Time to Wake up is Now before Kenya is Lost to our Kids

This article was compiled from tweets posted by Georgie Ndirangu.

“I’d like you for a moment to imagine you were in the Naivasha-Karai road carnage. You’re a typical Kenyan middle class family with a good job, sustainable income, your kids attend a reasonable private school & you have reliable medical cover for you and your family, from a reputable insurance firm like Resolution health, GA or Jubilee.

Imagine yourself driving a sleek SUV with your family going back home to Nairobi after traveling to a family function in say Nakuru. Of course, you always use private transport because the public transport system is “chaotic, unruly & unreliable“, so we think. Then, traffic piles up, you hear a loud bang and see a huge ball of fire coming your way at break neck speed.

Before you know what is happening, your vehicle gas tank explodes and all of you get severely burnt. Some bodaboda guys – guys we always despise try to salvage the situation but cannot do anything much.

Somehow, you manage to get out of the rubble that used to be your treasured car alive with 75% burns on your body, but your family die instantly. You’re taken to the nearest hospital, Naivasha Level 5, a public hospital. Your medical cover isn’t of much help.

On arriving at the hospital in sub/unconscious state, you realize the doctors are on strike & being a long weekend they’ve travelled to their upcountry homes. Even if they were to be human, they cannot be there in an hour or so.

As if that’s not enough the hospital’s capacity is strained. The beds in the wards aren’t enough & some patients are even sleeping on the floor. The ICU where critically ill patients like you should be has few beds & they’re full. Meanwhile, your relatives are being treated to blame games.

They realize the lorry ferrying the explosive chemicals was using the wrong road. Never mind it had passed many police officers on that road before the accident. Your relatives too realize that the accident was caused by some ill placed bumps that weren’t marked.

Never mind that there are those charged with the responsibility of ensuring roads are built up to safety standards & the bumps are painted as well as warning signs placed a few meters before. They wish the public hospital that you’ve been admitted had enough medicine including the powerful pain killers like Morphine, they wish the wards had enough beds, they wish the ICU had enough beds & machines they wish the medics weren’t on strike, they wish the number of medics was more than we currently have & wish that all other facilities like ambulances were intact but theirs is just that; wishful thinking!

Now, I know you’re wondering why this long torturing story. You know, many times some of us make political updates on social media that are oftentimes quite uncomfortable to many. Majority of you hate politics & can all agree that politics is dirty. When some of us try to hold the ruling government to account your posts aren’t understood by the same masses whom we seek to awaken their consciousness through social media.

The masses think we are “playing politics” – whatever that means or we plainly hate the government of the day. They think that the matters we raise are driven by malice, a political agenda or maybe we are sympathizers of the opposition. What was intended to be a sober debate that seeks to expose the problems ordinary Kenyans face degenerates into a hurling of words contest between sycophantic government and opposition supporters, each accusing the other of “politicizing” important issues or how the issue is being used to gain political mileage.

https://twitter.com/georgiendirangu/status/811804175164198912

https://twitter.com/georgiendirangu/status/811804405980917760

https://twitter.com/georgiendirangu/status/811804646079598592

https://twitter.com/georgiendirangu/status/811804756675067904

https://twitter.com/georgiendirangu/status/811804902892695554

Through online advocacy, we seek to make the public aware of the mess they find themselves in & who is responsible for that. The most heartbreaking thing is seeing a Kenyan look at you & think you have some personal vendetta against the ruling class.

These Kenyans think you’re being a pessimist, a rebel without cause. Or just a wild card with internet access. They fail to understand why only you alone cannot see the many good things happening to/in the country like how we are building the SGR, or how the economy is growing by 6%, how international investors want to invest in Kenya (even if many are leaving in droves) how roads are being constructed & electricity is being taken to the villages. In this discussion, costs of these projects won’t feature & an attempt to bring the cost issue is met by the same political rhetoric I mentioned above.”

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Many Kenyans share the same sentiments as Georgie but very few are ready to take a step to claim what is rightfully theirs, to put their leaders to task and to call for accountability with sycophancy and tribalism being a great hindrance to this.

Juma Fred only compiled this article and does not take credit for the views in the article.