Once a-mugging, Always a-mugging: Ku #FikaDebate na @FreethinkersKE

What do you get when you handpick a gathering of fiercely opinionated, incredibly knowledgeable, supremely conscious beings and throw them at a topic? As was evident with the #FikaDebate on Twitter and Facebook this past Saturday, this formula yields an explosive Top Trend on the Kenyan micro-blogosphere.

I was fortunate to be present for a FIKA meeting on 9^th August 2013; seated directly opposite me on a couch across the room, a man – amongst men – who goes simply by Lord Vasquo, pitted his immense wit against mine. The subject was, as it turns out, as to whether perfection is achievable.

This was to be the second head-on clash Vasquo and I would be involved in, within less than a month of our first acknowledgement of each other’s disturbing existences.

Such an infinitesimal question, to which many would simply respond with a yes or no, caused an explosion the likes of whose inestimable damage was rather predictable: Lord Vasquo now has a great friend in me; because – I always say – you keep your brilliant arch-nemeses close enough to figure out where they stash their kryptonite.

A bit later in the meeting, a lady who calls herself Dagitari sat next to me, a chap named Eric completing the sandwich. On my right side, trench-coat and cigarette pack at hand, Bluetooth piece dangling from his ear, sat a man known only as Double S. Being as the topic had strayed to knowledge and use of Condoms by teenagers, I immediately pulled a Kamenchu on Dagitari:

Yule M-two: Did you know that I don’t wear underwear?

The rest, they say, is a story. One mind-blowing story; one that we are here not to discuss.

A couple of cigarettes and a Guinness Kubwa later, the meeting officially called to a start. The topic, I was surprised to find, being about a debate to be held on 17^th August. Logistics were discussed in great detail, including how to best raise cash amongst ourselves towards footing the Venue cost. Who would handle the camera-work, who was to get there early on the day to do the space planning… basically, division of labour.

Let me state, at this point, that I am yet to become a full member of FIKA. I am, however, nearly there. As such, when I was suggested as moderator of the debate, my instant reaction was, ‘Erm, mimi ni mgeni wazeiya.’ I preferred the less audible task of Social [multi]Media Marketing, one I can do in my sleep.

It was so agreed, and Yule left. Leaving Dagitari caught between a Double S and a hard Eric. Lorde have Mercy…

***

The week creeps, the week crawls. On 12^th August, Yule writes a piece, shares a piece. Storymoja Publishers gracefully put the piece up on their Hay Festival conversation column. The piece is shared on Twitter, shared on Google+, shared on Facebook… Friends are made, friends are blocked, friends block…

Soon, it’s Friday all over again, and time to meet the gang at Chester House once more. The debate is tomorrow. The kinks are ironed out, Yule sees his old friend Waga back in the fray; he is to be part of the panellists the following day. Yule fears for him; he looks so dishevelled, and Yule wonders if he will be anywhere near ready for the debate. He should not have had to worry, he later realized.

***

D-Day. Yule wakes up at 7 am. He is to be 40 kilos of metres away by 8am. Yeah. Right. A quickie shower, some dog-like cloth-sniffing, cologne-whiffing, 2 Kilometre walk to the bus station and a bumpy ride later, Yule is in town. One of the panellists, the ever ebullient Nuru Bahati Shukrani, calls him as he awaits a damsel in distress to get unlost in Nairobi’s human traffic. ETA, 30 minutes, Nuru says.

Oh the irony, tweeted Ssemakula, one of the atheist panellists, and Chairman of FIKA.

Yule M-two: Si nikupatie namba ya mrembo mkuje naye?

Check. And so it would be that Yule got to the venue at 9:30am. One Chowder-keg accosts him at the entrance. Things are moving at a fast pace... Camera setup, seat arrangements, mic checks, pre-debate interviews... Kenyans trickling in at 11 am, more Kenyans trickling in at 11:30 am...

By midday, the guests are getting restless.

Mugendi: I paid to wait 2 hours for the event to begin? Good thing I came an hour late, otherwise I’d be so mad!

Aziz: Good thing I did not have to pay... You should know people.

The panellists eventually got settled down, and the debate began. The topic of the day?

