Third liberation will come if we align politics with our interests

By Henry Munene
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One of the most appalling observations about Kenyans and our curious brand of politics is that we feel nothing for ideology, logic, a critical perspective and just about everything that goes into brewing a healthy, balanced and factual national intellectual discourse.

We seem to have long lost the art of introspection, of soul-searching and asking ourselves where we missed the right path.

We care little about admitting that we could be part of the problem, after which we should wake up, dust off and forge ahead with renewed zeal and as one nation.

Instead, we are at any one time a country at war of words with everyone and no one in particular. We are adept at passing the buck and hurling epithets at each other, as if we are some innocent aliens just landed from planet Mars.

To the common man, the one who lines up outside factories in Industrial Area, Nairobi, for odd jobs, or the one who generally survives by the grace of God and from hand-to-mouth, the biggest problem with our country today is bad leadership. The county governments, the guy will furiously fulminate, are set to fleece this country because all they seem to care for are not jobs and better lives for the poor, but huge salaries for the county chiefs and a royal lifestyle for the governor and his executive team.

The county governments, on their part, think the national government and the Salaries and Remuneration Commission are to blame for the fact that they are not anywhere near beginning to alleviate the runaway poverty in the counties.

Even as reports indicate that they have spent a very small part of the cash allocated to them, these county governments will insist that more money must be pumped to the villages.

They will conveniently overlook the fact that more than 80 per cent of what they are getting from the National Treasury is being spent on salaries and tycoon lifestyles.

To add to the confusion, the national government will blame devolution for being too expensive to implement.

In fact as we speak, no economic and policy wonks are suggesting how we could leverage the cash flowing into the counties to boost production, exports and other way of making this country richer. So long as you can blame someone, everything is hunky-dory. The cacophony that passes for our politics is too raucous for our national health. Sometimes you wonder why we are so blind to see that irrespective of which party we support, we all suffer when we make no efforts to make our country more secure, prosperous and respected on the world stage; and spend all our energies on baseless exchanges.

Instead of strategically milking goodies from across the globe, we are divided between those who think we are a basket-case country (because they are out of power) and those will brook no criticism, hiding under the fact of our sovereignty (because they are in power).

So as the opposition strangely admits being bought by the ruling coalition, and as the ruling coalition bludgeons the media the NGOs – even the good ones that help the poor that the State has refused to see–the world is watching us.

What would be most comical if it was not so grave is the kind of ignorance displayed by the average Kenyan who is always caught in the cacophonous fight between CORD and Jubilee, among other useless duels.

Today, if a CORD supporter was given a loaf of bread by a Jubilee leader– and vice versa – they are likely to believe it if their party were to issue a statement that the said bread was just a piece of stone.

It is a dangerous situation to be in, dear Kenyans, as politicians and even countries in the East and West will continue to play us against each other for their strategic ends. And until we open our eyes, the third liberation will remain a pipedream.