perfect at all time. Their perfection must surpass the perfection we have lied to them that we had. They must reach Jesus levels of perfection. Whether it is in school, out in the field of play, the accents they adopt, the cloths they must keep clean and unruffled, the TV shows they must watch and enjoy, the novels they must read, the popularity they must calculate among their peers, the innate shit they must know better than anyone else...the pressure is enormous.

Basement-bars where sex, loud music, drugs and alcohol can be had far from the judgmental eyes of parents, teachers, older siblings, pastors and goody-tow-shoes friends are their pressure release-valves. So a few of them impregnate a few of their friends. So what? Teen pregnancies are as old as the bible. So a few of them spread among each other diseases that are best left unmentioned. So what? STDs and STIs are as old as sex. Don't you dare use the idiot-phrase, "In my day..." because this is your day now and these are your children today.

I am not going to tell you not to demand perfection of the fruit of your loins. I will not even tell you not to lie to them about how perfect you were, back in the day. If that's what floats your boat, so be it. But you really must find ways for these children to decompress that reduce the potential for harm significantly. That pressure will one day kill more of them than we are prepared to cope with. Help them decompress safely or be prepared for basement-bars of carousing, merrymaking, fornication and intoxication.

Diplomatic BS

Kenya has signed and ratified the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, 1961, and the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, 1963. As an emerging power, as we believe we are, Kenya has diplomatic relations with many countries and international organisations, such as the United Nations and the World Bank Group, and these two conventions standardise the rules under which Kenya's diplomats will operate when representing Kenya abroad. It is Kenya's diplomats who are primarily involved in advancing Kenya's interests abroad, and the privileges and immunities extended to them under these conventions are crucial towards achieving Kenya's interests.

Every now and then, a person who is not a member of the diplomatic service of Kenya is called upon to perform a service for Kenya in its relations with a foreign power. That person is usually granted diplomatic status so that the service he is performing for Kenya in its relations with that foreign power are privileged - and protected. For the duration of his service to Kenya, that person is a diplomat and he will be protected by the provisions of the two Vienna conventions.

Which brings us to the demand by parliamentarians that their spouses be issued with diplomatic passports. What it implies is that parliamentarians are routinely issued with diplomatic passports. What it also implies is that parliamentarians routinely undertake diplomatic services for Kenya and, therefore, they require diplomatic privileges or immunities. This raises certain questions about Kenya's foreign policy and diplomatic service.

Kenyans remain in the dark about their government's foreign policy and it's diplomatic service. Every now and then we get to know of fissures in the service when a diplomat refuses to be recalled from her post or where she refuses to take a new posting in another country. The biggest scandal so far involving the diplomatic service is the sale of Kenya's embassy (or was it purchase) in  Tokyo, Japan. What we do not know is whether Kenya's parliamentarians (and their spouses) contribute anything to Kenya's foreign relations when they travel abroad.

There are risks to including Kenya's parliamentarians and their spouses in the diplomatic service of Kenya. In Kenya, parliamentarians and their spouses behave like demigods, expecting privileges for their elevated status. They usually attempt to impose their will on ordinary civil servants without a care for the consequences of their actions. They commandeer a disproportionate share of public resources for their comfort. If they are granted diplomatic status, they are likely to carry this egregious behaviour abroad, not only putting a strain on the facilities available to Kenya's diplomatic missions, but also the spectre of bulls-in-china-shops moments when these people invariably run afoul of the law in foreign countries. I shudder to imagine the image parliamentarians and their spouses cut when they visit Tel Aviv, Vienna, Copenhagen, Karachi, Abu Dhabi, Pretoria, Lima or L Paz, because it is almost certain to be exactly the same with the image they cut right here at hoe, which is nothing to write home about.

There would be a case to be made for diplomatic passports for parliamentarians' spouses if Kenya's foreign policy also encompassed diplomatic duties for spouses of parliamentarians. But an examination of the draft policy does not highlight this. The benefits of such an indulgence - for it is a indulgence - are far outweighed by the inherent risks of extending even more privileges to those people. Sadly, in an environment where the political classes always get what thy want, the national Executive is unlikely to push back and this parasitic class is set to add one more privilege to a very long list.

Law-maker, what dost thou do?

I am a lazy man, but I am not Bill Gates's ideal lazy man because if given a task I don't like, I will not find the most efficient short-cut to get it done. I will simply not do it at all. Or that at least is what I think I am. I may be wrong. But in my line of work, I do come across the truly lazy; those who will not do their jobs simply because they think that someone else should do it for them. I don't really know what they do with their time.

The latest proof of this laziness is this rather startling declaration by a senator: "It would be prudent to withdrawal the Bills and only return them to Parliament when they have been harmonised with the views of all those affected." She is writing in the context of proposed legislation over community land. I will refrain from attacking her remarkable grammar; I will instead focus on her demand that Bills be withdrawn from Parliament until those Bills are harmonised with the views of affected Kenyans, mainly Kenyans who have a legitimate claim to community land.

