Chinese should face the law for flogging Kenyan

A Chinese citizen (pictured) is in the news for all the wrong reasons. In a leaked video, the Chinese Restaurant manager is seen whipping a Kenyan man who, it is claimed, reported for work late.

The mistreatment has attracted the ire of Kenyans who want the assailant punished.

But what is annoying is that this is not the first time a Chinese is seen publicly mistreating Kenyans.

In 2015, a Chinese restaurant in Nairobi was in the news for barring black people from accessing it. This caused public uproar that led to the closure of the restaurant, ostensibly because the management operated without a work permit.

Three years later, a Chinese businessman had the audacity to hurl racist slurs at none other than President Uhuru Kenyatta.

There was also the complaints of racial discrimination against Kenyan workers under the SGR banner in 2018 after a video detailing mistreatment was leaked. Kenyan workers complained they were not allowed to share laptops, tables, toilets or vans with the Chinese nationals. Besides working long hours, their pay was said be lower compared to their Chinese counterparts.

Needless to say, most Chinese working in Kenya are wonderful people. But clearly, there a few rotten eggs that believe Kenyans are inferior people.

Racist and dehumanising treatment have no place among a people who engaged in a bloody war against the Britons to win back their independence and dignity. We might be poor, but we hold our heads high.

Thankfully, the Chinese embassy has regretted the latest incident and called for the law to take its course. That’s how it should be.

Kenyans who step out of line in China are punished according the law of the land. That is is what should happen here. The suspect should be taken to court, and punished according to our laws, if found guilty. Deporting him ,as happened in the case of the Chinese who insulted our president, is letting him off with a slap on the wrist.