On the Morally Absolute side, there was Nuru Bahati Shukrani, and 2 pastors... We shall call Pastor 1 - Desmond, and Pastor 2 – Daniel, because those were their actual first names. On the Morally Relative side were Waga, Ssemakula, and Kamau. What happened next can be seen in greater detail here. Since we have videos awaiting upload on YouTube, and followup podcasts, anyone eager to see what went down, will. It will not be pretty.

In conclusion, it’s been a rather interesting week, and as it ends, the irony in this event – as well as the Arterial Network #CreativezCatchup – sticks a sore tongue out. In a post later this week, I will get into the details of the same, in a piece to be dubbed Once a-mugging, Always a-mugging.

For now, let me answer a question I raised last week Tuesday.

Am I an atheist? Well, here goes nothing:

 I do not believe in god any more.

There is no god called God.

There is, I have thought to know, God, a god.

Many still do, think they know, God, The One.

I don’t think they do, however, think. 

Not freely, at least.

It is good for them, to believe.

I respect their Choice, and Free Will.

They will usually not, respect mine.

It is better for me, to think.

All is well.

I am who I am.

Post-Election Insolence: Same Script, Same Cast, Different Lanes (Part I)

April 26th, 2013: 

Under the influence of an inspired State House PR team, and a brilliant presidential speech-writer, I find myself in the unfamiliar position of becoming President Kenyatta’s unofficial fan-boy. And going by my Social Media timelines, it would seem that I’m not the only Kenyan above the ignorance of tripping over myself at what must be this president’s burliest mascot – his smoke, pun unintended, and mirrors.

There was the YouTube video of bloopers from the campaign trail, aired live on Citizen TV – among other nationwide visual couriers of new agendas. What self-respecting PRO could in their right mind have passed up on that kind of marketing? A nice touch you’ll find available for download at Image-improvementfordummies.co.ke and cleanasababysbottom.com. 

Characteristically much later came the Cabinet Secretary announcements, anticlimactically revealing only four of a possible eighteen nominees. The images depicting UhuRuto with their sleeves rolled up with the red, blue or matching ties could not have been lost on us either, a leaf copy-pasted straight off President Obama’s playbook; as was the setup of the presidential platform at the foot of the pillars of State House, and the “brotherly love” approach to handling the media.

The immediate hullabaloo over this delay in cooking up a cabinet was counterbalanced by equally loud calls for patience, since the process of selection would only do Kenya good, hence requiring diligent input by the two Jubilee leaders. Opinionistas were quick to delve into the matter, adding the fact that it allowed Parliament to begin the vetting process on the four, notably the nominee to the National Treasury. A road sign was quickly erected, reminding us of the immediacy of the budget reading, and pointing directly at President Uhuru’s ingenuity in prioritizing that appointment. Even more pedestrian crossings allowed us to cross the reality that department of state appointments in democracies such as the motherload United States are also conducted in similar fashion. Hail the dapper UhuRuto for style, they said.

After ascertaining that we’d had enough time to mull over this perceived letdown, yesterday happened. The now sixteen member council of nominees’ credentials have since been turned into fodder on massive multi-page spreads in the National Press: a young and virile team of technocrats with the résumés, frequent flier miles and Varsity qualifications – read Diaspora education – to back them. It would be difficult to dig into a good majority of these consummate professionals before they’ve had the onus of a Cabinet track record to look back on; and so for the most part, Kenyans chose to eyeball the two final nominees, who had the ignominy of a hangman’s noose in the form of their past performances hanging over their heads.

It was indeed a masterstroke distinctive of this new regime’s style when the two final nominations came. The execution was flawless…introduce the less-maligning Balala first and fast as Mining Secretary, and what with Kenyan women’s obvious goo goo gaga reactions to both Andrew Kenneth and then-President Elect Uhuru’s son, it was hard to disagree with that logic. Much especially so when one of the bigger stains in Kenya’s conscience – if she had one – was announced next as Lands, Housing and Urban Development Secretary. A fellow blogger went as far as inaugurating the indelible ink used by the IEBC to mark voters’ pinkies as ‘the Ngilu’, aptly summarizing her hard-to-be-rid-of hard-as-nails Die Hardness. 

