State officials and politicians have made Kenya poor

By TEE NGUGI

Prior to the 2017 elections in Kenya, honchos of a political party made their way to the Kasarani stadium to meet with people who wanted to vie for various seats on the party’s ticket. On arrival, they were astonished to find the stadium overflowing with people. For a moment, they thought that perhaps people had mistaken the meeting for a campaign rally. This scene of multitudes of party ticket hopefuls was replicated across other parities.

This year, too, we are witnessing this messianic zeal to enter public service. The cut-throat competition is so intense that, already, an aspirant in western Kenya has been shot dead and another at the Coast barely survived a similar fate. If political murders in post-apartheid South Africa are anything to go by, eliminating rivals for elective seats could become commonplace.

A visitor from Sweden might be very impressed by this dizzying desire to serve the public. This is because in Sweden politics is almost a thankless job in terms of material gain.

In Sweden, MPs are provided a single-room government apartment. MPs in Sweden have no car grants; they are supposed to use public transport.

In Sweden, councillors have no offices and have to work from home. Needless to say, opportunities for corruption are few and if one is caught, sanctions are immediate. Once, a deputy prime minister bought chocolate and other personal items using a government credit card. She had to resign even though she refunded the meagre amount.

Reward for Swedish MPs, therefore, is the satisfaction of serving people, bringing ideas and programmes that transform lives, and making their citizens safer, wealthier and healthier.

In Kenya, MPs earn about Ksh1,000,000 ($8,600) a month in salary. If you add sitting allowances, per diems, false mileage claims and proceeds from corruption, our MPs quickly become the wealthiest people in the country. The other day, I was driving with a friend when he proudly pointed to a block of flats under construction. “That is my cousin’s construction,” he said proudly. “Just the other day, he had absolutely nothing, but since being elected an MCA, he has done very well for himself.”

But, in the next breath, my friend went on to complain about poor government services. I was dumbfounded. Here was an intelligent man who could not see the link between underdevelopment and corruption and pampering of public officials.

So it is not that we love public service so much. It is simply the sector where one can become very rich very quickly. Thus lecturers, teachers or doctors, who had been struggling for years, suddenly become billionaires when they enter politics or are appointed state officials. The state is a feeding trough. All one needs is to elbow one’s way to an opportune spot.

We don’t need big theories to explain why Kenya is poor. The reasons are right there before our eyes.

Tee Ngugi is a Nairobi-based political commentator