Until lions have their own historians, tales of the hunt shall always glorify the hunters.” That is something I read a long time ago. And although I have forgotten the context in which I read it, I know of a scenario in which it fits almost too perfectly.
Over the years, at least those years that I have been conscious of what has been happening around the country, I have seen, and I am sure you have too, many politicians die while in office. Most of them died in freak accidents like Helicopter crashes, Plane crashes, and car accidents. I am human and therefore sympathized with the families of those afflicted. I empathized with what they went through after the loss of their loved ones. And in those rare cases where the deceased were actually potentially good leaders, something twisted in my stomachs especially in the understanding that it is the worst kind of politicians that were instead alive.
It is the same old script when politicians die in this country. People mourn, raise funds, say nice things and then bury the poor guy. Then the real business begins in the name of succession politics. Brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, sons and daughters show up and show interest in the parliamentary seat. They fight amongst themselves and the one considered as the favourite of the dead guy when he was alive gets the go-ahead to run on the same party as the deceased. This is usually a sure thing as they never lose, reason; sympathy votes.
I have for so long cursed those who have waste their votes in the name of sympathy. Honestly, I think they are naïve simpletons whose thoughts have been institutionalized in political dynasties.
A politician’s dies and his wives receive millions in fund raising to help in the burial process. The government comes in and gives them a KES 10 million cheque because these guys have life insurance. To many of you out there, that is as good as it can get but for these guys, it’s not quite enough. They come together, and whether through consensus or coercion, choose a family member who will run for that very seat. They call this continuity and like the fools we have been for the better part of the last 45 years, we vote them back in. The only continuity that takes place thereafter is that the over half a million KES in salary goes to the same family. Period.
The 2007 elections had its good moments before the violent anticlimax. I remember musing with pride as the first, then the second, and finally the third of president Moi’s sons bit the dust in the elections. Their father’s political patronage fiasco had been soundly crashed and that made my day. This was symbolic to me because it was what I would base my arguments on whenever I wrote or spoke on change in leadership. This was a trend that I hoped would catch on but that was naivety on my part. Time after time again, people have voted in relatives of the deceased because of sympathy.
And here is my problem in all this is that we are carrying ourselves as if only a few select families are destined to be the political leaders of this country. As we speak, this president, who has been a failure in all respects of the word, is positioning his son to carry his mantle. A mantle that is drenched in the blood of post election violence, corruption, and dead institutions. And that is my point when I talk of lions and hunters. To this day, these people have never helped this country at all yet from what they shout at podiums; you would think we are a developed country. That is the reason I don’t do rallies. If I were to go to one, I swear I will force my way to the podium and tell this whole lot off. They claim how they are the best hunters out there and yet we have never seen any lion that they have killed.
And here is my challenge to you. Whenever one of these politician types die… the script should be as follows.
Send your apologies to the family and mean them. “I am really sorry about your loss; he was a good guy who did not steal too much.” You can leave the stealing part out but I had to write it. Let them know that you are there to help in whatever way as they go through this difficult time. But when the burial process is over and done with, walk away. But since you will not have gone far enough by the time they settle on who will run for the seat, they will come to you and seek to abuse your sympathy by playing the victim so that you can part with a vote. I have seen this on TV and I am not quite sure how to write it down but I will try. When they call upon you to vote for them, act clueless. “I am sorry, remind me again, I forget. Who are you? Have we met before?” Extend that to retirees too. When they retire, their wives, sons, daughters, step sons, brothers, sisters and mistresses usually show up from nowhere and then you vote for them. Say No! You don’t even know who they are… hence my question. Have we met?
Even though that may be construed as rude, it is not. It sounds rude on TV but that’s TV. In reality, these are the questions that we should be asking. By asking who you are, I do not want to hear that you are the wife, son, brother, sister, aunt, lost cousin or mistress of the deceased politician. I want to know what qualifications you have, your track record, the reason you are running and hell, I want a comprehensive manifesto of what you promise to do and how you think you can achieve it. Just to make your life difficult, I will ask you what makes you better than the deceased. And if the deceased was corrupt, I will even throw in the question; are you your father’s son? And then mumble something about the apple not falling not far from the tree.
And here is the truth that we are all scared of saying or for whatever reason shy away from saying. When people die or retire and their sons and daughters suddenly show up from wherever they have been hiding to run for these seats; these sons and daughter are not coming in to serve you. They are coming in to protect their economic turf, the wealth they have garnered (read stolen) while their relative was in office. That is all there is to it. That is the reason I was happy when Moi’s sons lost and still the very reason I will never vote for you if you are in anyway related to the person who vacated the seat. And look around; all we have been doing since independence is recycle surnames. And logic tells me that you recycle things that you have already used. These people have never been of any use to us and yet we keep recycling their surnames by voting in their relatives. When shall it end?
Look around and tell me who among the top brass of politicians is not there courtesy of a dead relative, or a retired, or one who is about to retire. Are we so dense that we can have only a few families recycle leadership amongst themselves? If we were anywhere near South Korea, I would not be complaining; but with every year that goes by, it seems that we are going further and further as these lot try to outshout each other on who the better hunter is yet none has killed anything. There is no food on the table at the end of the day. For 45 years, two generations of these select families have robbed us dry and have used the system, and tribal innuendos to keep us busy thinking that they are doing something; or worse, that they are the ones who can get us out of the quagmire. It is the same old story and it is about time we recognize it and do something about.
They have had the money and influence all along to tell their story. They have distorted this story depending on the leverage it can potentially get them, and to this date, the same story that they are the mighty hunters with special abilities is still being peddled. I am yet to see a dead lion; but in the mean time, the true hunters are in South Korea and most of Asian countries. They killed their tigers are now proudly wear the title of Asian Tigers. We claim that we have killed our lions and yet we are epitome of what not to do because we reek of everything that is wrong with leadership. Instead of killing the lions of poverty, unemployment, and disease; all their arrows have missed their targets and have ended up hitting you and me and we have died in big numbers. And my theory is that an unskilled hunter who has missed most of his targets for the better part of his career as a hunter has no business having his son as the apprentice. Under the guise of sympathy, we have consistently replaced bad hunters with worse hunters and hence the growing deterioration of affairs in this country today.
Please; no more sympathy votes. Do not encourage these people. When a politician dies and their relatives count on your sympathy to vote them back in, send a message with an overwhelming vote against them. Consider your own story. If, God forbid, you die; will the state give your son your old job? Will it give you KES 10 million as life insurance? Will it help your family with all your burial costs? And even if you did not work for the state; can private firms do this? The answer is NO to each of these questions. Who feels sympathy for you when your loved one dies? Does that sympathy get you a well paying job with ridiculously big allowances? These people have it good and want to continue having it that good by trading on sympathy. They leave whatever it is and in a few weeks time change careers to be politicians without a clue in the world on what it means to be in that office and serve people. Regardless of who died or retired; ask the right questions and get the right man or woman for the job. They are out there…
Winston Churchill wrote that “Today our concern must be with the future. For the world is changing. The old era is ending; the old ways will not do… It is a time, in short, for a new generation of leadership – new men to cope with new opportunities.”
And now I am writing this: let us change the rules of the game altogether. Let us proclaim ourselves the hunters and the political dynasties the lions that need to get killed.