  

In the interests of being fundamentally unKenyan, however, let’s spot and point out the obvious flaws in this action by the president, and the equal and expectedly opposite overreaction by the public. First off, if the past 7-odd years of Mr. Kibaki’s governance have shown us anything, it’s that we the duly submissive wananchi have an impressively sturdy level of BSc, aka Bullshit compliance. After an initially quasi-smooth beginning to his term, Señor Kibaki’s government began experiencing hit after hit of graft allegations on a grand scale. Cabinet Ministers who would go on to survive both terms in cabinet were at the heart of these scandals, and no less than the Prime Minister, at the time, as well as the current President and his Deputy have since had their fair share of the corruption allegation cake.

Our national ego however quickly massaged our national conscience into submission, cushioned by echoes of a booming economy that peaked at 7 percent+ growth in 2007. Secondly, even after the election violence slammed the brakes on this impressive trajectory in the eve of that year, our precocious National Accord did precious little to bring to account all the evils of the 3-odd month chaos that rocked the country, preferring instead to lock them up in a cabinet of faux peaceful oblivion. I will hereby declare my silence on the awkward little topic of how far up that cabinet’s annals the matter of the two Suspects-in-Chief’s involvement is filed. 

Fast forward through Mr. Kibaki’s second term, right past the fact that the economy has never quite recovered to its pre-07 election pregnancy glow, police brutality caught live on tape, Ngilu’s ‘Kusema-na-Kutender’ government contract policy for her family, and arrive at the fact that these four politicians that will possibly make up Cabinet are a precipitate remnant of the systemic cancer that permeates Kenyan politics. The fact that we’re reacting so strongly to two cabinet ministerial appointments belays the beleaguered truth that the President and his Deputy are not saints either. Their power is so much more potentially weary for Kenya’s economy than a couple of Secretaries could ever be. 

Moreover, there is also the little matter of the illusion of transparency – a cousin to the delusion of maturity that was peddled regarding our peaceful elections. Mock transparency concerts have become a favorite national pastime for us. Initially given to the impression of them simply being a little passing crush, I am wont to keep that false hope up given the vetting committee that awaits this panel of preeminent secretaries. A committee that itself wrought down the Integrity bill to its bare bone to escape vetting. Yet the same institutions that have been vetted include the IEBC (Independent Electoral & Boundaries Commission), the SCoK (Supreme Court of Kenya) and the SRC (Salaries and Regulations Committee) among myriad others. And look how far ahead of the imaginary pack that has taken us! 

Vetting is a superficially pointless attempt at presenting us sanctimonious facades, behind which still sit the deep-seated structural flaws we are yet to take off our collective feet.

So as you and I continue to exercise in our national training grounds for BSc, it would behoove us to continue upgrading our UXp (User Exercise in patience) coz it’s gonna be a long ride. If UhuRuto really wish to preside over a nation devoted to balancing the historically set up equation of inequity, they might want to start by cutting their flair for the dramatic and convincingly turn their images on their heads, and with that, all the attendant melancholy their half-baked policies could inflict on Kenya.

How much BS is too much BS? Kenya is the perfect case study establishing that there is simply no answer to that question. Hopefully in Part II remember to bash the insidious Cord leadership, but for now, this seems sufficient.

    On a sidenote: 

      Of course I too thought the appointments yesterday represented one region, and part of one region alone. Runda, Nairobi. Or Muthaiga et al. The nominees have a lot in common with President UK, not least in their overwhelming affinity for the Queen's language, and an inescapable half Kikuyu + Kalenjin composition. And before you jump on my throat, I am a Kikuyu, so by stereotypical thought I readily admit to being a thief and first cousin to the president. 

That being outta the way, what I'd like to add is the fact that we need a rollerskating kinda cabinet, not a credentialist/ tribalist kind. Credentials follow the set norm. As does tribalism. Rollerskating needs you to practice being on the board - and granted, fall off it as many times as Edison's light bulb moments anti-orgasmed - till you find a way to stay on top of the board. And begin to muster it.

The Struggle Within, The Struggle Without: #OccupyParliament [Part II]

"Assembly, demonstration, picketing and petition.

37. Every person has the right, peaceably and unarmed, to assemble, to demonstrate, to picket, and to present petitions to public authorities."

 Continued from part I

All well and swell, were it not for the fact that some overzealous protestor(s) went round, intimidating fellow protestors by threatening to ‘beat them down’ with their placards if they did not sit down. 

