No More Partying At State House

Earlier this week, President Uhuru Kenyatta summoned the press corps to State House to relay a message to the nation. However, he was addressing Kenyans, not in his capacity as the country’s CEO, but as a leader of one of 14 political parties affiliated with the Jubilee coalition.  The big news was, of course, that the parties had agreed to merge.

The choice of State House, the seat of the Presidency, as venue for what is plainly a partisan event was alarming. The constitution describes the President as “a symbol of national unity” but Kenyatta appears to be stretching the limits of this beyond what is acceptable. Party unity, even within the governing coalition, is clearly not national unity.

On the contrary, what the event highlighted is the creeping capture of the state by the party and the blurring of the lines between the two. And this is just the latest episode. The frequent and unseemly exchanges between the opposition Coalition for Reform and Democracy on the one hand and the Presidential Strategic Communications Unit on the other are legendary. They aptly demonstrate the latter's propensity to see themselves as more than just as civil servants working within the Presidency, but also as partisan agents of the Jubilee coalition.

One could also point to the curious case of Interior Secretary, Gen (RT) Joseph Nkaissery. I8 months ago, he was an opposition MP, having been elected on an Orange Democratic Movement ticket in 2013. Yet following his appointment to the Cabinet, he has been traipsing around his former constituency, pretending to be a member of the Jubilee coalition. So far, it seems, no one has asked whether he resigned his membership of ODM. It is almost taken for granted that going into cabinet automatically translates into joining Jubilee.

But why should this be of concern? Some on social media have suggested that the raging questions over the use of state assets were little more than just a storm in a teacup, a petty fuss over the use of microphones and presidential daises.  However, such thinking is dangerously ignorant of the lessons of Kenyan history. One of the reasons why the State House event left a bad taste in the mouth is the memory of the consequences of the fusion of the party and the state during the KANU era. That merger, which begun in the 60s under Uhuru Kenyatta's father and was completed under his successor, Daniel Arap Moi, was the foundation for a half century of abuses. As loyalties within government were steered away from serving the people and towards the party and its leadership, the state itself and the goods it held in trust for the people of Kenya were transformed into the personal property of the President.

In a very real sense, the cult of personality and the concentration of power in the person of the President that was engendered by Jomo Kenyatta, Moi and to a lesser extent, Mwai Kibaki, was essentially built on this fusion of party and state. Its legacy lives in the present day, when even nominally independent officials are loathe to go against the governing party line. The clearly partisan behavior of the police is a good example.

Further, as they say, the fish rots from the head. Other public officials will take their cue from the President. During the Al Shabaab attack on Garissa University, in which 148 people were killed, the elite GSU Recce Company was delayed in Nairobi as the police plane had apparently gone to Mombasa to fetch relatives of the Airwing commandant.

Separating the President’s personal and party affairs from that of the people is therefore no fickle matter. When asked about the appropriateness of hosting partisan political functions at State House, the President’s men are wont to point at US President Barack Obama's similar use of the White House. But while true, they neglect to mention that his party actually pays the US Treasury for the privilege, just as Obama pays for the daily meals, groceries and toiletries that he and his family get and use at the White House. Further, federal law prohibits federal employees and even elected representatives, admittedly excluding the President and Vice President, from conducting partisan business such as making fundraising phone calls, inside government buildings.

The Americans are certainly clear about the privileges their potentates are entitled to and go to great lengths to ensure public resources are not expended on party business. It is time we in Kenya followed suit.

What Obama Did Not Find The Courage To Say

The much awaited visit of US President Barack Obama to Kenya is done and dusted. By nearly all accounts, it was a massive success, showcasing the country as an investment destination and providing Kenyans an opportunity to claim the Kenyan-American leader of the free world as one of their own. However, in the fading afterglow of the trip, we can now begin to evaluate the events of the weekend. Perhaps a good place to start is with his previous visit here.

A leaked confidential US diplomatic cable reporting on a meeting between then opposition leader, Uhuru Kenyatta and the then freshman Senator for Illinois during the latter’s 2006 tour of Kenya, contains this interesting exchange:

“Senator Obama commented that when he returns to Kenya in 10, or five years, he hopes he will not hear the same comments about KANU and its failure to reform.  Kenyatta then challenged the Senator to publicly identify him as dishonest if he failed to remain on the reform track, stating that it is Kenya's true friends who will tell them when they are naked.”

