Women will develop Luo Nyanza- Not politicians

There is a discrepancy that has failed to make sense to me for a long time. My community, the Luo are the most learned and have contributed and are still doing so to many great achievements in the world. When the poverty index is published by Ministry of Planning and even UN agencies, we lag behind as the poverty stricken region in Kenya. It was encouraging to see that Siaya is position ten in the new wealth per county survey by the Revenue Allocation Commission. So, where is the problem?

The Chinese have a metaphor of yin and yang symbol of two fishlike shapes forming a circle. The more ‘male’ (yang) a society is the more the competition and total performance but weak group solidarity. The more ‘female’ (yin) a society is the more evenly rewards will be distributed and greater group solidarity but relatively low performance.

The yin factor is what kept Kikuyu’s economically afloat during the twenty four years of Moi era. Bad politics plays a role in entrenching poverty, but it only slows resilient people’s progress but does not stop it. A balanced society must attain the synergy between the ‘yin and yang’ for social growth.

Women make better leaders in social or business circles because of many reasons. They are relational; they share information and build people. Unlike men who outdo each other then bring each other down. Women tend to be less corrupt than men and are bound to look at long term solutions when men are consumed by the moment.

In an African family where the man is the head, the woman is the manager of the home. If the manager is not up to the task, it does not matter how much bacon a man brings home, it won’t have much effect on the health and wealth of the family. Look at it like the man is the CEO and the woman the operations manager. The ideas and policies the board comes up with will be pronounced dead on arrival when it comes to execution.

I am Kenyan of Luo descent, who grew up outside Luo Nyanza. When I was old enough to raise the fare to my rural home, I began to look at my people with an outsider’s lens. Among the Luo, a house belongs to the wife, a man builds a new house every time he marries. This led to many questions for which I will try to answer some and leave the rest to you. A Luo man who married out of the “lifestyle” as Luoism has come to be known will most likely meet an ‘enlightened’ lady. This will make his home more stable than of the man who married from within and had to make do with the average Luo ladies.

If I take a panoramic look at my village into several homes which look stable, I will find a focused mother. This is true even for the semi illiterate women. Women are born with innate abilities to multiply and nurture. When the woman gets it wrong like it happened in the Garden of Eden, everything goes south. Men may be strong but women are powerful, men have enormous spontaneous energy women have a long stay in power. Great men have realized this and Abraham Lincoln said that a woman is the only thing he was afraid of that he knew will not hurt him. Barack Obama calls Michelle the boss and definitely she is. The achievements of these men are evidence of the women behind them.

I then joined a public University to do a course with three hundred other freshmen in 1998. What shocked me and my Luo friends was the realization that we did not have a Luo lady in the class. Luo men made fun of it that now they could go out with Kikuyu ladies without a backlash from their sisters. This to me marked the epitome of social decline and educational decay in Luo Nyanza. Then the majority of student political activists were also Luos. This proved the theory that growing up in poverty and lack produces self driven individuals with a hunger for justice.

Then Nyanza led in the poverty index report and it was shocking how a region with a high concentration of intellectuals would be so poor. The report said that Nyanza Province: With a rural poor population estimated at 2.4 million, has the highest poverty rate across most Divisions and Locations in Kenya. The Leaders who did not agree said the report was more political than factual. On my next trip to Kisumu, the moment I entered Luoland from Kericho, I noted a big change. The difference is evident in people, houses and even cattle.

Let us hold politics constant and for Nyanza it also means leaving Raila out of this. I learned that numbers don’t lie- so I chose to believe the government statistics. The leaders from the region who concurred attributed it to pork barrel policies of the Moi regime and I do not dispute either.

United Nations Development Program released Multidimensional Poverty Index to look into poverty deeper than the income, it analyzes deprivation at household level. The indices measured are; school enrolment and retention, mortality, nutrition, water, electricity, fuel, sanitation and type of floor. Looking at Luo Nyanza with a high resolution lens, one gets the gist of why the region ranks high in poverty levels.

The theories, and scientific explanations in these reports however noble are not palatable to the same people the reports are meant to serve. The hydra headed face of development is not easily understood by the common man. They are used to their poverty which is caused by many factors and coming up with one reason as I have done here may appear pedestrian. I believe the reason for poverty in Luo Nyanza is the un-empowered Luo woman.

