The New Constitution: Part I

As we get ready for a new constitution i would like to hear some suggestions ‘wananchi’ may have. These are purely patriotic suggestions or questions that you may have. Tribe, political parties may be left at the door. Thanks.

1. Executive PM, Ceremonial President- How realistic is it for the president to be elected by the majority of the population only for the powers of the government to be concentrated on the PM. Can we trust the MP’s to elect a PM? What will be the horse trading involved. Personally i have no faith in our MP’s being involved in the process. I think that the people should elect the executive prime minister and also the president. If we get the ceremonial president, he or she should just be head of state and should nit share any responsibilities in governing; something like the Israel model.

2. We should maintain the current MP’s and i don’t want to hear about a lower and upper house. If we implement those then we should cap the salaries to a maximun $1,000. Politics is not a career rather a service to the nation. Kenyans have come to view parliamentary seats as a means of wealth…of course who wouldn’t considering they end up making more that $300,000 a year…its like working at Goldman Sachs without producing any results. When is the last time parliament produced a bill that has been beneficial to the country? Any bill passed is all abut power sharing while the real issues are ignored.

3. We need a compensation committee for parliament. This should be a non-partisan group consisting of the government, independents, lawyers, civil society and common mwananchi that looks into MP salaries, recommends raises and limits any excessive greed. It pains me to see greedy illiterate old men sock away fortunes while not representing interests of the common man.

4. Provincial administrators need to stay…we need those PC’s, DC’s, DO’s and chiefs. This is a way of decentralizing the main government. Villagers need to talk to the chief when problems occur and escalate it up the chain of command. What will happen if we eliminate these structures? PC’s should be something of regional administrators while dc’s should be incharge of subregions e.t.c. The reforms we need in the provincial administration include:
-They should be professionals and not political appointees- They should possess college education, should have administration experience e.t.c
-We need to reduce the number of districts and divisions- what happened to the days we only had 42 districts? We don’t need a million divisions and should reduce the administration night mares by having self-sufficient areas? I don’t see why we should split a district into 3 new districts only to have no services for the residents?

5. We need to reduce the number of ministries and ministers and eliminate the post of assistant ministers. Each ministry should be headed by a professional person who we could call Minister or Secretary e.g Secretary of Health. Using my example, the secretary of health should have experience in the health care field..e.g Doctor, Public Health Official, Nurse, Midwive e.t.c…they should have made considerable contributions to the field….i don’t want to see some ex-makanga heading the ministry due to political connections. The minister or secretary shall be assisted by an undersecretary( formerly known as Permanent Secretary) who will be an expert in policy making. The Undersecretary coordinates with the Secretary to implement policies to run the ministry.

6. The Cabinet will be led by the executive leader who will meet with the secretaries who will present the ideas or solutions their ministries are implementing to help the governments agendas.

7. Parliament shall have a certain number of MP’s to be decided by constitutional border review. There will be minimum qualifications to be an MP. College education, ability to write, speak and read English and Swahili. This is a new Africa and we can’t keep on insisting that a college education requirement is discriminatory. That way we would have kept many idiots from running down the country. Prospective candidates shall not be involved in any scandals, deals, entangled in court cases and shall be required to be cleared by a vetting committee before being allowed to run for parliament. If barred due to previous associations, one shall need to be declared innocent by the same committee after investigations. Its ridiculous that we have MP’s who are caught on television stoning others and yet we trust such idiots to write the law.

8. Anybody who wants to be elected to any constitutional enacted office shall meet minimum qualifications e.g college education, language fluency e.t.c. I am still embarrassed by some person who was supposed to be the mayor of Nairobi who would often say, ” I am the maiya and you are kanjuras(Councillors). Imagine a world convention of mayors and the individual is seated between Mayor Bloomberg(NY) or Newson(SF). How does he convince them that Nairobi is the place to be for tourism?

9. There will be a Chief Justice who will lead the Supreme Court and a certain number of justices. The CJ and Associate judges shall be chosen by the executive and will need confirmation by parliament. Individuals chosen shall have the necessary qualifications and experience and independent. They will have lifetime appointments. Then we shall have the High Court and District Courts. The Judges/Magistrates will be also confirmed by parliament with a majority vote after being approved by a parliamentary committee.

10. There will be parliamentary committees for purposes of approving nominations for ministers/secretaries, judges/magistrates e.t.c…What other positions need confirmations? Committees will also approve bills that need to be presented before parliament.

To Be continued…Let me hear what you people have to say.

 

Do We Need a New Constitution?