I walked across the road at this juncture; about 10 meters from where the protestors sat. The interpretation of peaceably and unarmed  seemed to be persistently tested by loose nuts in the crowd repeatedly. Not once, by the organizers, however.

By now, the show-of-force shock-and-awe campaign by the police forces was becoming more and more effective in its choreography; horsemen galloping past protestors and back again, trucks full of GSU - as well as Riot - policemen, cruising back and forth.

• I had been consistently expressing my reservations to Aficionado, and as I watched the Swine Truck back up towards Parliament, we mused at what was going on. As soon as I realized there were pigs in the truck, correlating the pigs to the chants on slaughter, I expressed my hope that it was not going to be slaughtered pigs on display.

One of the men next to me, apparently fed up with my bickering, turned on me with a barrage of bullets disguised as words. Questioning my ‘allegiance’ and basically giving me the ‘if you’re not for us you’re against us’ speech. 

Two things: 

I will never sit and watch in silence as something I believe is wrong goes down.

And, at the end of the day, symmetry is overrated. 

I was not there to join protestors, but there to protest. For Kenya, not for Occupy Parliament, so to speak. That is to say that some of the protestors could be wrong, and I wouldn't have had to join them in being wrong. 

But Kenya, whether wrong or right, I had to defend. 

This is the story of a girl, who cried a river and drowned the whole world. And while she looks so sad in photographs, I absolutely love her, when she smiles

-          Nine Days

• When the pigs were finally let out, the first thing I saw was the pighead held high, bloody where the neck had been cut. I have since come to learn that the pighead was not part of the protest. Not by the protest organization’s doing anyway. A madman in this market had thought it striking imagery to bring the head with him. 

And it was, striking imagery. 

An image that struck back.

Because, I maintain, this is what triggered the forceful dispersion of the otherwise largely peaceful protest. This head, added to the blood that was bought by organizers at a slaughterhouse in Dagoretti and poured on the pigs – which then went ahead to have their feel and fill of the macabre display of body fluid – only served to further aggravate the image.

That, right there, was strike 3.

Leave and Bicker

At which point, frustrated at yet another chance to shift perceptions, I left. The fact that this was a successful protest is not in contention here. That it was. Hugely successful, in getting the will of Kenyans across. More successful, in getting across the foot-down-on-them response by this government. 

But the few sour elements, elements that Bonnie and crew could not in truth be expected to control, sallied the display.

I got away, fast and furious, and by the time I got to the Hilton Hotel, the Fire Brigade was headed up Moi Avenue, in a series of beelines and turns, for the protestors.

Hear Jeer, and Sneer

On to Social Media for the due post-mortem then. There were those who sat back, heard others complain about the blood and ‘slaughter,’ and in turn sneered their responses at those who jeered. 

The most common criticism was that we who protested the sideshows in the protest had missed the big picture.

That those who had a problem with how things were done should get off their arses and do something that can be judged, not simply bitch about everything. True.

As you tell 'complainers' what to do, from within the confines of your Internet Security.

That the politicians’ pay rises were what we should have focused on. True.

Yet a sideshow was in fact created, in the way of the pighead. The pigs and blood alone would have been no major issue to me, turned off as I am by blood. The head, though, was overkill. And not the organizers’ fault.

But until Boniface Mwangi explained that yesterday morning, we whose sensibilities were so offended, had no way of knowing that it wasn't.

Like the legend of the phoenix, all ends with beginnings … We’ve, come too far, to give up, who we are. So let’s, raise the bar, and our cups, to the stars…

-          Daft Punk ft. Pharrell Williams & Nile Rodgers

Hear Jeer, Cheer at Jeer

Then came the pig jokes on Twitter. Which soon accepted and moved on to Facebook and Parliament. Some were admittedly hilarious, but once again, the big picture was missed by Kenyans eager for a Retweet based on the lowest form of wit; ridicule.

Hear Cheer, Jeer at Cheer

Soon enough the people who cheered on the protestors' bravery, in the face of being mauled by the hounds that are our Kenyan anti-riot forces, were subjected to sniggers; one particular tweet referred to protestors as being on the street for their own amusement. 

It’s hard not to lose your cannons when such bullshit flies across your timelines.

They forgot that as they cracked their jokes, deriding the protestors, we – those who were beaten and those who were missed alike – had managed to do something the idle armchair philosophers had not.