Parliamentarians, who include senators, have three broad jobs: representation of their constituents, whatever that means; oversight over the government, another catchall phrase; and law-making. Law-making, good people, is not the job of judges, though they sometimes do that, or the president and his cabinet, though they frequently do that. Law-making is the job of parliamentarians and if this senator does not understand this, almost three years since she was nominated to sit in the senate, you have to wonder how many members of her august chamber live under this delusion too.

The Executive and the Judiciary, as well as constitutional commissions, independent offices, state corporations and parastatals, can recommend the making of particular laws and with the advice of the Attorney-General, have done so on very numerous occasions. But that is not the making of law; it is the making of a proposal which Parliament can accept or reject. The decision to accept or reject is not in the hands of the Speakers of  the Houses of Parliament but in that of the members of both chambers. It is called parliamentary debate.

I am sure you too have waited patiently for this senator to take an active role in parliamentary debate and this far into her parliamentary term you must be wondering what assets landed her a senate nomination. For the life of me I cannot recall a single senate debate in which she has made an informed, impassioned contribution especially on this, she claims, her pet subject of community land. It must be that the-people-owe-me attitude she and her colleagues labour delusionally under where they get to trouser millions every year in salaries an remunerations while the little people do the heavy lifting. She is, ironically, an apposite example of why the Senate of Kenya is of absolutely no use to the people of Kenya.

Law-making is not easy, and the instinct to pass the buck to the Attorney-General, the Kenya Law Reform Commission, the National Land Commissions or the CIC is strong. But the constitutional arrangement will not change overnight: it is Parliament that makes law. This senator should get off her high horse and do what she was nominated to do and for which she receives the equivalent of a queen's ransom. Kenya's political parties did not nominate Barbie dolls. It's time nominated parliamentarians stopped acting like Barbie dolls.

What a sight

The fallacy is simple: there are men and women in Kenya who wish to serve in the public service for the good of the nation and the people. The fallacy is promoted by the President and key members of his government, including the Chief Justice and the Inspector-General of Police. The fallacy is promoted by the unofficial head of the opposition and key members of his coterie. In the history of Kenya, from when it became the plaything in the pre-colonial game to date, not even the most committed clergyman has had the good of the nation or the people in mind when they did what they did.

The idea that someone becomes a civil servant because of his love of country is swiftly dispelled by the lazy attitude towards the president's anti-corruption tirades. There are myriad forms of corruption in Kenya. It is not just the simple extortion of the police, or that of the headmaster, admitting nurse or the oily unctuousness of the one with his hand out for a handout, it is the expected payoff for doing ones job whether or not the job is actually done well or even done at all.

We live in a world where big numbers are bandied about every day: hundreds of millions and billions and trillions are mentioned as if they were abstract concepts of no import. Did your hear, we whisper conspiratorially; they lost 791 million! They lost 200 billion! These numbers mean nothing. Even reducing them to things that makes sense will still not make them make sense. "1.2 billion can build you a one-hundred room hotel in Nairobi" means nothing to the twenty one million Kenyans who don't have access to piped water and have to take a shit in the bush because they don't have land in which to dig a pit latrine.

Kenya is no different from Pakistan, Indonesia, Bangladesh, the Russian Federation or Egypt; service in its government is one of the surest way to great wealth and power. It is what service in the post-colonial regimes meant. Alternatively, doing business with the government, or doing business with money loaned to you by the government, were ways that one could avoid the stink of being a civil servant yet still make a killing in the market. These are not men and women who joined the public service to serve; the became civil servants to become rich. And they did. Fabulously so.

It might seem odd that an election petition will drag on for four years, doesn't it? Yet it must because the petitioner and the respondent want their lips suckling firmly at the tit of the government, suckling like their lives depended on it for it very well does. Our hypocrisies about duty and servant leadership must make whatever gods we worship a little exasperated: if you are going to behave like a god - greedy, grasping, selfish, unforgiving and coldhearted - you don't have to be hypocritical about it.

This is the scheme we have: every Kenyan, alive and yet to be born, pays taxes. Those taxes are collected in the name of the people. Those taxes go towards the comforts of the public service. What little is left is shared between people who win tenders and the people. The people frequently get breadcrumbs. And when the whinging gets particularly piteous the people are given an opportunity to shuffle the deck: some people get reelected; some people become civil service nawabs; some become "successful" entrepreneurs. The people are mollified. The game continues. The fallacy remains untroubled by analysis. It is quite a sight.

The weight and lessons of history

Only the truly naive believe that the President is a hostage of cartels. Either they underestimate the considerable powers of the presidency or they overestimate the powers of the cartels. These would be corruption cartels, by the by. The President is not a hostage of any cartel; the President is hostage to history. He needs to break free.

If you truly believe that there is a cartel powerful enough to keep the President from achieving any of his political promises, then there is little to be done except to advise you that when the Little Green Men come, tin-foil hats have been known to deflect their mind-control rays, and be done with you. The power of the presidency is not what is prescribed by law; its power is as it is exercised by the President to achieve ends that he feels must be achieved.