According to a report in the East African Standard, it seems the dragon called Constitutional Review is back again to haunt us. The committee of experts assigned to the talk seems to have come up with a draft but it appears that there are still questions and arguments on whats the right forward. The conflict of interest seems to be based on the current partisan politics which threatens to derail the reforms. As usual we are looking at it in terms of PNU, ODM, KANU, Muslims, Christians e.t.c; now that’s is an interesting way to look at things. Its said that the new laws will be designed to govern Kenya which is laughable since our justice and application of law is selective which leaves me to the ask, ” Do we need a new constitution?”

For starters we have had a constitution for 46 years that we disregard in our every day life. So what makes us think that once we get new laws we are going to follow them. Laws are made to be followed and to govern a citizenry but do we  really do that?  We don’t follow simple laws of the land like traffic laws, building laws e.t.c.  Other examples include not following ownership, marriage, child rights e.t.c.  If we are unable to do all this then why bother with new laws?

And what part of the constitution do we want to change? And talking about we, who is involved in this new constitution? It seems that the ordinary citizen have been deemed stupid and that’s why politicians seem to have hijacked the process. The parts of the constitution that are destined for change have to do with power grabbing, political control, power sharing, power glorification e.t.c. Therefore, we in the process refers to the partisan politicians who dictate what they feel will be beneficial to their interests and not the common ‘mwananchi’. At the end of the day the question is who will benefit the most. Bomas,  was supposed to be an all-inclusive affair but it was just elites trying to establish domination over the masses. No one looked at the real interests of the people. In my opinion, the constitution changes should be voted upon by eligible voters during the election ; something that Californians call Proposition. After that the parliament should vote on it and 67%  approval is needed before becoming law.

As we fight for the constitution, i feel that we need to improve on our situation. We need to improve health care, education, housing, roads, job market e.t.c. Who needs a new constitution when we still have malaria, cholera, diarrhea killing us? Who needs a new constitution when running water is lacking and child hood disease roams the land? Who needs a new constitution when the police still execute citizens, take bribes , collaborate with thieves to kill us? Who needs a new constitution when the government that swore to protect us allows stupid Ugandans to piss all over us in Migingo?  Ugandan troops in Kenyan territory humiliating Kenyans every day? Or what is it with bandits from Somali crossing over and killing our citizens?  Or what is it that corrupt Kenyan officials have issued passports, identification cards to foreigners who may be planning to one day attack us? We probably have terrorists running around with Kenyan documents and one day they will carry out their activities on Kenyan soil  just because some underpaid government bureaucrat got a Kshs. 5,000 bribe. We are so lacking that we have sold the rights of the mother land.

With those unaddressed issues, i don’t think we need now new constitution and whats the deal with the committee of experts and foreign experts? Foreign experts should catch the next flight back home since we need home-grown solutions suited for us. And this committee of experts is just an excuse by the academia to dictate the will of the politicians on the hapless masses. Religious groups are the only party i trust in these talks since we need God, Allah in the mix ; everybody else is untrustworthy.  The experts are part of the elite who think Wanjiku or mama mboga are too shady to participate in determining the future of their country. Just because you are titles include  LLM or PHD doesn’t make you the expert and final say.

Until we have satisfied the basic need of the population, we don’t need  no new constitution. Wanjiru should first be protected by the existing laws before we add a new bunch that we won’t be able to follow. And we should stop wasting time and money on issues that don’t help the common citizenry.

Round Up.

1. British aristocrat Thomas Cholmondeley is finally set free thanks to out retarded president who thinks that 7,000 Kenyans need to be pardoned for their crimes. Why do we abuse presidential pardons? And why does a murderer get away with just serving 5 months? He should have stayed in there.  Mr.President will you please shut up and let the criminals serve their sentences? Another 7,000 back to the streets to harass, steal and kill.

2. And seems Ruto is gunning for 2012? Why are we still talking about presidential elections instead of concentrating on whats happening on the ground?

 

Proliferation of anonymous hate; Hiding behind the screen

Hate.

Today i explore the issue of anonymous hate that seems to have taken over the Kenyan online world , an indicator on the level of hate that exists in the Kenyan community. We are blessed to have some tech savvy enterpreneurs, who have created online forums where we can discuss issues facing us. But as we say pre and post December 2007, hate and smear was carried to new level and some websites were suspended due to  hateful statememets that were being posted . The internet had turned into a hate base where Kenyans attacked each other based on tribe. We forgot we were Kenyans and engaged each other as Luo, Kikuyu, Kalenjin, Kamba e.t.c. We cheered the deaths in Kenya, we encouraged headings, burnings and all sorts of activities all in the name of politics. Never in my life had i seen so much hate.The activities that took place post December 2007 should be a lesson that hate is a dangerous creatature. Not only was it seen in online forums but also vernacular radio stations.

2009.

