Kibaki’s rejection of cars is not enough

The news about President Mwai Kibaki and the First Lady Lucy Kibaki’s rejection of eight vehicles , recently bought for State House, must not be allowed to hoodwink the people of Kenya, that the PNU leader wants to implement reforms in Kenya. His demand that Cabinet Ministers should observe car rules outlined by Finance Minister Uhuru Kenyatta’s Budget proposal can only be believed by the wananchi when they see the Head of State driving a reasonably smaller car. But even more important than rejecting new cars, to the people of Kenya, should be unequivocal implementation of Agenda Four, which Kibaki seems to be taking lightly.

The lackadaisical manner in which Kenyan leaders appear to implement Kofi Annan’s Agenda Four is caused by Mwai Kibaki’s reluctance to operationalise it. Raila Odinga seems to be the only leader seriously concerned in executing the recommendations whose main aim is to bridge the gap between the haves and the have nots in Kenya. In this, Raila has the international support from Kenya’s friends in the West including Barack Obama.

When Martha Karua resigned and claimed that Kenyan leaders were not interested in reforms, she knew what she was talking about. But she failed to tell Kenyans that the man she had in mind was Mwai Kibaki who is totally opposed to all the recommendations in the Agenda Four.

Today Kenyans need to be reminded that the final goal of the National Dialogue and Reconciliation mediated by Kofi Annan and the Panel of Eminent African Personalities was to achieve sustainable peace stability and justice in Kenya through the rule of law and respect for human rights. No Kenyan leader today, except Raila Odinga, can seriously claim to be concerned with the promotion of the rule of law and respect for human rights. Raila is in fact facing a very serious problem today in his own party ODM because there are leaders there who do not believe in the rule of law. William Ruto does not want to hear of any tribunal to try the criminals who caused mayhem in the post election violence in Kenya.

In the Cabinet the people who believe in human rights can be counted on one hand’s fingers. The Annotated Agenda and Timetable of the National Dialogue and Reconciliation signed on February 1^st 2008, recognized that poverty, the inequitable distribution of resources and perception of historical injustices and exclusion on the part of segments of Kenyan society constituted the underlying causes of the prevailing social tension, instability and cycle of violence. Nothing has changed in Kenya since that time. The tension is still there, the instability has gone underground but has never disappeared and the cycle of violence has now become part and parcel of life in this country. Yet these constitute the backbone of Agenda Four proposals which Kenyan leaders have shown no interest what so ever of intending to solve.

Among the most important reforms recommended by Kofi Anna’s team concerns Constitutional, institutional and legal reforms. Kenya leaders’ commitment to complete the comprehensive constitutional review process within twelve month from March 4^th 2008 was a mere joke intended to please the international community and calm the wananchi. Today it is only Nzamba Kitonga who appears to be serious about Constitutional reforms and as he moves too fast, as he appears to be doing, someone powerful will always be ready to pull the rug from under his feet and make him fail. That is how hypocritical our leaders are.

When matters were so hot and it looked like our leaders were about to lose the side of the national bread that is buttered, they quickly agreed that the national reforms should include , inter alia, the police reform, parliamentary reform, judicial reform, executive reform and civil service reform. Kenya leaders are notoriously known for passing laws they hardly intend to implement. Among these laws is The Public Officer Ethics Act of 2003 whose General Code of Conduct and Ethics is only implemented when a civil servant is about to be victimized for either being too efficient or belonging to a wrong tribe.

Section eight of the Act demands that a public officer shall, to the best of his ability, carry out his duties and ensure that the services he provides are provided efficiently and honestly. Ask any ordinary mwananchi who has wanted any service from any civil servant and you will be told the story of TKK. According to Raila himself TKK started as toa kitu kidogo ( give a little bribe ) and then it changed to toa kitu kikubwa ( give something big) and it is now at the level of toa kila kitu ( give everything you have to the corrupt officer) . To the big people like Raila this is a pleasant joke to laugh about, but to the ordinary wananchi it is a matter of life and death. Yet reforms in the civil service are taking ages to be implemented. Under Francis Muthaura nothing will be done until when the goose that lays the golden eggs is finally dead when Kenya is totally broke and ungovernable.