9 years later, Obama did return as President of the United States and again met with Kenyatta, now President of Kenya. Did Obama take up the challenge? Did he show himself to be one of “Kenya's true friends who will tell them when they are naked”?

Well, the verdict would appear to be mixed at best. Certainly, he spoke eloquently about the need to confront corruption but with nowhere near the forcefulness of his 2006 speech, when he had averred that “the message that many Kenyans seemed to be sending was one of dissatisfaction with the pace of reform, and real frustration with continued tolerance of corruption at high levels”.

This time round, while acknowledging that the government needed to enforce anti-corruption laws and prosecute offenders, he chided opposition politicians for demanding that he put pressure on the Uhuru administration over, according to them, corruption, insecurity and repressive laws restricting the media and civil society. "Everybody wants the United States to be involved when they're not in power but when they are in power, they don't want USA to be involved," Obama told representatives of Civil Society, adding that he had made it clear to the opposition chiefs that there is a legitimate government in Kenya, which the US would work with.

(Interestingly, according to another leaked US diplomatic cable, Kenyatta, whose administration has spent much of its first two years in office vilifying the West for its supposed impositions, had in 2006 made the same request, even going so far as to suggest that the Americans could use donor-funded programs as an effective pressure point.)

In his speech to the Kenyan people, very much a rehash of his 2006 effort but with important edits, he also declared that corruption was tolerated because it had become a way of life, a habit and culture that needed to change. This contrasts with his previous stance when he had painted corruption as a problem of governance and praised those who “reject[ed] the insulting idea that corruption is somehow a part of Kenyan culture”.

Earlier, during a joint press conference with Kenyatta, Obama had noted that the corruption culture can change “over time” when “people of integrity at the highest levels” are willing to punish, not just petty corruption but also hold the elite to account. ”Breaking habits and saying no comes from the top,” he noted. However, while praising his counterpart’s “announced commitment to rooting out corruption”, Obama did not mention that the fight against sleaze was already coming off the rails just four months after being trumpeted. Nor that many in the country were sceptical about the government’s commitment to prosecuting its own. Talk, it seems, is now progress enough.

This is again a marked change from 2006 when Obama demanded that wealth declarations by public officials be accessible to the public (hasn’t happened), called for accountable, transparent government and an anti-corruption commission with real authority.

By attributing corruption to the people and ignoring the meagre anti-corruption achievements, Obama appeared determined to spare his hosts shame, perhaps mindful of the reaction his 2006 speech had elicited from the Mwai Kibaki administration which described him as an unintelligent and immature opposition puppet.

The reluctance to directly criticize the Kenyatta government was most obvious when he addressed the issues of terrorism and the illegal wildlife trade. On the former, he praised the “extensive and effective counter-terrorism cooperation” and offered “practical advice” on avoiding stigmatization of communities and restrictions on legitimate civil society organizations.  

However, he chose not to highlight the fact that the Kenyan government had done little to convince ordinary Kenyans that it was taking the security problem seriously or learning lessons from the many attacks the country has suffered.

Similarly, even as he announced new restrictions on ivory in the US in a bid to help stem the slaughter of the country’s elephants, he failed to take to task the Kenyan government for protecting the poachers doing the killing.

Throughout the visit, Obama seemed determined to paint a picture of progress and amid continuing challenges, to re-cast Kenya as “a good news story” with Kenyatta at the helm “taking important steps in the right direction”. Nothing wrong with that, I suppose.  But disappointing for those who had hoped Obama’s tour would include a candid examination of whether his hosts had stayed true to the reform agenda. In the end, for all his flowery talk, Obama could not find the courage to tell the emperor that he has no clothes.

On Obama's Second Coming

From a Kenyan perspective, the last decade has pretty much been a wasted opportunity for the country’s relationship with the US. The election of Barrack Obama had raised hopes of a deeper and more meaningful engagement given his Kenyan roots. However it coincided with two seminal events of Kenyan presidential ballot history. This was the violence that followed the disputed vote in 2008 and five years later, the election of a crimes against humanity indictee to the highest office in the land.

Like Mwai Kibaki before him, President Uhuru Kenyatta came to office with a serious legitimacy deficit. His administration too is hobbled by corruption and has been accused of clamping down on civic freedoms. Coupled with Obama’s own troubles at home, as a loony fringe loudly questioned whether he was sufficiently American, these, inevitably created a regrettable distance between the two countries. The situation was perhaps best summed up in then Assistant Secretary of State Johnnie Carson’s statement on the eve of the 2013 election: “choices have consequences”.

