Kenyan middle class madness- our biggest undoing

For scientific minds which I have always acknowledged I lack, the term middle class takes many shades depending on where you are describing it from. The middle class distinguish themselves from the class below them by their ability and willingness to depend on their expertise and determination rather than wait for 'serikali itusaidie.'





To me these are the people who live by the carrot and stick. They have not made it, but the environment portrays all attributes that they can make it if they worked a little hard. The middle class are known the world over to be the engines of growth, change agents and definers of the social values of a nation. 


The above description sheds some light of who the middle class are. They have the skill and know how and a twenty four hour access to information. They also have the means to support themselves and a few relatives who remind them of where they have come from and where they do not want to find themselves in.


It is the middle class who have initiated change everywhere in the world. Be it fashion, music, political or social yet the Kenyan middle class has failed in this responsibility. There are those who have chose to live in a bubble and mind their own business. Then the ones who have stood up for change still have hangovers of tribalism, nepotism and corruption. Do not listen to their words, just listen to what they lack the guts to say.


These are the same people who will talk of how tribe does not matter. Yet when you hear them talk in hush tones, you get to the bottom of their heart. They go ahead and vote for 'one of their own' and use their influence to spread the same vitriol to the lower classes. It is the middle class who seek elective posts as well, the rich would rather support and sponsor them.  Then they go to their hang out joints to drink and proclaim how they are not tribal and how things will never change in Kenya.


We are the same people who overlap on the road then complain of traffic jams. We get absorbed by English Premier League, Rugby and Motor Cross (note I did not mention Polo and Golf) and forget that the lower class who are breathing at our feet play and watch basketball, football and hockey. If these sports do not develop, the youth from humble neighbourhoods will come knocking at our doors. What we will do is erect a tall fence and enhance the grills, but again it wont help. We can live and let others live as well by offering our time and expertise to assist them grow.


From Che Guevara, Nelson Mandela, Osama bin Laden and many others who have stood up for something, they were all educated with at least a first degree. They could have lived a good personal life but rallied their fellow middle class and lower classes to a greater cause. Until the Kenya middle class gets an antidote for its hangovers, we will continue to hear 'tunaomba serikali itusaidie' and laugh about it without knowing we are laughing at ourselves. Then send our children to 'group schools' we can ill afford. 


Lazima tupate dawa ya hii 'kasumba ya mabwenyenye wa kadiri'


Stand up and be counted................................

Why Sofapaka will be one of the BIG clubs in Kenya.....

Football is more than just a sport; it is an art, a language and to some extent a war in which every match is a battle. The world governing body FIFA tries to maintain sanity in a sport that generates emotions all over the world. Football was invented in England, thanks to colonization it spread all over the world and the English must be wondering what happened to ‘their’ game.

There are many dynamics in football in every country and culture. Kenyan football clubs took a tribal dimension while the Tanzanian clubs went the social class way. Simba is a club for the middle class while Yanga is for the working class. The community clubs in Kenya have had a tribal following; Gor is mainly supported by Luos while AFC Leopards by the Luhyas. The other clubs in KPL are institutional, formed by employees and sponsored by a corporate body.

In 2009, an unknown club called Sofapaka was promoted to the KPL. It had metamorphosed from a men’s ministry pass time at M.A.O.S church into a professional outfit in five years. They spent a year each in the Nationwide two and Nationwide leagues before the promotion. In their first year in the league, the club was fully sponsored by business man Elly Kalekwa and they clinched the title- a world record.

Then the old teams woke up, they were shocked by the new kids on the block. K’ogallo and AFC fans began to cheer Sofapaka’s opponents in the 2010 campaign where they finished fourth. Mathare United came into the league with a bang but took time to win it while ‘watoto wa mungu’ as they are known won it in their maiden appearence.

I have many reasons to believe that we have not seen the best of Sofapaka yet. While arguing a case in court, a lawyer will quote authorities; these are related cases whose judgments give weight to his arguments. I have my authorities as well.

Two English men Herbert Kilpin a lace maker and Alfred Edwards from Nottingham found themselves in Milan, Italy towards the end of nineteenth century. Being foreigners, they must have been bored after work due to limited social ties. They formed AC Milan in 1899, after a row the Italians broke away to form Internazionale of Milan in 1908. The rest as they say is history, the club has won eighteen officially recognized FIFA and UEFA titles. It is now owned by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

In the Catalan province of Spain, a twenty year old business man from Winterthur Switzerland arrived in Barcelona in 1898 and formed FC Barcelona in 1899. Hans ‘Joan’ Gamper had formed FC Zurich just before he left his native country. Barcelona has morphed into one of the biggest clubs in Spain and just like AC Milan, it was founded by a foreigner.

Argentinean club Boca Juniours is known as the club that ushered Diego Maradona into the world of football.  In April 1905, five Italian boys met in one of the boy’s home to form a club. The father to the boy was not happy and he threw the boys out. They went to a nearby house called Plaza Solís to continue with the project and Boca Juniours was founded.

These are just a few examples of football clubs started by foreigners in their adopted countries. I believe it is not only in football, foreigners tend succeed where the natives fail. I believe there are other foreigners who took charge of many clubs and raised their profile even if they were not the founders.

Football elicits great passion, especially among the working class who form the majority of any society. This attracts influence from the political class who are in pursuit of votes. A local administrator will definitely have political leanings. This will work for some time until he falls out of favour with his allies or they are thrown out of power. I talked to Elly Kalekwa a few years ago and he was very categorical that his politics is football. Foreigners will avoid getting directly involved in politics hence concentrate more on their private business.