There have been some reforms in Parliament since Marende took over the position of the Speaker to the National Assembly but what is very sad about Kenya’s legislature is the grouping of MPs along tribal cabals instead of political parties. Today the tribal hegemony in Parliament is threatening to block any legislation to bring the criminals responsible for the post election violence to book through a local tribunal. Reforms in the Judiciary have now become a mere bar joke as justice continues to be delayed when judges swim in the ocean of bribery and corruption.

The one subject that our leaders do not want to talk about concerns land reforms; yet Kofi Annan’s team recognized that the issue of land had been a source of economic, social, political and environmental problem in Kenya for many years. From the moment Kenyatta became the first President of Kenya, huge, profitable agricultural land has belonged to the very rich in a manner that is no different at all from the colonial days of White Highlands. As the poor people were slaughtering one another in Rift Valley for the sake of land, the rich continued, as they do now, to own huge plantations where there was no trouble at all after the last elections. Our leaders are among the biggest land owners of Kenya and they want no changes in the status quo.

When Kofi Anan was around they agreed that land reform was a fundamental need in Kenya and that the issue must be addressed comprehensively and with the seriousness it deserved. Towards this end, the leaders agreed to fully support efforts to establish the factors responsible for conflicts over land and to formulate and implement actionable short, medium and long term recommendation on the issue. No sooner did Kofi Annan enter his plane back home than those beautiful words evaporated in the air. As soon as Kofi Annan went away the leaders went back to their big farms to supervise underpaid workers whom they exploit unashamedly. What the leaders forget is that next time there are land clashes their huge ill-gotten plantations will be at the centre of the clashes as they will be the major bone of contention.

It is unfortunate that on this issue of land both Raila and Kibaki appear to be paddling in the same canoe. They are both owners of huge tracks of land as they pretend to help the poor landless people of Kenya. Just like land, Agenda Four concerns itself with poverty, inequality and regional imbalances and this is where Raila is closer to the people than Kibaki.

While Annan was in town the leaders said they recognized that to ensure sustainable peace in the country, poverty eradication and equitable development were essential. The leaders further recognized that the issue of inequality, manifested along income, regional and gender lines remained key challenges for Kenya. For some very strange reasons the people of Kenya believe Raila can bring those changes given the chance and powers to do so. So far Kibaki has not made good use of both the chances and powers he has to bring the changes Kofi Annan was talking about.

Paradoxically the changes the former UN boss was talking about happen to be in the manifestos of both PNU and ODM. Both parties claimed to be champions of poverty alleviation and of implementing equitable development. But that was when they were seeking the people’s mandate to govern them. The problem is that they told Kofi Annan that they intended to harmonize their two manifestos and make poverty alleviation and equitable development a top priority of the Coalition Government.

Wananchi have been starving to death while waiting for those changes. What happened to the promise Kibaki and Raila made to utilize the National Accord to implementation mechanisms that committed them to a consultative process to identify short term, medium term and long- term strategies to fight poverty? God alone knows!

Very soon the same leaders will be seeking to be reelected in 2012 and yet unemployment, particularly among the youth, remains a serious problem. It is these same unemployed youths the leaders will be drowning in beer as they seek their votes to continue misleading Kenya. When Kofi Annan was in town the leaders agreed that unemployment was a serious concern that must urgently be addressed. When they got in office the only people they gave jobs to were their close friends and relatives and the people still remain unemployed.

This is the sad case despite the fact that the leaders acknowledged before Kofi Annan that the lack of effective opportunities that integrate the majority of Kenya’s youth into mainstream economic activities contributed to the destructive role played by the youth during the post election violence. Ensuring that all citizens have the opportunity to be gainfully employed is a policy likely to be implemented by Raila rather than Kibaki and his team. Unfortunately Raila has enemies in the ODM who would like power for the sake of accumulating wealth in the same manner as Kenyatta, Moi and Kibaki.

When it comes to rhetoric promises no one can beat Kenyan politicians at election time. Before they got into power they told the people of Kenya that the nation’s economic growth, prosperity and social stability would be their priority in ensuring that each individual is given an opportunity to develop their full potential and live in dignity. They repeated the promise word for word before Kofi Annan and said: “We commit ourselves to advocate for the development of all comprehensive strategy on combating youth unemployment.” Very soon in the next election the leaders will be seeking the unemployed youths' votes. It will be the youths’ opportunity to combat greed and corruption among our leaders who must now be shown the door. The only survivor will be Raila Odinga and whoever joins him in the revamped ODM.