The Year Is Gone And So Is Kenya's Innocence

2008 is by far the most horrible year that the motherland has had in the recent history. We started off with the post election mayhem that cost over 1000 lives and millions in lost property and business opportunities. In the course of the year our healing was delayed by the greedy MPs, high cost of living, drought, fuel shortages, political bickering and brinkmanship that had the country drunk and directionless when resolve and leadership post-Waki and Kriegler Reports was all that we prayed for. The healing was somewhat accelerated by the best Olympic performance and our cousin Obama’s win in America. This our annus horibillis was a year during which our politics lost the veneer of respectability, our decades-old communal hatred came to the fore unhindered by pretences of civility and the collective innocence was forever lost. As we usher in the new year, the initial signs are that we have not learnt any lessons and our politicians are already engaged in sparring fights over which way to go with the new constitution, taking differing positions on the new ICT Law (media bill) and all the posturing in readiness of 2012 that is going on amid all the mwananchi problems that no one seems to care about. Thousands of IDPs are still in transitional camps waiting for their leadership to sort out their problems. It is no wonder Kofi Annan, Kenya's nanny and chaperone has had to cajole and reprimand us with his "Op-ed on Kenya" now running in all the dailies. He says that "in my view, while the progress has been remarkable, the pace of the reforms should move faster. That is because the window of opportunity for serious reform will start to close sooner than we might wish. I am already concerned that a premature focus on the 2012 elections could distract the country from the more pressing priorities-pursuing the IREC and CIPEV reforms and tackling the other long-term issues identified in Agenda Item Four of the National Dialogue. I appreciate why some have dubbed Agenda Item Four the "mwananchi agenda", as it deals with those deep-seated problems that most directly affect the lives and livelihoods of most Kenyans-whether its poverty and inequity, youth unemployment, land grievances, ethnic discord, stalled judicial and other institutional reforms, or lack of action to counter corruption. Kenyans are demanding more effective-and more expeditious-action on the "mwananchi agenda". They are eager to reap some benefit from the National Dialogue agreements. And their growing impatience is exacerbated by rising cost of living and a perception that their elected representatives-the "ruling elite"- are paying insufficient attention to their daily plight. Moving quickly to fully implement the tasks agreed in the National Dialogue talks would go a long way towards changing that perception" . I doubt if anyone is listening out there, but I am willing to be proved wrong.