We were heard. We could not be ignored.

I had a dream, it was golden. There was a king, he sent soldiers. They had orders to tear us apart. So we ran and ran, and they chased and chased. We were huge, we were tall. They were weak, they were small. And at last we were free, we could save. Sound the horn, call the cavalry. Together we’re invincible.

-          Lemar

In Conclusion, I understand now, what Bonnie and crew, what we, did on Tuesday. They know, they must, that the pigs and blood will be a whip to sensibilities and sensitivities, and a harsher whip to those sprung off their hips. 

Yet, I can only imagine, they have a pragmatic approach to their protest and activism. Bonnie got ribbed by government security once again yesterday, center of focus that he is; but he understands that the good of the many overrides the good of the one.

Until you have done something for humanity, you should be ashamed to die.

-          Horace Mann

We need to end the heartbreak warfare. Lose the grey areas and pick a side. Either you are with the protest or against it. If you are for, then be for; express your opinions either way, but at the end of the day, remember the issues.

Are you still talking about the protest? Some, a good number, are. International and Local Media included. Discourse has been resurrected, a new kind of discourse. A passionate form of discourse, whether for or against, the revolutionary road. That, is victory. 

• On a sidenote, those who were arrested have been charged with animal rights abuse. Do we have animal rights' legislation in Kenya? Like my friend Michael asks here, was the case in which a porn director at the Coast was charged for engaging women in bestiality last week, also charged on animal rights' abuse?

• The police have said that they were forced to act with violence because the rights of Muslims were impinged upon by the use of pigs to symbolize MPs in the struggle. First off, I’m sure it would have made no difference if the pigs were actually vultures shot down and weighed down with stones, so as to not fly off.

And, are we really going to sit here and pretend, in this country, that we give that much of a damn about Muslim sensibilities, in justification of hosing down and tearing up peaceful protestors?

Excerpt from a post on Seven Sentences.

• We each only have 24 hours in a day, but greatness breaks time down, examining each action frame by frame, bringing forth much clarity. 

• The ability to see clearly, prioritize and make great decisions in a heated moment, marks greatness. 

• How can you learn to slow down time? 

• You must learn to relax and become the master of your emotions.

The Heartbreak Warfare - #OccupyParliament [Part I]

Anyone who takes a cursory glance at my Digital Timelines may already know that I suffer from an advanced case of foot on keypad syndrome. I think it... I tweet or update it. No forethought, and sometimes, if left to my own devices, no afterthought either.

Such was the case on Tuesday; a case that has taught me to question. To ask. To be patient in my resolve to neither ignore nor be ignored.

And upon some rather impressively mature – not so common in my book – reflection, some notions I expressed after leaving #OccupyParliament shamefully missed the big picture. I will now attempt to elucidate it. A swipe or two unavoidable ones will be taken at some ass-wipes, but otherwise, this time I quite fully agree with Bonnie's way. We're in a war, and it's about time we choose a side and stick with it.

Lightning strike… dreams of ways to understand my pain. Clouds of sulfur in the air, bombs are falling everywhere... it’s heartbreak warfare. Disappointment has a name [no one really ever wins] in heartbreak warfare… 

I swear to God we’re gonna get it right, if you lay your weapons down.

-          John Mayer

 Stop and Join

We left Freedom Corner at Uhuru Park, or as I call it, FC President Park, after about an hour of morale boosting chants and speeches from the likes of the revolutionary Reverend Timothy Njoya. It was quite an honour meeting the man, by which I mean being within 5 feet of him. 

His arrival, with the stripes he earned from the Nyayo regime’s boots, added more ‘legitimacy’ to the protest for me. In that there was a certain intangible euphoric patriotism his presence evoked for me; and, I’m sure, for many more.

As we left the corner, with press cars holding up traffic behind the procession and policemen walking by us, it was hard to ignore their palpable show of nuanced intimidation. They did, after all, while ‘protecting us,’ have tear gas canister guns in hand, and full riot gear to boot.

Yet, I was impressed to find some Kenyans joining the procession, one they seemed to have no idea was planned to happen. They read the placards. They agreed with the message. They joined. Idle Kenyans, some who sit on benches in the day, others who sleep on these benches in the night; but not idle of their own doing, I would posit. If anything, they embodied the very injustice we were there to protest.

