It is safe!

The youth, it has been said, are the fountain from which a new generation will sprout and lead the society into the Promised Land, wherever that land is. In many instances, the youth have been referred to as the modern Joshua who takes the baton from Moses and points the way to that misty future full of promise.

If you care to look at the broad spectrum of Africa, you will shudder at the Moses types from whom the youth must fashion a future. They are a motley mix of marauding Moses types who seem to have been molded in the wood of selfishness and fed into the fire of kleptomania. I am sure that Kwame Nkrumah is shuddering with Ghanaian rage and wondering if he lived in vain.

As with all days, there is always light after dark, and it is indeed darkest before dawn. Africa's finest hour seems to stem from its darkest moments. The bright light that is shinning through the cloud over Kenya has brought new meaning to the phrase; there is light at the end of the tunnel. 

There is this sweet, fifty year old lady who shares the food that is placed before the man they call Uhuru Kenyatta. The other day she dreamt of running a marathon. Then she runs a half marathon and before the excitement of that marathon had died down, she had completed eight-hours of non-stop running in the London Marathon.

While it is noble that she was doing it to  'raise money for the provision of 47 mobile clinics, through her 'Beyond Zero' charity that seeks to prevent early child deaths and improve maternal healthcare', it does not take the brain of an ugali chef to figure that she had better options before her. She could have passed around that huge begging bowl to the Chinese and all those counties would have had state of the art clinics before you said sukumawiki.

All she needed to do, dare I say, was to whisper sweet nothings into the ears of the most powerful man in Kenya.  That man would then summon all the powers invested in him and cause clinics to sprout wherever she deemed fit. Or better still, she could have evoked her membership to the first ladies of Africa and nudged their maternal instincts and thereby cause money to flow into the accounts of 'Beyond Zero'

Of all the options that were laid at her table, she chooses to run a marathon. A marathon!!!! Let it be known to one and all that running a marathon is not kuku business. I have run a marathon…. a half marathon. All that pounding on the road plays tricks on the mind and body and it is not a thing for the chicken hearted.

She put her body on the line for the sake of unfortunate mothers that are spread out in the far-flung corners of Kenya. Therein lies the light that shines through this decision, that I am sure was made when blood flashed through her brain. Therein lies that sacrificial spirit that Africa needs to progress beyond the pit of egotism that we are mired in.

Therein lies the stuff of which a modern day Moses is structured; the stuff that causes an individual to lift others up; to light up the face of a poor community; to give dignity to the process of populating this fair earth: to give of oneself in ways that is as challenging as it is tormenting; to gallivant all over London when one could easily muster the financial might of the Kenyan taxpayer in the pursuit of jewellery at Harrods.

Therein lies the magma like heat that can fashion an exemplary baton. The kind of baton that is as solid as it is legendary; the kind of baton that the modern day Joshua will firmly hold, lift up and declare to the world; the future is safe with us!

 

 

  

 

A dog without teeth

I will be the second last Ugandan to stand on corrugated iron sheets and declare, to all and sundry that education has no value in the life of a human being. In addition to being a socializing and engaging tool, education is the means by which the human ability can be mined into a treasure trove with infinite possibilities.

Monumental things can happen to the human potential when you marry the words education and system, and create education system. Suddenly that potential is measured by a particular set of beliefs, ideas, and customs. Sets of beliefs, ideas and customs, that are structured in far away lands.

We may have all the 'trappings' of a free people but our minds have been entombed by the empowering influences that float on the clouds from the west. We may have thrown off the dehumanising shackles of slavery, but we may never be able get a hold of that key that will free us from the prison that Bob Marley called mental slavery.

When I presented this issue to my conscience, my conscience pointed out that I seem to have carved out a dark hole and that I was intent on filling it up with more dirt. My conscience urged me to look on the bright side and that I should speak to my muse.

So, I spoke to my muse and we agreed on the type of educational system that would egg out the Ugandan potential and cause it to grow and bloom in the winds of the world.

We agreed, my muse and I, that our country should stop engaging in the unproductive pursuit of gathering students into laboratories in the vain hope that they will become scientists. Our education system should be based on our strengths and, as far as we were concerned, Uganda is blessed with agricultural potential.

The greenery that makes up this country has caused and continues to cause the chosen people of God to question the logic of planting them in a desert and making them feel blessed. To this day, according to sources close to my muse, they are intent on transferring our soils to their land. It is called modern day soil slavery.

Agriculture should make a comeback in the classrooms that are dotted all over this land. On second thoughts, the classrooms of this fair land should be planted in every farm, garden and backyard in every village, town, city and slum. That way, the children of this land will be able evoke the spirits of the soil and engage them in a money making dance.  A dance that is as everlasting as the word itself.

 Food is the one thing that will continually sustain man until the end of time. I know that the good book says that man should not live on bread alone, but a satisfied man is much harder to tempt.

Once we focus on agriculture, this world will stand up and acknowledge this tiny country as a world power. We may be small, but we can produce a food explosion of biblical proportions.

Picture this, if you will. In the next so many years, Uganda is declared a world power and is the only country that has veto power in the United Nations. It is the only country that will be able to deploy anywhere on earth, at very short notice, a fully equipped army that can solve the food problems that will beset nations.

Uganda will then dictate and spread agricultural democracy to every nook and cranny in the world. We shall set up dictators whose sole task will be to channel their resources to feed our agricultural might.  We shall imprison the minds of their young. We shall sell the idea that a white-collar job is ungodly. Our premise will be that dirt is part and parcel of humanity and especially that Ugandan dirt and mud is as blessed as blessed can be.

Wishful thinking? Yes, I know. You can bet your last shilling that this will, nay, this cannot happen. As a people and a country, we have readily bought the idea that we are inept. That, the land on which we walk and toil is only as good as it can be sold to accord us an opportunity to slave in the so-called capitals of the world.

In their wisdom, the Acoli, say, God gives bones to dogs without teeth. This refers to the epic madness of a man who is blessed and yet cannot mine his blessings. Methinks, Uganda is a classic example of a dog without teeth.