There are times, in Kenya, when we live without too much hope of seeing a better tomorrow. There are also times when we get too ambitious and hopeful. But such times are rare. They happen in frequencies, which are regular in pattern.
Every time a new government takes over, Kenyans have a lot of hope for the future. Nevertheless, it so happens that the bright faces expecting a lot of goodies from a new government are made to shrink back to normal or worse posture after a few months.
The trend is usually that we put too much faith in our leaders during campaigns, especially when they unveil their manifestos. We often forget that these are politicians who will explore the sweetest language possible to persuade voters.
They will spare all their time to listen to our grievances keenly. They will even walk with us on foot, participate in strikes, eat what we eat and sleep where we sleep.
However, history and history is my witness, very few honour their promises.
Talk about the laptops and think of a child lacking food, clothes and shelter. Talk about grants of cash to the youth and think of the more than 18 million youths who are jobless and waiting for the same. Talk about free maternity services for women and think about a district like Kwanza with only one public hospital. Talk about modern agriculture complete with state-of-the-art machinery and think of the landless, IDPs, and squatters.
I am not saying these promises are not achievable, they are simply far from what the common mwananchi need. Many families live below the poverty line and therefore it will be a mockery to give their children laptops when they do not even have a classroom.
It is clearly impossible to give every Kenyan youth Sh30,000 considering their number. Not everyone has a business mind, and if so, what kind of business can be done by everyone in Kenya successfully? Many regions in Kenya have insufficient health centres. Before offering free services in the hospitals/ clinics, build and establish them first!
This is how we often end up disappointed by our leaders. First, we believe in their promises. Then we vote them in. Lastly, we wait to see the promises fulfilled.
More often than not, the waiting process takes years. As I write, we are already in the third process. What we are waiting for at the moment varies. There are those waiting for their county representatives to fulfil their promises. Equally, there are those waiting for their MPs and governors to honour their pledges. Whichever the case, we are in a new era fashioned by the new constitutional dispensation. We no longer ought to wait for five years to punish or axe wrongly-elected leaders.
As we remain optimistic that the new Government will deliver, let us not forget to focus on what we can do individually to improve ourselves. As America’s 29th President Warren G Harding put it back in 1900, “America’s (read Kenya’s) present need is not heroics, but healing, not nostrums but normalcy, not revolution but restoration”
{Erick Naibei, Law student, University of Nairobi}