40 million, held at ransom by a mere 4 hundred.

Stop and Stare

We beat a path through Kenyatta Avenue, into Moi Avenue; drumline a-timed, heading up the drumlin towards the symbols of impunity erected on Harambee Avenue, percussions a-costumed, lungs a-wailing as we headed on to Parliament Road.

Kenyans stopped; and stared. Being my first proper protest march, I mused, almost amused. Were they stopping, standing by the side of the roads in their droves, sitting in the various Coffee stalls that litter the CBD, Central Business District, because they were scared? Afraid to join us? 

Or were they giving us a guard of honour? 

If so, were we dignitaries? Or heroes fallen in war?

Perhaps, however, they were just disgusted enough not to join us, but still curious enough to stay and watch; hoping to witness the battle go down, when, inevitably, the long whip of the law cracked on our hides.

Standing to gaze or seated to watch us, they personified the struggle within our ranks. Passive passengers in the accident we call a justice system. I mean, you can watch. But you can’t join?

There is no failure. There is only feedback.

Hear and Jeer

The windows in every building the procession went by served as big screen reality TVs, connected real-time to a world just within reach, not quite within touch. We do love our reality shows, our Kard- and jubilated CORD-ashians. 

The voyeurs filled up every space on every opening, to watch the world beneath them. On rooftops. On illegal ‘smoking zones’ in the way of mezzanines.

Some seemed overly bemused, somewhat appalled in their disagreement. Particularly those employed on the government’s Avenue, Harambee. The same kind of people who 24 hours later, upon hearing that I was at the protest, sneered and asked, ‘Kufanya nini? - Doing what?’

Fighting for MY and mine's rights. YOURS too, by extension, but mine and mine's first.

Hear and Cheer

Then there were those who heard us, and took an early lunch break to ‘join us,’ waving and cheering us on from within their offices. 

I salute you all. 

I understand that unlike me – unemployed to some, self-employed to me – you could not join the struggle. Your thoughts mattered, as did those of the many Kenyans not working within the CBD or Nairobi, or Kenya even, who resonate with our slight forbearance on Kenya’s loan, owed to the justice sector.

Stay and Bicker

I may be alone on this one. I enjoyed my participation in the ‘democratic right’ to protest. 

I chanted. 

I also could not help but note. Note that we focused a little too much on the negatives. Chants of ‘wasaliti – traitors,’ and ‘mapambano – conflict (in the context used)’ as well as ‘Kanyaga – crush them’ echoed through the city. I have little qualm with that.

I do, however, believe that we should not ALWAYS protest against…it’s an easy ride to get on board, a bandwagon that focuses on the problem. Protest, chant, let us, for something. I did manage, with a certain degree of success, to pass this message across to some of my fellow protestors. The chant I asked for, was ‘Kenya yetu – Our Kenya.’

Simple. Effective. We rocked Harambee Avenue, reminding the Treasury, the Central Bank, Judiciary and the KICC among other buildings who cared notice, that it is, is Kenya – ours.

Just as we went past the Office of the Deputy President, a sobering moment came to pass, and in quick succession precipitated a chain of events that teed me off; saw me leave the protest livid and seething fire through my pacifist nostrils. This was where the poetry ended, and the dull prose began.

•  Two General Service Unit (GSU) trucks came cruising at break leg speed, pummeling a hole straight through our stand against the system, as we scattered to avoid being barreled down.

• Then, as we approached the roundabout onto Parliament Road off Harambee Avenue, the chant turned from the constant against mindset to a for mindset. What was the chant for, you ask? ‘Manguruwe, chinja. Manguruwe, chinja chinja! – Slaughter the pigs!’ 

I began to ask myself if that, really, was what we were for. Slaughtering.

MPs are only symbolically pigs, meaning a symbolic slaughter. 

But yelling that Pigs should be slaughtered, in a nation that has yet to heal from the 3 months of slaughter we went through post-2007 elections, was a message that could be easily misconstrued. I quickly noted the same to my friend Aficionado (who, incidentally, had taken the black and white dress code and run with it in true style); she too had noticed it and stopped chanting.