I have travelled across the whole region and interacted with Luos from all walks of life.  I noted that a Luo is a Luo regardless of where he grows up and Barack Obama is one typical Luo. Luo men despite their arrogance, pride and imposed swagger are diligent and hard working. They provide for the family and spare some of the evening hang out which is important to us. So where is the disconnect? The leak is in the household where UNDP and other agencies conduct their surveys. These households are the workstation, playground and property of the Luo women.

When a wife is not empowered she will lack access to information on common diseases which increases child mortality. It is mother who can keep a child in school even when the father provides school fees. It is the woman who will keep the house clean and the environment cleaner even if the man does not bring tap water. It is the woman who decides what food will be eaten and how it will be prepared.

The Luo woman has been disempowered by her men and now the whole society is paying. She is not just beautiful but morphologically endowed. Educating or empowering a beautiful woman is like pouring honey into a fine Swiss watch, everything stops. The Luo man who is used to a submissive lady now finds this new woman threatening. The ‘liberated’ Luo woman needs to find a balance for her sake and the good of the community.

To get the Luo out of poverty, I put my bet on the average Luo woman; she holds the key to the emancipation and development of Luo Nyanza. Politics may appear like the way out but we need to turn off the tap rather than keep mopping the floor.

Poverty is rampant all over Kenya and every community must debunk their points of leakages and plug them. We shall never eliminate poverty totally, but the advent of a devolved system of government is a good starting point. A precondition for its sharp reduction is for professionals and the middle class to become more proactive and get closer to and learn more from those who live in poverty; then act accordingly. Sometimes you have to look at the dog not people to know the true economic status of a home.

The more underdeveloped a society is, the more underdeveloped the women. Develop the woman and you develop a society.

AIDS: Human grain will be resistant to HIV weevil

Imagine an AIDS free world. What would change socially in the world? The first time I heard of HIV/AIDS was in late eighties, 1987 to be precise and I was eight years old. Joe Muriuki and Ugandan Phylis Lutaya brought -mdudu- as we called it to our screens. It was remote then, infecting ‘other’ people. A decade later it had spread and today every home is affected.


I received a call from the village and as is the rule, I was informed of the latest souls to depart. I was not shocked but I sighed at the thought of another addition to the statistics. Today HIV/AIDS has infected infants, teens, adults and the senior citizens. Sexual freedom devoid of responsibility has spelled doom for this generation.

My late grandmother was a bright woman, whenever I visited her I would inquire from her how people were doing before I visited them. Her response on some of my enquiries would be- “that one has been infested by weevils,” she would turn her neck sideways in resignation to their fate. That was her way of saying they had contacted the HIV virus and that they would not live long. Once grains have been infested by weevils, you cannot completely eradicate them. The best option is preventive and so it is with HIV virus.

This scourge has created social paradigms in third world countries. It has raised poverty levels by weakening bread winners and drowning resources. AIDS has diverted resources meant for other important sectors into a bottomless pit.

Researchers have made great strides towards finding a cure for this disease. So far we have drugs that slow down the virus, while the focus is on finding a vaccine. My theory is not to trash the efforts of these great brains that have devoted their lives to this end. Our hope lies in our ability to develop a natural ability to resist this virus.

I am none the wiser to delve into the intricacies of biochemistry and molecular biology involved in the research for a cure. I will shed light on evolution theories (I have my reservations) which my lecturers taught me.

Nature abhors liabilities, weak species or elements in a species. So all the people infected will pass on eventually if a cure does not come by soon. The virus has been mutating so fast that it has evaded researchers trying to decode it. These different strains have made the ‘weevil’ to spread deeper and wider into the human ‘grain.’

This mutation as much as it is a challenge it may lead us to the evasive light at the end of the tunnel. Imagine if the virus mutates into a softer version of the virus due to ARV impact. The other option is a strain that that is ARV resistant, both ways could lead to a breakthrough.

The softer strain will be weaker as time goes by while the stubborn strain will shorten the life of those infected thus reducing the rate of new infections. The soft version may become a natural vaccine or inhibitor while the other may become as deadly and rapid as ebola with time.

Those who will be lucky to escape will survive and give birth to healthy children. The offspring tend to be stronger and sophisticated than the parents. These children may be able to resist or withstand HIV/AIDS. There is a possibility of a human generation coming up that is totally HIV resistant.

Meanwhile sex is booming across the divide. Older men are known to prefer younger ladies, now older women are preying on young men. This is one frontier that will complicate the war on AIDS, as young people will be infected then infect each other. If we can all agree to consciously reduce infections then we can begin to dream.

