HAIL MAMA WA TAIFA!!!

For the love and care for our mothers and children; in marginalized areas, slums, rural Kenya and all mothers and children who are not able to afford or access quality maternal and child care, First Lady, Margaret Kenyatta chose a noble path to lead the fight against these and secure the health and future of our mothers and children!

Sunday, 9^th March 2014 and Mama Margaret led the inaugural first ever First Lady Half marathon in Nairobi and supportive Kenyans, from the political, sporting and corporate arenas among others joined her in this noble cause! The goal was to save the lives of our mothers and children and help cut down on the HIV infections amongst the Kenyan child. Statistics show that at least 5500 mothers die yearly, from pregnancy and child birth related complications, over 100, 000 children die each year before they attain their fifth birthday and 13,000 children get infected with HIV each year! Now, in terms of projecting into the future and the current state of the country, these are potentially ticking time-bombs that call for concern from the government and all Kenyans. Just as a loving mother is to her child, Mama Margaret saw this and took the giant and courageous step to fight it. Congratulations Mama wa Taifa!

On 13^th April 2014, under the sweltering London sun, she became the First Lady to ever run the entire London Marathon course, just to tell the entire world of the plight faced by Kenyan women and children. Her mission to rally the world to raise funds to support programmes to stop new HIV infections amongst children and promote maternal health care, for both the mother and the child was announced to the world.

By championing her Beyond Zero Campaign on the streets of Nairobi and along the streets of London in one of the most prestigious marathon courses, Mama Margaret sent a message of intent; the healthcare given to our mothers and children in Kenya must be improved. Children are the future of the entire globe, not just Kenya and thus efforts must be made to secure their lives, and our mothers who are an integral part in ensuring that the children mature into a healthy future!

Our expectant mothers in far flung areas, those who can ill-afford the required health facilities to deliver, and also the children, can now afford smiles, as the 47 mobile clinics targeted by Mama Margaret in her Beyond Zero Campaign, are delivered to needy mothers and unborn children across the country. The ambitious goal to reduce maternal and child deaths, and HIV infections amongst the Kenyan child are well on course, spearheaded by a determined woman who has honestly felt the pain of our mothers and children, and decided to act.

Off to one of the country’s key economic supporters, Tourism, and Mama Margaret launched the ‘Hands Off Our Elephants’ campaign, earlier in the year. This noble drive is aimed at educating Kenyans and the entire world on the need to conserve the elephant, for posterity. Indeed, a timely effort from the nations’ premier lady, as Kenya’s elephant population has faced near total decimation in the recent years. In 2014, the number of elephants that have been killed by poachers has hit a staggering figure of more than 182! 182 elephants butchered by illegal cartels of poachers in under a year! This includes the death of Satao, one of the world’s iconic elephants, who was cruelly slaughtered by poachers in May this year, inside the Tsavo East National Park. The elephant whose giant tusks were easily identifiable from the air and nearly touched the ground, and had roamed our wild for 50 years attracting the global eye of all tourists to Kenya was no more! The anti-poaching campaign direly needed a big and influential voice, and in Mama Margaret, it has one staunch voice!

The butchering of our elephants by cartels all over the national parks, game reserves and sanctuaries has silently gone unabated and in recent years, it has reached the alarming level, thus threatening the tourism earnings in our country, the jobs that come with it and the huge economic gains. In the strong willed campaigns that conservationists have waged against the greedy and selfish cartels of poachers and dealers in this illegal trade, the entry of Mama Margaret into the fray to lead the fight is priceless. The timely and much needed shot in the arm!  Revered conservationists of our elephants like, Paula Kahumbu now have the much needed support of the country’s premier lady, to help protect our elephant heritage.

The concerns that our First Lady has for this country are unrivalled by most of us, and as politicians deafen our ears with unending political rhetoric and broke the Kenyan hearts by renegading on their promises, and enriching themselves at the expenses of Kenyans, one person has chosen to show us the light and she is doing this in a humbling and touching manner.

