Failed Government Officials and Agencies…..

President’s Uhuru Kenyatta’s directive on cracking down on illicit and deadly alcohol has entered its third week, albeit muted action far from the eerie that the process began with. Exuberant politicians and Kenyans joined hands in this ‘noble cause’, and dealers in alcohol, especially in the president’s backyard have borne the brunt. Both legal and illegal dealers in the alcohol industry have been on the receiving end, as the mob mentality in the hands of politicians and Kenyans has turned the judge, prosecutor and executioner! Simply put, the rule of jungle has turned the law and looting, destruction of property and all sorts of malice is in the air, all in the name of illicit brews-crackdown. The president’s directive is sadly doing the very job that government officials and agencies should be doing, but have miserably failed in.

Kenya Bureau of Standards (KEBS), police officers and government administrators should take the flack for the illicit brews quagmire that we find ourselves in. Dens that prepare cheap and illegal brews and alcohol brands are all over the country. From the illicit chang’aa dealers hidden in far-flung villages and slums to a brand of fearless Kenyans who are busy sealing deadly concoctionsstamped with the KEBS’ stickers right in the centre of Nairobi, things are simply out of hand.  Corruption and compromise are the rules of this game, otherwise, nothing explains how illegal dealers prepare these lethal brews and even stamp the counterfeits KEBS stickers, fearless of the law and its enforcers.  The physical locations and owners of these factories are clearly known to government officials and the business is known, yet they are free to play in the dangerous game that culminates in the loss of Kenyan lives, physical disabilities and loss of economically-productive Kenyans. Only when does the president issue a directive, that the police officers, KEBS officials and other relevant government administrators come out guns blazing to conduct crackdowns. The question begs, do security officers, authorities and Kenya Bureau of Standards waste taxpayers’ money and sleep on their very responsibilities? Yes that is what happens. 

 

Back in my home village in Makueni County, chiefs and police officers making their way into the village chang’aa dens is such a norm! The mighty boots of the government simply go for kitu kidogo and alas, the village mafias who brew chang’aa are immune to the law. Luckily, no death from these dens has ever been documented but that is no reason to tolerate illicit breweries across Kenya. Fast forward to Nairobi and the hard hit Central region whereby greed for a quick buck drives men and women to use deadly chemicals just to sell to thirsty Kenyans for a few coins. Sadly this turns to be the sip of death, loss of memory of blindness! Yet all these dens blossom under the full glare and knowledge of security officers. Just as in my home village, bribes to the government authorities is the license of death!

Whose business is it to make sure that the illegal and counterfeit KEBS stickers do not ‘legalize’ the deadly spirits and alcohol brands? It is purely a responsibility of Kenyan Bureau of Standards officials and government authorities to arrest the culprits and put an end to the vice. Sadly, they all turn a blind eye to this vice. We simply pay these men and women to sleep on their job and only wake up from the self-induced sleep when President Uhuru issues directives to drive illegal alcohol dealers out of town. Yes, KEBS, police officers and relevant government authorities simply do not perform their job in the war on illicit and deadly alcohol and brews. Instead of issuing a countrywide crackdown, President Uhuru should have sent the responsible officials packing. The work of Hon Ferdinand Waititu, Hon Moses Kuria and their fellow legislators is in the making of laws to run this country, but not leading panga-welding youths to run down illegal and legal alcohol dealers and joints.

The society takes its share of the blame too. Why do we let our family members, relatives and friends to prepare and sell illegal and deadly brews in the name of business? Why do we always wail loudest when our brothers and sisters die or are permanently incapacitated by these deadly concoctions? Why has alcohol been normalized in our villages and cities? Every weekend, our town streets are full of incoherent and intoxicated Kenyans all due to our love for the bottle! Our villages are always never short of Kenyans drunk from cheap and deadly chang’aa. It has become a norm! All manner of excuses are thrown into the air to justify why Kenyans rot in alcoholism. Unemployment has been the most misused reason!!

Instead of solely clapping at President Uhuru for his directive on the illicit brew crackdown, we ought to ask questions on why the relevant institutions never perform their constitutional duties. We should also ask why our society has disregarded its moral duty! The jungle law and the reckless impunity at which legal alcohol dealers have been visited by unruly Kenyans and politicians, under the pretext of fighting illegal and deadly inebriants can never be the solution to the alcoholism problem bedeviling our society. Otherwise, Kenyans will keep dying from these deadly concoctions every other year.

