This week, I have been vindicated in constantly seeking to have insecurity declared a national disaster and dealt with the force and resources commensurate with the enormity of the malaise.

As Kenyans villages mourn their dead, questions linger. At whose doorstep does the buck of runaway insecurity stop? What is being done to address the shortfall of boots on the ground to UN-recommended levels?

“I am calling upon all of you to come out and fight corruption, and agree to support the government in fighting corruption as our first priority.” These were the words of President Mwai Kibaki when he took office on Monday, December 30, 2002.

Anybody landing in Kenya would be forgiven for thinking the country is at war. There are voices of discord, posturing, supremacy contests and a flurry of litigation between various constitutionally-entrenched organisations and offices.

Is the Kenya Police Service becoming one of the riskiest jobs in Kenya today? Hardly have we exorcised ghosts of the Baragoi massacre than 21 others die under a hail of cowardly bullets in the lawless expanse between the Baringo and Turkana counties

From Ancient Greece and the city-state of Sparta, we got the longest-running sport, the Olympics and the Marathon. Successive generations of humankind have staged sporting events, some with a winner-take-all bent and yet others as tools of cohesion and expressions of camaraderie between neighbours.

“Fellow Kenyans, our nation has now successfully navigated the most complex General Election in our history. Our journey began three years ago, with the promulgation of a new Constitution, and ended eleven days ago, with a landmark Supreme Court decision.

When Kenya-born British singer and song-writer Roger Whittaker sang “Make Way For Man” in the album My Land Is Kenya (A Musical Safari) in 1984, poaching of wildlife was at an all-time high. Little did Whittaker know how true his melody rang as time has proved him right: Mankind is the greatest enemy of our wildlife heritage. Period.

This week has seen a large number of institutions of higher learning shut due to student unrest. It is like there is a new season requiring violent confrontation between students and authorities.

German philologist Friedrich Nietzsche once said; “All things are subject to interpretation whichever interpretation prevails at a given time is a function of power and not truth.”

Benjamin Franklin, one of America’s most celebrated politicians, once said: “Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.”

Kenya’s national executive is headed by President Uhuru Kenyatta who was democratically elected by Kenyans in March 2013. Kenya, therefore, has no vacuum and Kenyans have asked President Kenyatta to exercise their sovereign power.

This has been another sad week as more than 20 people died from taking illicit brews in Rift Valley. To make it more grave, a Form One student from Uasin Gishu County died while a Form Two student was admitted to hospital in Nyeri County after consuming a toxic brew.

This week saw two tumultuous events on the local and international scene.

It started with the Laptop project; then the Standard Gauge Railway project; we then moved to the Security Surveillance Project. Now, Parliament has blocked the new Mombasa-Nairobi pipeline project.

National Treasury Cabinet Secretary Henry Rotich presented the Jubilee Alliance’s second trillion-shilling Budget statement on Thursday.

Much of the world is now preparing for what is thought to be the biggest El Nino to have ever hit planet Earth. Local meteorologists say their forecasting shows an increasing likelihood of an El Nino next month, but then again, word on the street is that we have barely two weeks to the ”mother of all rains”.

In his work titled ‘The Spirits of the Laws’, French political sociologist Montesquieu wrote, “There is no greater tyranny than that which is perpetrated under the shield of the law and in the name of justice.”

American linguist and philosopher Noam Chomsky once said, “Everyone is worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there is really an easy way: Stop participating in it.”

Kenya has been an agricultural country and has relied much on farming to build its economy. However, it is unfortunate that the recently launched Economic Survey shows that there was a decline in the sector’s contribution to the economy last year.

Millions of Kenyans do not have identification documents that are key to accessing essential services — they cannot purchase a mobile phone sim card to open bank accounts because they lack these documents.

After independence, Kenya adopted a devolved system of governance quite similar to what we have today. However, mistrust and lack of political goodwill killed the devolution dream, but the country is now making a second stab to make it succeed

“First they came for the Socialists, and I did not speak out — Because I was not a Socialist. Then they came for the Trade Unionists, and I did not speak out — Because I was not a Trade Unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out — Because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me — and there was no one left to speak for me.”

Events experienced days ago following attack at a Likoni church exposed a wanting situation the Government needs to address urgently. As far as emergencies are concerned, Kenya has become a reactive rather than proactive nation. Plainly put, health reform has acquired a permanent bed at the Intensive Care Unit.

President Uhuru Kenyatta has initiated critical national debate to address spending in government. The President has led the Executive in taking a pay cut to reduce the country’s wage bill burden when executed all over government. Uhuru knows there is a problem.

If Kenyans were ever convinced on the need to support performing arts among the youth, it is at this moment in the country’s history. One of Kenya’s actress won the country its first ever Oscar award becoming the first black African woman to do so.

The key foundation to a country’s future is primarily anchored on the quality and affordability of education.

Freedom of worship and the free will to choose where to worship is enshrined in the Constitution. Christian evangelists invade our private and public spaces in schools, work place, on TV, and in crusades.

Developments at the International Criminal Court, (ICC) at The Hague during the ongoing trial of Kenyan leaders time and again exhibit blatant falsehoods by prosecution witnesses.

“The nation-building surge witnessed in Kenya during the first 15 years of Independence was remarked around the world. It was a mark not only of acceptable national leadership and management but also of Kenyans’ yearning to improve their standards of living …to be masters and architects of their own fate.”

Can the Uhuru administration promise the new leadership in Central Africa Republic teachers, nurses, artisans and bookkeepers to re-transit her war-battered nation to the 21st Century?

When Kenyans got together to celebrate the 50th year of independence on December 12 last year, it was evident that people did not look at what tribe they belonged to. Kenyans celebrated the jubilee fete without blowing the balloon that are the ethnic differences between them.

Development agenda is a merciless and exacting taskmaster.

Though it may seem cliché, agriculture remains a key aspect of Kenya’s economy and should be given priority in 2014. And I say ‘key’ because a country is like a marching army, for whom a growling stomach and yawning granaries/silos are a greater enemy than any armed adversary.

Medical practitioners who have sworn to uphold the Hippocratic Oath, reaffirming that life is worth living, and that they shall ensure “utmost respect for human life from its beginning”, have a sworn duty to safeguard life.

Last Thursday at 1am, the entire world came to some sort of standstill as South African President Jacob Zuma announced that former freedom fighter Nelson Mandela had passed on.

Jan Morris tells us “great minds have been fostered entirely by staying close to home. Moses never got farther than the Promised Land. Da Vinci and Beethoven never left Europe. Shakespeare hardly went anywhere at all”.

In the past week, the government launched the 100 Rapid Response Initiative as a support base for the ‘Nyumba Kumi’ initiative to help fight crime.

Every new Head of State or Government is the recipient of a poisoned chalice and cart full of expectations from friend and foe alike. Theirs stops being about mere governance and must minutely stare at the hourglass containing the sands of the quality of governance.

To start us off, please take note that the traffic cameras mounted within the Nairobi CBD are now fully operational.