Just to put the icing on the cake for unrivalled efforts in her Beyond Zero Campaign, she was crowned United Nations Person of The Year 2014, on Friday, October 24, 2014. A befitting crown for a woman who has in all ways showed us the way in helping our vulnerable mothers and children.

During KANU’s 24-year reign, retired President Moi was Baba wa Taifa! And for these concerted efforts to save our elephants and improve the lives of our mothers and children, Mama Margaret is the revered Mama wa Taifa!  Since independence, no first lady ahs ever impacted on the Kenyan society as Mama Margaret has! Well done Mama Margaret, you are the nation’s mother, May God bless you in all your endeavors to improve the lives of our beloved mothers and children.

Off to The Hague, Our politicians feigning a tear over Uhuru's nightmare!

A day to Wednesday, October 8^th, the day when His Excellency President Uhuru Kenyatta appears before the International Criminal Court (ICC),  for the status conference of his case, all tales have been told by our politicians and better put, the average sycophants who dominate our politics.

Some have lied to the ordinary Kenyans at public rallies that if the president physically presents himself to The Hague based court; it will be akin to trading our sovereignty! Others have opined that it is not Uhuru Kenyatta on trial, but the entire country! We have seen learned politicians at political barazas, trash away the charges at the ICC, urging Chief Prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda to wind them up and admit a failed case. But as common sense dictates, away from the classes of law, are political rallies the avenue to let loose mouth about matters that have a due process to follow as laid in law? 

But as it has been the norm in Kenyan politics, from the times of founding father, the Late Mzee Jomo Kenyatta, through to retired president Moi and Mwai Kibaki, sycophants are a breed that has always been in abundance in our politics! They become loose cannons who loosely let out their tongues in public and political barazas without putting much reason to it. Not once, but countless times, that our politicians get lost in steamy political affairs and carelessly speak, and this week’s anticipated trip to The Hague by Uhuru Kenyatta has once again brought up this ugly face of our politicians!

Over 100 legislators are on the trip to The Netherlands. Nairobi Senator Mike ‘Sonko’ Mbuvi has already pledged to pay the expenses of 16 ‘patriotic’ Kenyans to The Hague, all to show support to the president! Yet, as our legislators, prepare to pretentiously go to The Hague and cry more than the bereaved, some were in the last Parliament, that sold Uhuru, Ruto and Sang to the ICC, when they blatantly refused to engineer a local process to try these cases, and as a result ICC came in, through former prosecutor, Luis Moreno Ocampo. Now they are wailing on rooftops, lamenting how the entire nation is on trial, yet years back, Let us not be vague, let us go to Hague’, was a national chorus!

Those who have chosen this conceited show of support to the president by accompanying him to The Hague, will not be allowed anywhere near the court’s premises, No. As His Excellency, Uhuru Kenyatta takes to the stand on Wednesday for the status conference of his case, these legislators will probably be spotting caps with the Kenyan colors, miniature flags, kneeling down and wailing in prayers and loitering in the streets of some European country! Indeed, these acts will be harmful to the Kenyan face internationally, than it were by our president’s humble respect for the court that he has shown by choosing to heed the summonses, even as the African Union (AU)  and our sycophantic politicians chest-thumped that he should not go.

Contrary to the minds of our sycophants in our political class, and the AU, President Uhuru Kenyatta chose to reason this matter and obliged to present himself to The Hague, just as his Deputy, William Ruto, has. This is respect to the institution of presidency and the president is indeed pulling in the right direction on this one. Just as the public mind has opined, maybe the cases have fizzled out, and Uhuru’s humble gesture to the international court is respect to the rule of law, both nationally and internationally.

Do we even know if these funds to foot the legislator’s expenses to The Hague are from the public coffers or from their pockets, as some have claimed? The money being wasted on this trip by our legislators could have been used to feed starving Kenyans in some part of the country and pay university fees for some deserving kid somewhere, among other ways of improving the lives of the long-suffering Kenyan.

The only blot to Uhuru’s humble acceptance to oblige  to The ICC is this trip by our legislators to ‘show solidarity’.

They have simply chosen to cry more than the bereaved, on the funeral day!