Some wise counsel from Wavinya Ndeti to voters

Youth Affairs Assistant minister Wavinya Ndeti raised quite some eyebrows in Tala at the weekend when she openly reprimanded a councillor for campaigning for Wiper presidential aspirant Kalonzo Musyoka.

She argued that no one should go out campaigning for the VP and that he should go out and do it himself. PointBlank doesn¡¯t agree with her on this because we believe that while an aspirant should traverse the country and meet the people, any of their supporters have a right to speak up for them.

But we agree with her when she tells the Kamba community to vote their preferred choice for State House. Wavinya urged voters to gauge leaders by their development record, and avoid "being driven by political waves". That is wise counsel.

This country has for long suffered poor leadership because of ¡®herd mentality¡¯. Tribes vote as a block for their own, or their community leaders¡¯ preferred candidates, without considering his/her leadership qualities. That is why we are never short of inefficient, corrupt and warmongering leaders. Shame.

Determined to clean up Mombasa, the local council has introduced a new by-law which requires all business premises to be repainted white. Before this, Mombasa resident Justin Njagi says any "colour was colourful in the town".

But there is a new vocabulary doing the round, the one about bad "screaming colours". While no-one has ever heard colours making noise, the council allegedly insists that colours such as red, blue, green, orange and indigo do scream. The council wants to whitewash the town, claiming that white is friendly and not ¡®noisy¡¯. White, the council has further reportedly told the residents is "traditional and against heat".

But Njagi is scoffing at the whitening move. He says Mombasa¡¯s problem isn¡¯t the multi-coloured buildings, but the unccountable garbage heaps at every nook and cranny.

"At Mackinon Market and Mwembe Tayari a powerful stench keeps visitors away. Painting the markets white won¡¯t take away the smell."

He advises the council to stop jumping the gun and first rid the town of all its foul stenches before thinking about making it white, black or magenta.

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