LOCAL FOOTBALL GOT A LONG WAY TO GO

After a labored goalless draw against Ethiopia on Saturday, at the Nyayo National Stadium, Harambee Stars were knocked out of the African Nations Championships (CHAN) qualifiers on a 2-0 aggregate. The verdict is out; our local leagues have not grown as we have been made to think! The local-based players from Ethiopia proved us wrong on Saturday. It was a disappointing game, drub approach by Kenya. A grimier fact is that until the late introduction of Noah Wafula and Danson Kago for Edwin Wafula and Ali Abondo respectively, our twin strikers, Jesse Were and Michael Olunga had not received any cross from either Ali Abondo or Kevin Kimani! Except for Ali Abondo’s in-swinging free-kick that was parried by the Ethiopian custodian, and the 60^th minute by Abondo penalty that cannoned off the post, Kenyan chances were few and far between. Awful free-kicks, pathetic corner kicks and miserable passes best describe the shambolic display that Harambee Stars put on against Ethiopia.

Ethiopia nearly scored in the first half only for Boniface Oluoch to deny Behailu Assefa after a frenetic counter attack by the visitors. Oluoch had to twice deny Ramkel Lok on two occasions. This relatively easy on paper game epitomized the technical and tactical naivety that describes our local football! The bitter truth is that local leagues are the founding stones for the national team. That is why our poor Harambee Stars is the miserable product of the below-par Kenyan local leagues! Since its inaugural edition in 2009, Harambee Stars has never qualified for the showpiece! The CHAN jinx continues!

No cross came in from the flanks, yet we weirdly believed we could score at least twice to force the game into penalty-shoot-out! Ethiopian stood out tall with their 4-4-2 that was designed to suffocate any Kenyan attack. Foolishly, we went out with a system that hardly functioned. Our wing-play virtually dead! Even when it was clear that Ethiopian were content to sit back, defend and catch us on the break, we continued hurling long balls to Olunga and Were, hoping to get a miraculous goal! In a frenetic break in the 30^th minute, the visitors nearly caught us on the break as they turned our free-kick into an all-out attack that miraculously missed our net! We fluffed a penalty that could have changed the game, courtesy of Ali Abondo’s casually struck kick! Kevin Kimani had missed another in the first leg. Simply put, it was a disappointing game from our boys and only sterile optimism kept pushing on the fans on the Nyayo terraces! Remember the previous weekend, Olunga hit four past Chemelil while Were hit a brace against Nairobi City Stars! But from the weekend’s drub showing by Harambee Stars, we all must have realized that the Chemelil and City Star’s defenses were pathetically weak and maybe that’s why they conceded six from the two men who hardly threatened against Ethiopia. However, it does not mean that Were and Olunga are not good players, only that they are far from the finished article that can win international matches that present tougher defenses.

The question begs, has our local football improved as so much believe? Our local players have always came second best to their counterparts in these qualifiers of the second-tier African Nations Cup! Is that not proof enough that the other leagues across the continent are ahead of us by a mile? Since Sofapaka famously reached the pre-Quarter finals of the 2011 CAF Confederations Cup, no Kenyan club has ever gone past the second round and worse still, humiliating defeats mark the exits of Kenyan clubs from these continental tourneys! Since 2008 when Tusker Fc lifted the CECAFA Club Championship in Tanzania, no other Kenyan club has ever being a serious contender, let alone winning the regional cup.

CAF assignments, especially CHAN, club championships and CECAFA Club Championships have been enough vindication of all the pessimistic minds on Kenyan soccer. Yes, Supersport came in, pumped in money and airs the matches live to the entire globe, but we have never exported any talent to lucrative African leagues and the ultimate European stage! Southampton’s Victor Mugubi, Parma’s MacDonald Mariga, Dennis Oliech and Lillestrom SK’s Arnold Origi all went long before SuperSport came in. Consecutive top-scorers, players of the season, midfielders of the season et all, have never made an impression in Africa or Europe. They simply get lost the following season in the local league. At best, we move in circles, without any steps forward! All players that are honoured at the end of any Kenya Premier League (KPL) season should step higher up the football ladder and onto elite African leagues or Europe, but it has never really happened. Look at Francis Ouma (Top Scorer, 2008), George ‘Blackberry’ Odhiambo (Player of Season, 2011) and John Baraza (Top Scorer, 2012) among others who shone in the local league. They top scored in the league, won player of season accolades and went to Europe only to come back after being part-time practice players in Europe!  Simply put, the best talent from the KPL has always failed in foreign land!

