Friday, January 06, 2006

 

CONSULTATIONS

I was watching the news and saw the president of the USA, George Bush, holding a meeting with former secretaries of state and secretaries of defense going back to the Kennedy era. In Kenyan parlance this is called holding consultation. These are men and women who served or continue to do so, as experts in foreign affairs and defense. They went through senate grilling and confirmation and gave their best in the positions they served. They have published writings about their work, given lectures, have been consulted and have given advise. They form a reservoir of knowledge and experience that the nation can tap on at a time like this when America needs to re-focus her Iraq policy. These were eminent citizens from both mainstream political parties, Republicans and Democrats.

This sent my mind on a whirl tour of our political landscape. Who would our president call at his table, as experts, to discuss national issues, set aside international? In Kenya today our MPs become experts and professionals overnight on being appointed to the cabinet. A constitutional lawyer becomes an expert in environment and pollution, a former councilor becomes an expert in sports, a cycle repairman is an expert in wild life. Tomorrow, if there be a reshuffle, the same faces will become experts in foreign affairs or water.

The appointments into the various positions of authority tend to lean on political expediency rather than professionalism. The Permanent Secretaries, who as accounting officers, are supposed to be the experts in their respective ministries are not exempt from this game of musical chairs. Most of them are in the wrong ministries per their training and experience. The same case with the high commissioners and ambassadors, some were plucked, as it were, right from their slumber in the village and planted on these posts with no prior training, experience, or even inclination for the job. This is a major de-service to the nation and an embarrassment to those experts in the profession.

Back to the issue of whom the president would sit down with. Looking at the political spectrum over the past forty two years of independence, and three presidents, we have had more ministers of foreign affairs in that period than America has in the same period with nine presidents. This dearth of expertise is not limited to foreign affairs it is prevalent across the whole civil service and pre-eminent in the cabinet. Our level of experts is at the lower cadres of the civil service whose advice is often ignored.

Which field is Kalonzo Musyoka an expert in, education, foreign affairs, environment, deputy speaker, law, ODM all of which he has served, with distinction in some I should add? How about Nyachae; public service, agriculture, finance, energy, industrial enterprise, opposition, where has he left his mark? We do not suffer from lack of experts rather from lack of appreciating our experts. In every field we have qualified manpower whose talents we can tap, yet every day we ignore them and seek counsel where it is least available. We have to distinguish between sycophancy and expertise. We have our Washington Omondis, Yashpal Ghais, Wangari Mathais, Mazruis, Bethuel Kiplagats, people whom the world hungers after and whose opinions are respected and sought. Yet at home we are tinkering with the psychos who will dance at the wriggling of the threads. Let us give honor to our prophets and respect their message.

The art of consultation need not be left to the kitchen cabinet. That some ministers would threaten to resign if the president sat down with the ODM leadership, shows the extent to which our political leadership value national unity. For the president to succumb to such threats and cancel a meeting of national importance and significance is to show how weak he has become. Wapende wasipende, progress in constitution making will be only possible when the bananas and oranges are mixed together in the salad bowl.

You cannot clap with one hand. Right now, by locking out the ODM out of the plotting the way forward in the constitutional process, the government is attempting to clap with one hand.

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