As we make baby steps towards seeking solution to this calamity, I believe God created nature in a way that it balances out extreme situations. Global Warming and HIV/AIDS are a threat to human survival today and in the near future. I can’t wait to see how nature will readjust back to equilibrium if it happens in my lifetime.

My grandmother may have left the weevil causing havoc to the next generation. Her great grandchildren may usher a new era of HIV resistant generation.

Aid for Gay Rights is Gay

There is a new tune from the west- American liberals and British conservative governments are singing to the developing world. When these two divides think alike on an issue, then it is serious. They are all united in saying that gay rights are human rights and they will open their purse to nations who agree to dance to this tune.

Two watershed world conferences were held in the nineties, one in Beijing and the other in Cairo. The women met to count the gains of feminists’ movement in Beijing. The homosexuals and pro-gay movement met in Cairo Egypt as well. I now realize why they had to bring the conference to Africa and especially Egypt. Since then, the tide has been unstoppable both for women and gays.

I am not against gays, they can continue with the lifestyle as long as they don’t interfere with me. My basic knowledge of law is that my rights stop where your rights start. I have a problem with the West arm-twisting the third world to accept their culture.

As it has been the norm with other western ideals like democracy, human rights et al, the poor nations will follow South Africa in legalizing gay unions. Democracy has been practiced in the West for centuries, yet the third world countries were arm twisted to adopt democracy and perfect it instantly. The pressure to democratize and improve human rights came with the same aid tag. What will we be told to do next for aid?

African nations will make steps towards development the day we find a balance between adopting the positive attributes of the western society without losing who we are. The Asian tigers have achieved it the same way albeit without democracy. They are moving towards democracy slowly as they transition from second world into first world nations.

They kept their Asian culture of Confucius (moral order) and hard work while they adopted industrialization and free market economy of the west. You can only take in as much as your culture and social structures can accommodate. Africa is not ready for the liberal lifestyle of the west.


The greatest war you will fight in this world is to be you, to have your own identity. It is what pushes us to achieve great feats in life. That satisfaction that we made a difference in life. You can not do the same if you do not have an identity. It is this identity that the west will not let us have, for it will make us hard to manipulate. A bongo flava song Swanglish has a line- we are going into slavery without chains or bells.

Come to think of it- what has aid done for Africa? The same developed nations siphon back the aid through expensive supplies and expensive expatriate labour. If we apply the law of relativity, the aid comes at the western speed then it gets stifled by the third world bottle necks. By the time the systems clear, the plans have been overtaken by events creating a conducive atmosphere for corruption.

It is time Africa stood her ground in the face of such bullying. Recognizing gays or legislating pro-gay policies will not result in any meaningful social or economic change. We can do without aid if the West can work out the North- South trade imbalance. Why don’t they peg this gay rights arm twisting with progressive trade with the developing nations who will agree to it?


We have enough problems to look into, gays and homosexuals can wait- it is not an emergency!

© Since 1978

Tribalism is bigger than Al- Shabab

I have followed closely the war of words that has followed Hassan Omar Hassan’s (KNCHR Commisioner) comments in a past issue of Sunday Standard. He wrote that Kenya is not ready for another Kikuyu president after Kibaki, mainly due to Kikuyunization of crucial government dockets.

 As a matter of fact, Hassan is not the first to say that Kenyan’s will not replace Kibaki with a Kikuyu. The problem is he chairs the commission that has the responsibility to choose the Kenya Police Service Commison and the Commisioner General.  Some Kikuyu MP’s feel that he will be against candidates from their community.

This is the kind of catch 22 situation we find ourselves in when we delve into the Kenya ethnicity matrix. We are damn if we don't tackle it and damn if we try to sort it. The sly choose to weigh their words, the orators circumvent it. The few like Hassan have the guts to call the devil in the room by name.

Hassan is one of the people who inspired me to jump into student activism. He had just been expelled for proposing that Moi University changes its name. He dubbed as the Kenya National Students Union chairman so he kept himself busy around Nairobi. I came to meet him as a freshman before I became a SONU congressman. One thing I know about Hassan is that he is not a tribalist, he may be many other things.

Tribalism in Kenya, just like many things about us is peculiar. We are very hospitable, stay, play, work and worship with each other for four years then go for each other in the election year. It has permeated our social systems from politics, corporate Kenya and even our churches. It is a system that the colonialists used to govern us and our political leaders have perfected the art.

