Prophets will keep popping up from unexpected places

Generosity is the hallmark of the Christian as Jesus challenges his followers ‘freely you have received; freely give’ (Mt 10:8). However, he also warns them about making a song and dance out of their contributions and parading their good deeds before people, ‘do not sound a trumpet as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets so that they be honoured. They have already received their reward in full. Do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing so that your giving may be in secret’ (Mt 6:1-4).

Our politicians seem to have selective amnesia in this regard because every media house is enlisted to record for posterity their lavish giving. The Deputy President appears to have a particular penchant for donating in this fashion and last weekend he was back in the Coast region where he gave Sh5 million for a church from himself and his ‘mdosi’ (Boss).

This event followed the recent Ufungamano National Dialogue Reference Group meeting that stated emphatically, ‘religious leaders should not accept public donations or contributions from elected or appointed political leaders or state officers that are given with fanfare.

Contributions from such persons should be anonymous and personal like those of all other worshippers’. Such directives have clearly not impacted on the grassroots nor are they likely to be anything but a pious aspiration. 

 Suspicious donations

The lure of money is too big a temptation for most people of the cloth and politicians know it. The price for benefiting from such suspicious donations is of course silence or at best polite corrections. For those on the outside looking in, it means faiths have lost their credibility and prophetic role and are ignoring their own advice since the same Ufungamano Communiqué stated, ‘Religious institutions should not be seen as channels for sanitising corrupt individuals’. 

Put another way, religious bodies just like the private sector can hardly be depended upon to overhaul society since they are part of the status quo and benefit too much from the current flawed value system. Don’t expect much either from Civil Society Organisations that have found their own comfort zones and are happy to settle there. 
Yet God will always sends prophets and they are more likely to be found in the marketplace than in the houses of worship; in the fields rather than the boardrooms.

The well heeled Senators discovered this last week when they went to the North Rift to take the Senate to the people. They planned a hearing on maize in Nandi County but their ears must have roasted when the farmers took to the floor and told them home truths. These were not young and loud activists but seasoned, mature elders hurting due to the corruption and mismanagement that has bedevilled the agriculture sector.

The Senators were told to their faces that they are the cartels destroying the maize industry and that while farmers struggle to send their children to school the political class take their children to Australia and Europe for their education. No protocols were observed and no titles like ‘Mheshimiwa’ mentioned; no ‘omba serikali’(beg the government) but blunt truth spoken to power in a prophetic manner.

Wastage and theft

Another glimmer of hope emerged this week when former Chief Justice Willy Mutunga was appointed an Ambassador for tax collection by Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA). The tax collectors however must have had second thoughts when Dr Mutunga called for the establishment of a commission of inquiry into the Sh5 trillion national debt; how it was incurred and how it was utilised.

Finance Cabinet Secretary Henry Rotich was not keen on the idea which in itself was very telling. However, the point the Dr was making is that how can we ask Kenyans to pay more tax when we know we are dropping our cash into a bottomless pit of corruption, wastage and theft. No new taxation until we have accountability. End of story. 

Prophets will keep popping up from the most unexpected places because the arc of the moral universe is long but it bends towards justice as Martin Luther King said. Which reminds me of the words of the prophet Moses to Joshua when he complained about Eldad and Medad (Numbers 11: 25-29) prophesying outside the official temple and religious group. Moses realising that he had no monopoly on prophesy or wisdom humbly replied, ‘would that all the people were prophets, that the Lord would put his spirit upon them’. Let that be our prayer. 

- [email protected] @GabrielDolan1