life's a circus

By Ted Malanda

When informality borders on disrespect

I spent the better part of August 4 flipping across television channels. Of course I knew poll results for the constitutional referendum wouldn’t be meaningful till the a day later but what the heck, it never hurt to be an early bird.

One station was interviewing the Kenyan National Human Rights Commission Boss. Then out of the blue, the host, a young lass not much older than 30, says, “Thank you for coming to the studio, Florence.” Florence? Was she referring to Commissioner Florence Simbiri-Jaoko, the stern-faced former magistrate who calls the shots at the KNHRC?

Maybe I’m just old fashioned but in my view, the only person authorised to say, “Thanks, Florence,” is Jaoko himself, an honour he earned after penning her endless love letters to coax her into allowing him to send serious elders to negotiate a few things with her clan.

Boot camp

But worse was to come. Flipping over to another station, a newscaster, also not much older than 30, gazed into the camera and said, “We will take you to Kajiado where ‘Nkaiseri’ has just cast his vote.” That almost made me drop out of my chair. For Christ’s sake, ‘Nkaiseri’ is a retired two-star army general, a Member of Parliament and the assistant minister in charge of National Defence!

In my view, the only people who can call him ‘Nkaiseri’ are a smattering of elders in his Maasai heartland, the men he faced the knife with and those he did boot camp with as a military cadet, long before the newscaster in question was born.

I was still fulminating at this impertinence when the same newscaster said, “And now to Ongata Rongai, where ‘Saitoti’ has just cast his vote.” Was he referring to the same Saitoti who is a professor of abstract maths, former vice president and the current minister in charge of Internal Security?

You hear a great deal of this casual stuff on television and radio to the extent of people referring to ‘Kibaki’ and ‘Moi’ as one would of old classmates. I guess it’s a modern thing, calling people by their first names. Unfortunately, you only do that when the President leans over and says, “Forget about ‘Your Excellency’ – Hakuna haja. Just call me Emilio!” But that’s something he would only tell Mzee Njenga Karume, not a newscaster with two hairs on his chin.
But it’s not just a news thing. I once accompanied a friend to give a lecture at a private school. And as she talked, the children kept chatting among themselves like she didn’t exist, inflaming the old school master in me beyond measure.

Visibly shaken

When I interrupted and called the class to order, I noticed that the teachers were visibly shaken. Apparently, those children were too ‘posh’ to be chastised by their ‘poorly paid’ teachers.
Well, ‘modern’ as America is, President Obama may be nobody’s Excellency but everyone stands up when he strides into a room to strains of ‘Hail the chief’

life's a circus

Related Topics

Popular this week

Latest Stories

The Standard Insider

Digger Classified

DIGGER MOTORS

DIGGER JOBS

DIGGER REAL ESTATE

GET OUR NEWSLETTER

CONNECT WITH US

FOR THE LATEST JOB ADVERTS

DIGGER JOBS

Digger Motors

Digger Real Estate

life's a circus

Related Topics

Trending Now

Popular this week

Latest Stories

The Standard Insider

Digger Classified

DIGGER MOTORS

DIGGER JOBS

DIGGER REAL ESTATE

GET OUR NEWSLETTER

CONNECT WITH US

FOR THE LATEST JOB ADVERTS