• When we got outside parliament, things went south relatively fast. There was a vuta nikuvute (tag of war) between the protestors at the frontline and the riot police, about putting banners up on Parliament’s perimeter fence. The protestors made their first mistake. Perhaps for the aesthetic value the banners would have in the evening News, they persisted. 

And won.

Strike 1. You do not win, against the riot police and their battle-reinforced egos.

• Some loose cannon then decided to hurl a bullhorn (megaphone) into parliament. There were parliament personnel standing near where the speaking-horn fell.

Strike 2. You do not give the riot police any excuse to attack you.

• The organizers, Bonnie and Gaceke among others, to avoid provoking the riot police any further, requested the protestors to sit down, on the tarmac. 

They read out Article 37 of the Kenyan constitution:

"Assembly, demonstration, picketing and petition.

37. Every person has the right, peaceably and unarmed, to assemble, to demonstrate, to picket, and to present petitions to public authorities."

All well and swell, were it not for the fact that some overzealous protestor(s) went round, intimidating fellow protestors by threatening to ‘beat them down’ with their placards if they did not sit down. 

Continued in Part II

Occupy HELB, says the Fiddler on my Non-existent Roof

Tom, as Rabbi

“Rabbi! Rabbi! Is there a prayer we can say for the Tsar?”

“Yes! May God bless the Tsar…and keep him far far away from us!”

-          Scene III of Fiddler on the Roof (1971)

Dear HELB*, 

(*Higher Education Loans Board)

90%Sold Out, you say?

Where have I heard that sold out threat before? Oh, yeah, that’s right. Every new skyscraper that litters the lines in Nairobi’s horizon has that pitchfork aimed at our sights, long before it’s actually complete.

Every event organizer threatens that advance (cheaper) tickets are about to sell out, despite tickets also being ‘available at the gate’. Every other radio show host will promise you juicy call-in sessions that are (I swear!) unscripted. Safaricom threatened to trap all unregistered trappers in the whole of Kenya oga oh. Digital TV threatened to go ham on Analog TV late last year. 

We’ve become a society that feeds on – nay; gobbles up and hobbles off with, to use pigliamentary language – Public Relations exercises and marketing gimmicks. I have no doubt that this SMS I received from you during the course of this week was inspired by State House’s hyperbolic antics.

Your loan balance is Kes. 888,888 for Idno. 2xyz2abc. Repay your full University Loan by 6^th June 2013 and get a full penalty amnesty; contact HELB - 0711052000

Sender: (no name) HELB 

Received: 18:43:27 0y.05.2013

So allow me to respond in kind, dear no name.

I will not contact you.

As we have already established, I have no money. See text you sent me above. In case you need advance settings on that simple message, I will be willing to assist. Bank statements from my 2 money changers should bring you to tears. I can assure you that they will be no joy drops, either, as the Revenue Authority may well choose to alert you. Simply put, even my Mpesa statement - nay, Okoa Jahazi Account! -  is by and large a casting call for phantasmagoria. *Google is your friend, dear no name*

‘History records that money changers have used every form of abuse, intrigue, deceit, and violent means possible to maintain their control over governments by controlling money and its issuance. ’

         -          President James Madison

I am willing to pay.

If I could eat will, I would be one helluva fat man. Complete with the willing wrist and neck chains, glistening with will as I stand on a podium of will, next to the president of will, and chant willingly about the will of the Kenyan workers' ill will against the House of Common thieves. I am sure, however, that you understand that will is not yet a currency. As soon as it is, however, I will more than likely pay you.

‘You can be killed just as dead in an unjustified war as you can in one protecting your own home’

       -          Will Rogers

I have not refused to work.

This is not a statement of my lack of intent to pay. I know you bureaucratic types have a way of selecting what you listen to, and even then you've already filtered out what you hear. 

This is a statement of my lack of ability to pay. 

Show me the money, and I will quickly give it to you. So in the spirit of giving back, and all, how about you give me back my dignity before you attempt to take away my liberty?

‘We don’t have to worry about anything. No nation in the history of the world was ever sitting as pretty. If we want anything, all we have to do is go and buy it on credit.’

          -          Will Rogers

Of course, to quote Tevye from Fiddler on the Roof (the movie), "we don't eat like kings, but we don't starve either."

I will not be threatened.

You said there’s a penalty amnesty? I wish, oh how I do, that I had 2 weeks of my area MP’s salary. The current one, not the one he wants. 