Lets fast forward our thoughts to the current day. You would think that Kenyans have learned lessons but as i check out various Kenyan online communities i still gasp for breath. People are still STUPID, BLIND & ARROGANT. Here are listings of various comments or posts that Kenyans still post. Some of them are offensive and you would how any wise man or woman would ever think of  such things. We are still letting out tribal instincts lead us and forgetting that first and foremost we are Kenyans.

• Ida Odinga to Mboch for Michelle Obama,
• Raila weeps after Obama BANS him from Whitehouse
• Oburu Odinga fail to heal after facing the knife
• BREAKING NEWS: Kibaki appoints his tribes man police commissioner
• kyuk can be monied and in state house but mavi kabisa

The above statements are just a common day in the Kenyan Blogosphere. Its rather amazing that sane people have the guts to propagate tribal hatred after all we went through in 2007. Despite numerous pleas to maintain civility such efforts have not borne fruit. It seems the more controversy in the websites the more the moderators encourage it. Why can’t such characters banned?

Kenyans…Kenyans….Its high time we woke up and saw each other as brothers and think about the future of our motherland and the generations to come. The politicians will encourage you to fight but one those arrows start burning they will be running to Luxembourg, Switzerland and other shelters as you slaughter and finish each other. Lets stop the stupidity and be proud to be Kenyan.

 

Stupid Kenyan…

Welcome to StupidKenyan or should i say Stupid Kenyans. Apparently this is not a polite title but as a Kenyan born and raised patriot, its disturbing that for 43 years we are not yet  Uhuru(Independent). We have spiraled into an abyss of self destruction and December 2007 was one of the final chapters.  I have lived in and out of Kenya but my heart and mind are still captivated by the motherland. I can’t stand any longer and see us leading to destruction.

Why the title Stupid Kenyan? I think Kenyans never had and will never have a foresight of our future. We have turned into hyenas and vultures where we eat and vomit on our own feet. We don’t consider that man comes and goes and has to preserve the land for future generations. Its all about eating or its the turn for our tribe to eat. We have no conscious about the environment or even education. We are corrupt to the bone and Julius Nyerere described as a “man eat man” society. We are hungry, greedy and inconsiderate and only act when we have self destructed. We have no pity for fellow men and its all about the money.

I am not trying to be harsh but how do you explain scenarios that have happened in Kenya. How do you explain that we are having the worst drought in decades just because some buffoons allocated forests and trees were cut down? Who imagined that Lake Nakuru would one day almost dry up since the feeder rivers originating from Mau forest have dried up? How do you explain that defective condoms have found way into the market and we don’t care that some may have acquired HIV because some corrupt gooks bribed the quality inspectors? How do you explain that Somali’s have taken over Kenya and bought land everywhere and proliferated illegal arms and even terrorism in the country? How do we explain that Mau Mau veterans are homeless while the home guards own zillions of acres that they grabbed? How does a foreigner come into Kenyan and gain a passport and identification card while a natural born Kenyan in North Eastern Province can’t get work or go to college since they lack the documents. God i know you are out there and you see everything but i think we are worse than Sodom and Gomorrah.

How did we go to extents of killing our neighbors in December 2007? What sane person hacks their neighbor or even burns women and children hiding in a church? Why do we pay millions to an anti-corruption czar who has prosecuted nobody in all those years he has been drawing the paycheck? Why do we have Members of parliament drawing millions like they work for a Wall Street firm when most of those bums are illiterate and have grabbed every part of the country? What important legislation have they passed that helps the citizenry? Why have people looted millions from government organizations and are walking with carefree spending? What government allows its strategic food reserves to dwindle and citizens can’t even afford maize flour?  Its the 21st century and water and electricity are luxuries…where did God go wrong when he created the African? Our health care sucks such that government officials prefer to fly out for medical care? Health care sucks and it amazes me that we still have Cholera, Tuberculosis as  nuisances when they can be eliminated with simple solutions. Whats the use of public health officials, educators, doctors when the government lacks health care?  Why don’t we act when people import substandard drugs all in the name of quick bucks and disregard those who will be prescribed such drugs?

Kenyans we are stupid.We have let the rich rip us and we don’t hold our government accountable. Parliament is trying to act but this is just an act. The Kenyan parliament is a den of thieves, murderers and society rejects. We have let corruption trickle all the way to the bottom. We have let our borders be porous and compromised our security. Laws in Kenya are just on paper for the show. Explain to me how a piece of land or property can be sold to ten people all at once. Where is the land ministry? Why do we have a million ministries and yet we have no policies on anything except corruption.Kenyans are simply lacking in morals and integrity. We took things for granted and we shall need a big broom and dedicated time to rectify the situation. My blog is not meant to blame but to attack and encourage people to see the vision and preserve the motherland. Till then God Bless Kenya.