Somehow, fans have trooped back to the fields, Gor Mahia has regained its ‘Big Boy’ title in Kenyan football, the Ingw’e-K’Ogallo rivalry has always given us two great games each season and players are making lives our of soccer. But the truth is that our local football has not grown as we thought, at least tactically and technically, we are football babies in diapers! What Ethiopia did over the weekend was simply a painful reminder of the bitter truth that our elite football league is still terribly low in the technical and tactical approach!

AFC LEOPARDS ON A FINANCIAL DEATH-BED!

Dire financial crisis best describes the hole that once financially healthy AFC Leopards have plunged to in the 2015 Kenya Premier League season. With Mumias Sugar Company facing uncertain times financially, AFC Leopards played precariously close to financial death! It hit them as the first leg drew to a close and has refused to go away even as the second leg started over the weekend. Maybe, Ingw’e cheated death but the scars have devastatingly hurt them. 

Former skipper, Martin Imbalambala was nearly thrown out of his rented house in Thika over unpaid rent. Ugandan import Karim Ndungwa, a day after his exploits as stand-in goalkeeper in the 1-0 win over Sofapaka had to leave for his country too, as he could barely pay his rent and bills. Mass exodus of players followed. Ingw’e could barely raise a team against Sofapaka in the first leg and now against Thika United in Saturday’s aborted match, they only had 14 players to choose from! Such is the shame that the cash-crunch has plunged the once revered club into. A consequence of incapable leadership that solely went asleep when Mumias Sugar kept pumping in the money. Now, begging bowls define AFC Leopards. Hand-outs and harambees feed this weakened leopard whose spots are fast disappearing! It is shameful and all Ingw’e faithful know it. What irks all Ingw’e fans is the bitter fact that their nemesis, Gor Mahia are running away with the league title, despite lack of a sponsor since TUZO pulled out nearly two years ago! 

The club is simply paying hard for its poor management systems worsened by political patronage that is finally killing the team! Death is inevitable if no tangible solution is found thick and fast!The big club is run like a personal kiosk that in its owner’s absence can never function! With a near-colossal fan following in Western Kenya and entire nation, no one in the Ingw’e den ever saw the need to make financial use of this huge fan base, only rivalled by her nemesis, Gor Mahia! The Mumias Sugar sponsorship sent the club’s leadership to a deep sleep and now financial starvation has woken them up. Some have found the going tough and made hasty exits as former chairman, Allan Kasavuli did! Others like former Secretary General, Timothy Lilumbi chose Mugabe-like antics and clung on to their positions even as the ship sank. He had to be literally forced out by irate fans who stormed his workplace baying for his blood. In the backside, a caretaker committee led by former chairman and Speaker of the Nairobi County Assembly, Joseph Ole Magelo quietly pulled out citing hostilities from the duly elected club committee. A midweek fund-raiser headlined by the top honchos in the Luhya community raised at least Sh 5.5 million. Tribe once again brought together the people, at least to fill the empty stomachs of her sons who don the famous Ingw’e colors! Former Prime Minister, known for his love for the beautiful game, President Uhuru Kenyatta and his Deputy, William Ruto all made hefty contributions to this desperate cause within the Ingw’e camp! But will the club rely on hand-outs and harambees driven by human apathy to suffering to stay afloat in the coming seasons? No, it is not possible. 

The club’s leadership has failed to capitalize on the colossal fan base to sell the Ingw’e merchandise! Replica jerseys, wrist bands, caps and all other forms of club merchandise never make sense to the officials. Gate collections, sponsorships and miserable hand-outs do! The club must wake up and make money out of her colossal fan-base. With at least one million countrywide fans through membership drives, the club can rake in at least Sh100 million monthly if each fan contributes a meagre Sh100 a month! With such monthly contributions, player and technical bench salaries and allowances can always be smoothly paid in time. Selling the club’s merchandise too can be an invaluable avenue of raising funds. Replica jerseys, caps, wrist bands et all are every fan’s love! Every fan wants to don his/her club’s colors all over the world! Can officials in the Ingw’e see this? Merchandizing and fans’ membership drives are key to solving the financial crisis that are bedeviling AFC Leopards. Prudent accounting of gate collections in all home matches for AFC Leopards must be made too by the responsible official. The club, just like Gor Mahia fills the stadium in home matches and this should translate to financial gain if prudent accounting system is in place.