We may be fighting the Al-Shabab in Somalia, but tribalism has killed more Kenyans than terrorists. It is a threat to our national security more than Al-Shabab and other gangs. It is time we faced it, sugar coating words and ignoring it will not help.

I was born in Nakuru and I grew up in Kaimosi. My first language is Kiswahili laced with Kikuyu words for slung. I spoke Luo only with my folks at home so it was not all that. Then I found myself in Ikolomani and I spoke Luhya in three months.

Kaimosi is an educational complex that attracts staff and students from all over Kenya. In a small area, I met Kenyans from all walks of life. I ventured deep into the villages to play with my Tiriki friends so much that today I am the only non-tiriki member of Tirikis on Facebook.

My encounter with tribalism was in a very unlikely place-The University of Nairobi. This is the very place where we expect to teach young minds to shun it. Like virginity my Kenyan innocence was ruptured and lost, may be for good. Nowhere is the Kikuyu-Luo rivalry axis huge like the University of Nairobi. I confess I have sometimes looked at many issues in Kenya with a tribal lens.

There was only one lecturer (who I will not name) who was a tribalist and did not give a damn about it. He spoke his mind about his tribe’s supremacy and I respect him to date for that. He is the only lecturer who taught me who I can take time to go and visit back in college. Unlike most of us, who will preach water by day and drink wine by the night.

Slowly I resigned to the fact that tribalism like corruption are as Kenyan as Mt. Kenya and Lake Victoria, they aint going nowhere soon. Tribalism and corruption are two sides of the same coin, the main impediments to our social and economic development.

I concur with Hassan’s latest remark that we have to come out and discuss tribalism. The Luos live in a siege mentality due to pork barrel politics of previous regimes. The Kikuyu have this engrained claim to Kenya as the people who fought for independence. The Luo believe they have to fight for their 'right' while the Kikuyu are out to defend what is 'rightfully' theirs.

These are the tribes that form the two axes upon which Kenya’s tribal turfs revolve either by design or default. The times Kenya has made meaningful progress is when the two communities have worked together.  It is time the Luo and Kikuyus looked beyond politics, may be we will see the Kenya we want.

The church is as guilty as the political class by not standing up to fight tribaism. Listening to Anglican politics before the election of Archbishop of Nairobi leaves you with a sour test. It will be ages before another Luo gets to the pinnacle of the Anglican Church however qualified a candidate is. It will not be said openly like is the habit in the mainstream churches, but that is the bottom line.

In the build up to 2007 elections, the Kisumu Catholic Bishop publicly disagreed with Cardinal John Njue. When a Bishop says that the Cardinal's statement is personal to appease his flock, we have a problem. Times may have changed, but the underlying problems have not been sorted.

The regional division of churches that was done by the colonialist has been retained to date. That when I hear of a Methodist in Kenya I see a Meru, PCEA is for the Kikuyu, SDA the Kisii and Luo and so forth. It is time churches stepped out and reached to people of other tribes out of their ‘area of operation’ and even put them in major positions of leadership.

This can be done by offering scholarships to bright students from these regions and slowly inculcating them into the church. The missionaries did it very well, the times may have changed but the needs remain the same.

There are drastic measures we need to take if we are to see some gains in this war. 


The first is to strengthen and streamline the county governments. Putting up the systems will be a challenge but we need to sacrifice and overcome the teething problems that will arise. By equitably building the parts, we will build the whole (Kenya) easily.

 Then we need to elect someone from the small tribes into state house. They have already gained from the mistrust among the big tribes as crucial positions in post new constitution Kenya are going to them.We can learn from Tanzania where all their presidents have come from minority tribes, it is the CCM party that matters.

Then we need to elect a Luo president, the earlier the better. It is a bridge we came to long time ago but we have never crossed. For some wounds to be healed and chasms bridged, this will have to happen, who and when is up to Kenyans.

Then the long term answer to this problem is inter-marriage among the tribes. The next generation born from these unions will be devoid of tribalism. This has proved the answer between the Luo and Luhya. In spite of underlying differences they can trust each other. Their common border is a buffer zone as most families do not know where they belong.

Meanwhile, it will take people like Hassan who will courageously and truthfully speak against tribalism to fight it. We cannot wish it away, but engage on ways to right past wrongs and put up ways to secure a good Kenya for us and the next generations.