Nairobians choice for leaders

By Edward Indakwa

Baringo County is a backwater – drub, arid and remote. Its people are humble pastoralists who live at the mercy of the elements, often ravaged by drought, famine and hunger.

Even without bothering with statistics, one imagines the levels of education, and access to healthcare and clean water, child mortality, per capita income and many of the statistics that the UN churns out to gauge standards of living are abysmal. But take a look at the people Baringo has lined up to brawl it out for Governor:

Aaron Tuikong is former Managing Director for Chemilil Sugar Company and Deputy CEO of Moi Africa Institute. He is an Agriculturalist. Simon Chelugui has an MBA and runs a multinational engineering firm that employs 120 people. Samson Kibii has a Masters Degree in Strategic Management and boasts of 20 years of service in the private and public sector.

Stanley Kiptis, a trade unionist, holds a Master of Business Management degree while Benjamin Cheboi, holder of a Master of Education degree, is the immediate former CEO of the Higher Education Loans Board.

These are the warriors, the fattened bulls, which the humble people of Baringo, who are dirt poor and not altogether too well educated, are sending to battle.

In Nairobi, the region’s economic and IT hub, Bishop Margaret Wanjiru leads in opinion polls, followed by Embakasi MP Ferdinand Waititu. They dwarf Dr Evans Kidero, who has run two corporate giants in East Africa and the tried and tested mzee John Gakuo. I’m beginning to think Nairobians deserve the zero planning, joblessness, hovels, potholes, traffic jams, filth and crime in their noisy city.