Kenyan clubs are more inclined to tribal and regional loyalty. AFC Leoprads has signed most players from the Luhya community except Congolese import Jonas Nahimana and Ugandan Jimmy Bagaye. Gor Mahia has tried to move away from this trend and has several players who are not from Luo Nyanza. Sofapaka having a Congolese owner has a few refugees but the bulk of Kenyan contingent is a mixture of many tribes. This is another factor that will endear more people to ‘watoto wa mungu’ in the near future.

The foreign touch has spiced many leagues in the world. The great Pele came out retirement to play for New York Cosmos and American Soccer (not football) grew by leaps. Arsene Wenger brought the French finesse into the English Premier League. The Dutch invasion of Barcelona led by Rinus Michels and later Johan Cryuf transformed football in Spain. The Congolese invasion of KPL may just trigger a transformation in our football.

The entire France contingent that won the World Cup in 1998 were descendants of immigrants. Already we have Bob Mugalia in the national team, who knows who will be next. If we embrace more foreigners we are bound to see growth in the quality of our football.

History repeats itself, so it is prudent to learn from it so as to repeat the good and shun the wrong aspects of it. The current supporters of the clubs I have mentioned above may not know the foreign hands that shaped them. Like mercenaries, these men made the best of their love for the beautiful game in a simple way and many people are benefiting today. Sofapaka may be a Kenyan club owned by a Congolese businessman today, but I see a trailblazer in many fronts. Time will tell. 

I speak for the African..

I have tried to describe myself in parameters that the world has set but none comes close to fully describe who I a am. The conclusion I have arrived at is that I am not a conservative, because I am open minded though I do not adopt new trends for the sake of it. I will say I am just not conventional, I will adopt a trend only if I am satisfied that it is for my good or the good of man kind.

I do not see why Africans, especially the youth should adopt and copy the trends in the West just to look cool. That the parametres of coolness or 'being there' are measured by how Western you are or rather by how much you can copy the styles of the West.

I appreciate beauty, even the subtle beauty that does not scream. I know African women are beautiful; who said that they have to put on hipsters to look cool. Not every hip looks good in a hipster, or even a trouser so it is better for some ladies to stick to skirts. It is prudent for people to understand their physique and dress them accordingly. Again, not every lady looks elegant in heels, some can save themselves from the torture.

What we fail to understand is that the masters of capitalism, which is also a western ideology spring up this trends to rip us of our cash. They know some copy cat cannot wait for what is next in line to buy. We roll over each other to catch what ends up to make the West more rich.

The lingo, oh my! we have our sheng they have their slung. Yet we cause our tongue mayhem just to adopt the lingo that suits a specific Harlem neighbour-hood. The biggest mistake was for our people to work so hard to be like the British. So much so that my people the Luo, who are known to adore their culture would discard the removal of six lower teeth as a way of initiation because the uninitiated  spoke 'better' English.

This has killed our creativity. You cannot express yourself artistically in a language you have not mastered. At the moment, our Kapuka music will never hit it big simply because our youth cannot express themselves fully in either English, Kiswahili or their mother tongue. They end up singing songs that cannot rule the airwaves for long. On the contrary, South Africans will sing and act in any of their Bantu languages and move the world.

This is the same misconception that rules our media houses. That one must have a certain twang to get the opportunity to go on air. The twang will have to be imposed if it does not come naturally. No wonder radio has become very boring.

To all this I say, we will remain the second best, we shall never compete with other people in their culture, what comes naturally to them. We can learn from them, and domesticate it, then grow it in our culture. Ask, Nigeria and South Africans. They have learned from the West but have come up with their own versions, that suits them in film and music.

We missed the boat a while back. The shift will have to be generational, so we have to nurture the younger generation to appreciate Kenyanese. That is the only way we will discover the KENYAN DREAM.

Systems, Al-Shabaab and Sharp minds....

I have been trying to get information on the Kenyan invasion of Somalia from all sources. It is the first time our country is going out in a semblance of full war. It is good that we like to make noise as Kenyans, complain and rant about almost everything. This may be the cause why we are never quick to go to war. We can even say that Al-Shabab threatened our tourism industry, our golden egg goose that is why we had to go for them.

It brought me to systems, the networks that supports such outfits. It is claimed that the commanders of Al Shabaab are in Kenya's Eastleigh Estate. They command a port that brings them Ksh. 5 Billion per annum at the expense of some youth out fighting a holy war. Like the confusion in Mogadishu, it is difficult to differentiate the head from the tail in Eastleigh. The systems that operate here are known only to the people who run and fund them.

A college classmate came to mind. Alvin Lee Oguga (RIP) was one bright man. This is a man who I believe like many others was messed up by our own education system. We were doing a Science degree, but all indications in him were clear that he was an 'artist' at heart. His command of English was exceptional, the books he read and his thought process betrayed his disdain for Geology and Mathematics. He drowned his frustrations in alcohol until he could not complete his studies.

What brought Lee (as we called him) to mind was a tag line he would have used in the Luo spirit of pakruok. He claimed to be the first man to have made love to a woman in the rebel held town of Kisangani. It was the time when Eastern Congo had the combined forces of Rwandese and Ugandan forces as well as the Intarahamwe and Banyamulenge  rebel militia armies.

Today as I take a look at social systems that should make life better but end up to make it worse for some people. I honour Lee, who made our college life worth the hustle of proving and deriving equations. His humour, love for rhumba and easy demeanor added to a true sense of Luo nyadhi and pakruok was off the hook. Today he would gleefully quip that he was the first man to make love to a woman in the Al Shabab held port of Kismayu.

May we all tweek our personal, corporate and social systems for the sake of social good and sharp minds like Lee.