I wrote a tribute to our late Dad for the opening of the John N. Michuki Memorial Park but we weren’t asked to give a speech, so I’ll share this here. My sister Sheila and I were there and Sheila planted a tree on behalf of the family with the Chairman of Kenya Forest Services, Peter Kinyua, and the Cabinet Secretary Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources Keriako Tobiko. We thank His Excellency Uhuru Kenyatta for his dedication to rehabilitating and inaugurating the park and Raila Odinga for bestowing the honor in 2012.
A Tribute to a great man: Our Dad
Our Dad, the Honorable John Njoroge Michuki was a Great Man. Saying this means that he was not ours as a family alone; he belonged to this Republic, using his life to make a positive difference in every public space he occupied- as a Public Administrator, as a Banker, as a Member of Parliament, as an Entrepreneur, as an Employer, as a Mentor, as a friend, and as a State Minister. In all these spaces, the one thing that was consistent was that his focus was to be the best that he could, given the circumstances.
I am going to try and share with you what he was like with us – what we saw and experienced of him as he focused on his duties– when he put his mind to something as he always did, and I’ll use the example of how he put his mind to rehabilitating the Nairobi River and the riparian land along the river and what he called Mazingira Park- which we are here to officially open as the John N. Michuki Memorial Park.
What I’d like you to appreciate is that his focus was always on how his service could positively impact the lives of people he was accountable to and his intention was always win-win-win.
When he was appointed as Minister of Environment, it was a bit of an oddball in that it was such a different portfolio to say Ministry of the Interior and Security or Ministry of Finance or Ministry of Transport or Roads. It seemed at first to carry less weight than the more “substantial” Ministries. Our brother Martin, who is a prolific reader and always very switched on with current affairs and trends such as “climate change” when it wasn’t even a buzz word was the first to say “This is actually a really great portfolio- there is so much happening in the world in this area”.
And so we all rallied behind him with this new appointment. I remember in 2008, when he was starting to collect information on the Nairobi River rehabilitation project.
This project had begun in 1999, with the launch of a two-year project supported by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) which is now UNEA and it focused on water quality assessment, public awareness and capacity-building.
The second phase (2001–2003), started as a pilot and targeted a tributary of the Nairobi River, the Motoine-Ngong River. The focus was on monitoring pollution and it also included community education.
The third phase was four years (2004–2008), focused on a five-point plan to restore the river ecosystem and provide clean water for Nairobi as well as a healthier environment for the people of Nairobi.
So when he was appointed to the Environment docket, he started by looking at what had been done so far in the Ministry and identified what would be his project of passion- the Nairobi River. He discovered what had been done and what was not working with the rehabilitation of the Nairobi River. We all came to know about the previous work that had been done since 1999 through his conversations with us- either collectively on Sundays or individually.
His motto was not to reinvent the wheel. He believed that if there were already plans in place, then those plans should be implemented. He really disliked the idea of not looking at existing planning, and existing resources and this is where he always began. He found the idea of continuous workshops to reinvent strategic plans unnecessary and boring and found great excitement in forming teams and getting them to roll up their sleeves and get work done for results. In his teams, he made sure that everyone felt like a useful member, making the most of their best skills.
And so he rallied the Ministry teams to work on what had been planned before.
He got his Nairobi River team to bring out the strategic plans and the recommendations from studies that had been commissioned and carried by the Ministry and this formed the basis of the 10-point plan that was to oversee the Rehabilitation of the Nairobi River.
While you saw him on television, promising that one day, we would drink from the river, at home what we saw was how he worked through Vision. Our Dad used his imagination extensively in his work and really in everything he did. He didn’t use it in a whimsical way- he spent a lot of time in quiet contemplation and when he talked, whatever he said would ring with inspiration from envisioning how the lives of people would be positively impacted. He was always thinking about other people.
So for example, when he started working on this project, he brought home two DVDs: - one, had footage of the riparian lands along Nairobi River and the other had footage of waterways around the world, primarily Europe- places like the Netherlands. After the 9 o’clock news, he would play the DVDs and comment on what he was seeing and also ask whoever was watching with him -- oftentimes our Mother or myself – what we thought or he would explain things to us as we watched or make phone calls for clarifications. It went something like this: “look at the River and all this garbage! Are those pigs?” Can you see that there is no sewerage? People actually drink this water?”, he would say in disappointment. The images were quite bleak and what he was most concerned about was the quality of life and all the occupational hazards along the riparian areas. This is where sewerage was being emitted frequently, whether from abattoirs upstream or from the mechanical activity up the road or the plastics and rubbish that was dumped into the river.
On other days, he would be focusing on the quality of the water and start a conversation to educate us on the origins of the Nairobi River and listing all the tributaries that flowed into the River. Sometimes, and this is what made him so fascinating, he would be giving a free lecture- that’s how it felt to me at least. I remember wondering, how does he know so much. I also remember him being a voracious reader and always saying “you have to read.”
So what he would do was paint a picture of what was possible in his mind and he would do this by watching the DVDs of waterways in countries that had adopted technologies that were environmentally sustainable and provided positive public externalities, he consulting widely with everyone and anyone. I remember when he gave out his phone number to the public to call him. I never saw him not answer or return a call. His bodyguard Mwangi always made sure that he informed him of calls and he always called back. So we could be having lunch on Sunday, and someone would call to complain about the smell of the sewerage in Lavington and within 30 minutes, he would have called the person to whom he would delegate that responsibility, and then he would call back the person who had called him and make a commitment, like “Call me next week at the same time and tell me if it has changed. It should have changed by then”. I was in his presence many times when people called to thank him for taking swift action. He was all about results and making a difference in the lives of people and by people, I mean individuals and communities- not some amorphous idea of people.
He had the personal stories of those he interacted with throughout his work to refer to because he took the time to hear their stories.
When he planned cleaning up the riparian areas, his concern was what would happen to the homeless people that lived along the river. From our home in Ridgeways, he used the globe cinema roundabout to get to work every morning so he saw the squalor of homeless people who bathed in the river and slept on the river bed and his thinking was to design spaces for people to set up kiosks and spur some economic activity in a way that was in harmony with the environment and could also create some employment. He had youth recruited through the Nairobi City Council- many of whom were living in the streets - to earn an income by participating in the clean-up exercises. He identified this site as an area where Nairobians could come and immerse themselves in nature and rest and relax in the heart of the city, without a care or worry of crime.
When he left us on February 21, 2012, he had made good on his promises to us all regarding what would happen to the Nairobi River.
I want to end this tribute by sharing something that he said on the night he had a stroke in London that sums up who he was for us all. It was just before Christmas and he had insisted on coming to London to spend Christmas with me, where I was based at the time. I was having dinner with a group of girlfriends and I looked at my phone and saw 16 missed calls from Mwangi his bodyguard. There was an emergency and we had to rush to the hotel. One of my friends said she would come with me and one look at dad and we realized something had happened though it was not clear what it was. From there we proceeded to the hospital and while they were taking his vitals in triage, one nurse was antagonizing him about his sugar levels, which he did not like talking about as he was diabetic. So he was about to read him the riot act as a Minister, when he just surrendered to them, and so passed his card on to Chipo. Chipo is an actress and has a very particular way about her and so she looked at the card and said “Hon. John Njoroge Michuki, MP, EGH”…What does EGH stand for? And he looked at her and said, “Elder of the Golden Heart…It means that you must dispense your duties with a Golden Heart.”
And indeed, he did. He was an honorable, great man. An Elder with a Golden Heart. And so we are truly delighted that he is being recognized for all that he did for us all. Rest on in peace Dad and thank you for everything.