Uhuru Kenyatta came to power with the weight of expectations bearing down on him, a son of a founding president and the protege of the founding president's successor. He was expected to have his father's steel in addition to his obvious charisma and the wilyness of his father's successor. He was never, ever seen as his own ma and this has contributed greatly to his own mixed-messaging. If he is to rule effectively, he must shake off the ghosts from his fathers rule and chase away the shadows from Baba Moi's, which have cast a shade that has proven immutable to the bright light of day.

You can tell that vestiges of Kenya's first two presidents' regimes are nipping at his heels every time he has to take an unpopular decision, or when he justifies some unfortunate matter. He is not free to declare his feelings on the matter, and no matter how many pet reporters drop hints about his work ethic or disciplinarian streak, he is seen as a son of one and a protege of another. Keeping artifacts from those two regimes around him only reinforces this fact.

Jomo had a Kalenjin deputy; so does Uhuru. Moi had a very vocal chorus section; so does Uhuru. Jomo was ultimately betrayed by his Ministers; it is only a matter of time before Uhuru's betray him. Moi tried to buy the loyalty of his electorate by making incompetents ministers and parastatal chiefs; this is the same road that Uhuru is walking. What the President does not seem to have is the fear of the people, something that Jomo and Moi exploited to the full, keeping their enemies discombobulated and the people in line. Both Jomo and Moi had the Special Branch for political crimes; Uhuru seems to have delegated the investigation and handling of political crimes to novices in his party.

Both Jomo and, eventually Moi, were unrivaled in their power and their resolve. It is difficult to say the same about our President. The speculation has engendered a certain lack of respect for both him and his office and it is why people are comfortable asserting that he is the hostage of cartels. Being president, at the end of the day, is not neat or pretty. If he wants to be President then he must be prepared to be hated by all his friends and feared by all his enemies. His friends must be prepared to hear "No!" and often. His enemies must face the full force of his wrath for crossing him. But first he must identify his friends and his enemies.

That well into his third year we do not have answers to these two questions is troubling. His government has come under great scrutiny and his friends and enemies are both rejoicing; his friends because they are safe from him and his enemies because they too are safe from him. Both conspire to sabotage his economic and political plans. Both conspire to reduce him to reaction every time something bad happens. He is not, it seems, the master of his fate. It is not cartels that have him in a age; it is the weight of his own history. Those who do not learn the proper lessons of history are doomed. I hope he escapes that fate.

How the cookie crumbles

On 20 January 1942, Reinhard Heidrich held a conference at a villa in Wansee at which the Final Solution to the Jewish Question was discussed. The horror unleashed on European Jews by the Nazi High Command has come to be known as the Holocaust. What is striking is that the Germans, methodical and detail-oriented as always, wrote down everything they ever did, ever evil they ever committed. It is their attention to detail that guaranteed that when the remain Nazi leaders were put on trial in Nuremberg, they would all be convicted.

This is the Information Age, where the digital tools at our disposal guarantee that no information is ever far from the public domain. The National Youth Service has lost close to eight hundred million shillings. That is the amount that is known to have been lost. This is not the sophisticated crime its authors intended. It is the IFMIS' (Integrated Financial Management Information System) equivalent of the classic smash-and-grab. It is emblematic of the problems that the public procurement environment in Kenya suffers from.

In Kenya, our desire to save face is the guiding principle of the public service. There is no one in the entire public service willing to admit that they might be wrong, that the Government might be wrong. It is this obsessive desire to save face that opens so many doors to the digital smash-and-grab crowd. In our zeal to keep the egg off the faces of the moving and shaking personages of the upper echelons of the public service, the nefarious-minded take advantage of every loophole in the books, no matter how small or obscure, to conduct swindles of such simplicity it must drive the Head of Government apoplectic with rage - except that he seems to be a member of this do-not-embarass-me brigade too.

One of the particularly insidious features of our system is that things are not written down unless they absolutely must and even the, the number of civil servants willing to put their signature ion those documents is frighteningly small and grows smaller the high up the hierarchy you go. For sure Cabinet Secretaries and Principle Secretaries avoid as much as possible signing anything that pays out money to anyone; it is how everyone and his cat who was not the CS or the PS in the NYS saga got the short end of the CID stick recently. No matter how much Alfred Keter screams, the Devolution and Planning bigwigs will not be facing the ruinous attentions of the National Assembly or the EACC - their fingerprints, quite literally, are nowhere to be found in the saga. If it really gets out of hand, all bets are off that it is the D-G who gets it in the neck.

However, just because there are no fingerprints doesn't mean there are no records. Even with our notorious secrecy, John Githongo pioneered the collection of proof by unconventional means. The truth may not come out today, but it is almost certain that it will come out and all the secrecy and obfuscation in the world won't be able to disguise the true authors of the scam. To be honest, I don't think the CS or the PS had anything to do with it, though the PS should have known better. The NYS is one of the darlings of the perfidious KANU Era and anyone who though new uniforms and five-point strategies were all that were needed to sweep out its Augean stables has simply not been paying attention. The CS s capable enough, but the NYS is even older than her and she will need much more than her strength and determination to get it on an even footing. That's just how the cookie crumbles.