Then I would, in order of priority, buy a quarter acre of land in some Savannah of the un-silicon kind, buy a trailer container, use it to ‘develop’ said kaquarter, buy a mattress and fit it midway into the container, then – and only then – I would send you the change.

In the meantime, take a chill pill as my MP and I negotiate. 

Unfortunately, he is not a cougar (that’s an older woman into younger boys, no name) – and I don’t roll that way, neither does he; I haven’t heard it on Ghafla! anyway. If he was a she, an actual she, not a he-she, I would consider giving him some.

‘A man only learns by two things; one is reading, and the other is association with smarter people.’

              -          Will Rogers

Find yourselves a book. Or else look for smarter people. You’re reading one right now, by the way, no name. Thanks to your Loan, Varsity was a blast. The reading part, the partying part and the women part; we even learnt to do all three at once. Don’t believe me? Google the World’s Loudest Library (@pmbclibrary)

Are you so out of touch with reality, in your penthouse offices and leafy suburban bliss, that you forget why you gave me the loan to begin with? Because I could not pay my way through Varsity on my own; now you’re going to sit there paying for this bulk SMS system, advertising rigorously that I pay ‘or else’?

You are called the Higher Education Loans Board – higher education is pointless if I will not be working anywhere without being either underemployed, or overworked and underpaid. Then you expect me to simply watch as you deep your claws into that piggy bank I call an existence? Whatever happened to a saving culture?

‘We will never have true civilization until we have learned to recognize the rights of others.’

                 -          Will Rogers

I have a right to peace of mind, and a piece of meat in my daily meal. Not the 3-course you’re on as you demand your money back! And you have the right to a piece of my mind. I’ll try serving you to your fill.

                     

If I were a rich man ... there would be no questions. When you're rich they really think you know

I will put up my own house.

This particular one is a message from my ol’ man. He may be my guarantor, but there is absolutely no way he is paying that loan. He says, by the way, that you can find him on Twitter, and he'll gladly reiterate that sentiment. 

I wouldn’t have it any other way. He builds his own houses, and I will build mine. If that means the penalty (Kes. 5,000 a month is it?) will continue to dig a hole through my as torn pocket, then so be it.

I have after all been out of Campus for two years, and by my estimation of my own worth, I should be paying the Revenue Authority at least Kes. 15,000 a month. That, over a duration of 24+ months means I owe the Government of Kenya at least Kes. 360,000. By my reckoning, I have at least 2 more years before my loan, plus the monthly penalties, gets that far. I can live with that…scratch that; I can SURVIVE with that.

‘Ten men in the country could buy the world and ten million can’t buy enough to eat.’

                    -          Will Rogers

Just as I will pay my own bride-price should it come to that, I do not expect to be emasculated any further by having the man who foots my bills when times are thick (whale-skin thickness, not your regular hide) and has fed me regularly over the past 24 months, also have to pay my dues at no name.

***

Incidentally, what is the world coming to when a man has to take out a loan to pay back a loan he was granted as a student loan? Forget interest-free loans, President Uhuru…we want a rebate!

So as we plan to #OccupyParliament in less than 48 hours, I challenge every defaulter who has defaulted not by choice but by lack thereof it, to join me in asking President Uhuru to budget for a government bail-out of we the meek.

I do not seek to ask for a handout. I seek to receive a scrapping on the BS penalty that ignores the fact that I need to earn to pay back my dues. So before any Salaries and Remunerations are upgraded for 400 odd able-bellied men, how about the richest man in Kenya by Forbes’ account help us #OccupyHELB?

Think of it as indemnity for the youth, Mr. President, and your soon-to-be parliament.

"He's right and he's right? They can't BOTH be right!"

"You know; you are also right."

                                       - Fiddler on the Roof 

If we deserve to ‘accept’ your nomination of political devil incarnates who have ‘moved on’ and reincarnated as technocrats, don’t we deserve to also give the youth a second chance to pay back their student loans interest- and penalty-free?

As a man who appreciates more flair and panache in a speech than Kibaki, I’m sure you can relate with this one.

‘There is one thing in common with all revolutions (in fact they are pretty near like wars in that respect) nobody ever knows what they are fighting about!’

                                                  -          Will Rogers