Due to political patronage, pathetic financial accounting and management systems and lack of visionary leadership, AFC Leopards is paying in the worst way possible. The players feel the vicious heat and as it happened, other clubs easily pluck them away. The fans agonize as too as they watch their club on her knees and dismally performing in a league that years ago, it easily had made her own! The club must solve the financial crisis with clear long-term solutions. Otherwise, the shame of begging bowls and apathy-driven harambees will cling on the leopard skin for years to come!

Are Presidencies the African curse?

Comrade Bob has destroyed Zimbabwe and her people, yet. He has ruled the Southern Africa nation since December 1987!  In neighboring Uganda, Yoweri Kaguta Museveni has suffocated the country’s economy and democracy. He has held onto power since January 1986! Others like Tedoro Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea has been in power for 34 years and has showed no signs of leaving office! And now, Jean Pierre Nkurunziza is setting Burundi on fire! The nation’s Vice president has already Bujumbura and sought a safe haven in Brussels, Belgium. Hundreds of thousands of innocent Burundians are fleeing to neighboring Rwanda and Tanzania with every dawn of the sun!

Something must be terribly wrong with a majority of African presidencies! The greed for power has caused bloodbath, agony and war crimes on the very people they are supposed to lead! Unlike, the West where the institution of presidency is a noble one that leads the nation to prosperity and unity, presidencies in Africa are the cause of untold suffering, agony, depressing economic states stinking shame! From Somalia, Central African Republic, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, South Sudan, Rwanda et others, the name president elicits fear in the people. In these nations, the greed for power and evil desire to stay in power has scarred the citizenry. Many have been physically and psychologically maimed, women and girls raped, men and boys sodomized, innocent children turned into cruel merchants of death, starvation and all manner of humanitarian crisis! Kenya too is no saint! In 2007-08, post- election violence nearly burned the entire nation as the fight for State House turned vicious!

No continent on the planet is endowed with natural resources than Africa! Sadly, these vast deposits of mineral wealth have led to tears and anguish on the very people they are supposed to benefit! Democratic Republic of Congo has never known peace since 2002, and we all know how the rich gold, diamond and fluorspar deposits have created rag-tag militias, from Goma to Kivu! In Nigeria, the Movement for Emancipation of Niger Delta (MEND) nearly decimated the Nigeria populace in the Niger Delta, in the vicious fight to control the vast oil wells! In Sierra Leone, we are remember Foday Sanko, the slain war merchant whose child soldiers chopped off the limbs of innocent civilians. It was the bloody race for control of the ‘Blood Diamonds’. South Sudan split from the larger Muslim-dominant North, but the deadly battle for control of the oil-rich Heglig region saw mass killings, displacement and war crimes committed against innocent civilians.

Most presidencies in Africa epitomize the dire standards of poor leaderships that Africa continues to suffer from. Massive rigging of elections, coup d’états and assassinations have been accepted ways of ascending to power in Africa. Intimidation of political opponents, disregard for the rule of law and use of government machinery to ward off any opposition from sitting on the coveted seat of presidencies are accepted evils in Africa! Morals in the institution of presidency in Africa are a near un-palatable idea! Some turn into presidents-for- life, others change constitutions into personal wills and most use presidencies to entrench wealth, loot public coffers and appoint wives and next-of kins to cabinet positions and other political seats that they barely merit! They regard themselves as demi-gods and their loyal lieutenants are no better. They become the lyrical sycophants who dance in the king’s dance-yard and can never tell the king when he is naked! Truth and honest become obsolete to them and deceit reigns supreme, all to please the king! That is Africa for you and the sick mindset that has plagued this otherwise noble institution!

Unless a change in mindset comes thick and fast, most African nations will languish in poverty, abuse of democracy and civil wars and conflicts whose cause are mainly the presidents.  A change is inevitable if democracy and socio-economic development are to blossom on most of the African countries. Morals should find a place on the African leadership tables! Otherwise, if the same old traditional minds on presidencies reign, wars, conflicts and poverty will forever be the synonyms to describe Africa; the richest continent in mineral wealth. 

Meanwhile, the humanitarian crisis is getting dire with every dawn of the sun. Somebody should teach Nkurunziza et co these noble lessons on leadership morals!