By Kilemi Mwiria

When I got employed at Kenyatta University after my PhD, my ambition was to be a rich professor so I could do good with money. I wanted to replicate my sponsor, the Rockefeller Foundation who paid exorbitantly for my graduate training in America under the University of Nairobi’s staff development programme. African beneficiaries of this fellowship programme christened Rockefeller "Uncle John D" because Rockefeller did what would be expected of a rich African uncle. The scholarship was generous as it also covered a spouse and six children. There seemed to be a belief that Africans would rarely go through undergraduate education without a spouse and many children.

Now I know that I will never actualise my dream of emulating Rockefeller as the wealth I need is beyond me. There are however hundreds of Kenyans of means who could serve as indigenous Rockefellers. Their conspicuous absence is disappointing. How distressing it is that the very Mzungu we detest for his exploitation of Africa seems to care for the poor of Africa than Africa’s own rich class? Thankfully, Kenya’s own Equity Bank has given me hope that after all, Kenyans can do better than "Uncle Rockefeller".

This year, Equity Bank will sponsor one Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE) boy and girl from all of Kenya’s 210 constituencies for undergraduate education and will employ them for the 18 months they wait before joining university. The total project cost is Sh145 million. This is in addition to another Sh350 million the bank has dedicated to a similar secondary school project.

While working with Equity, they will also be trained and mentored on leadership. They will be educated on why being a bookworm is not enough for success in the non-school world from Kenyatta University where they are being interned prior to embarking on their degree courses. They are taught to be neat, disciplined, ambitious, confident, honest, and nationalistic, among other values.

The majority of these lucky Kenyans who are rural kids cannot take confidence building and ambition for granted.

I was touched by the knowledge that one of the 200 beneficiaries is from a humble school in Kangema (Nyagatuga), which in five years has graduated from a mean score of three to more than eight, thanks to the commitment of Equity Bank’s chairman, Peter Munga and James Mwangi, the chief executive. Mr Munga and Dr Mwangi have single handedly transformed a village school and many poor kids who would otherwise have no chance of making it in life.

Even more impressive, Equity has a programme to assist beneficiaries join top world-class universities such as Harvard, Stanford, MIT, and Oxford. They are targeting 100 students every year. Just imagine the impact one organisation would have by educating 100 Kenyans in the best universities in the world especially if there is a clause requiring them to come back to build Kenya.

Although this programme is equalising from a national perspective, greater equity could be realised by paying attention to the quality of schools potential graduates are enrolled in as well as their home backgrounds. Otherwise, the programme may serve to intensify existing social inequalities by mostly paying for the education of children from able families.

How gratifying that in less than a decade a local Kenyan bank could do much better than "Uncle Rockefeller" and others may have managed since arriving in Kenya in the 60s and with a much broader coverage.

If Equity enrolls its fellows for PhD training as well, it will guarantee Kenya a powerful national team of technocrats and business executives who have merit, and not tribe to thank for their success and who will contribute rather significantly to propelling Kenya to the ranks of Africa’s most prosperous nations. If more corporate organisations and individuals partnered with Equity Bank, upwards of 1,000 Kenyans could benefit from such a programme annually.

Now you know why you should be a member.

The writer is an Assistant Minister for Higher Education, Science and Technology and MP for Tigania West.

kilemimwiria@gmail.com

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