The UK also issued similar warnings of minimal contacts should Kenyatta and his running mate, William Ruto, both of whom had been indicted by the International Criminal Court over the 2008 post-election violence, win the polls. Though these eventually turned out to be hollow, the perceptions of Western interference supercharged the duo’s campaign and helped get them elected.

Once in office, a part of their push to get their cases dropped, UhuRuto (as they became known) fanned anti-Western sentiment both at home and across the continent, painting the ICC, in the words of Uhuru’s address to the African Union, as a “toy of declining imperial powers”, and playing up the new engagement with China as a counterweight to the West.

Obama too was keen to keep his distance. Following the example of his immediate predecessors, he made a point of skipping Kenya on the two African tours of his first term. If anything, it appeared that Tanzania, which is getting rather used to US presidential visits having hosted Bill Clinton, George Bush and Obama, seemed to be the US’s new BFF in the region.

One would thus have imagined that relations with the US had settled into the back of the freezer for the foreseeable future. It was all so different from 2008 when Kenya had been the only country in the world to declare a public holiday in celebration of Obama’s election.

So what changed?

Terrorism for one. Kenya has been a target of attacks from the Somalia-based Al Shabaab terror group ever since it invaded its neighbour in October 2011. But under the Uhuru administration, the numbers and severity of attacks have skyrocketed. The government’s incompetent response has generated the possibility of a spreading Islamist-inspired insurgency across Kenya’s north-eastern border regions. The threat to the largest economy in East and Central Africa and a bulwark for regional stability simply could not be ignored. Perhaps Obama is betting that by re-engaging with Uhuru, he can gently nudge him to take the necessary measures to confront it.

Secondly, it is important to note that the anti-Western rhetoric was always little more than a charade. The aim was to discredit the ICC, not alienate the West. It was not about taking Obama on, but getting Uhuru off. Under the surface, admiration for Obama ran deep. The two modelled their campaign and atmospherics on him, and across the country, as reflected in a 2014 Pew survey, Obama remains popular.

 What are we to expect of the visit?

While the official reason Obama is coming is the Global Entrepreneurship Summit there is little doubt that behind the scenes, it will dominated by concerns over the worsening security and governance situation. Less than a week prior to his arrival, the reopening of the Westgate mall, scene of an Al Shabaab massacre of at least 67 people two years ago, will be presented as a sign of resilience in the face of terrorism. But it also stands as a monument to the refusal by the authorities to learn lessons from previous attacks and to make much needed improvements. Obama himself has said that counter-terrorism will be an important focus of the visit. And while he will probably be more restrained when criticising his hosts in public than he was during his visit as Senator in 2006, one would still expect some tough talking away from the cameras.

The Kenyan government will also probably be on its best behaviour. It is best to ignore the loopy-headed warnings of Obama being thrown out of Parliament if he mentions gay marriage - he is not even scheduled to address MPs. Ditto the mooted 5000-strong nude march to protest the issue.

Nairobi is being spruced up in anticipation of the visit but that will be cold comfort for its long suffering residents. The homeless are being rounded up and will be kept out of sight and with much of the city expected to be in virtual lockdown, the usually terrible traffic will be nightmarish. In fact there is talk of an “Obamigration” as those who can flee the city in advance of Obama’s arrival.

The visit will also be a boon to the country’s cops. A new directive of dubious legality requires that everyone in Nairobi carry ID or risk arrest. There is no law in Kenya that requires the carrying of documents on pain of detention and this will only create an avenue for rich pickings for 15000 members of the famously corrupt National Police Service as citizens try to avoid the prospect of a weekend behind bars.

 The real test of the visit will be what happens after he leaves. Will there be any lasting change? It will be particularly interesting to see whether Obama is able to persuade Kenyatta to take security seriously and to stop using it as an excuse to clamp down on civil rights. Movement on that front alone would make all the hassle worthwhile.

Why Obama's Second Coming May (Temporarily) Save Kenyans

Two weeks ago, a team of Kenyan security officers was ambushed while responding to reports of armed militants from the Al Shabaab terror group being sighted in the eastern Kenya village of Yumbis. The security officers apparently escaped without sustaining any casualties, leaving the militants free rein to terrorise residents, hoisting their black flags and forcing them to listen to their sermons, for up to 7 hours. Later that night, the Kenyan government issued a terse statement claiming security forces had “repulsed” the attack on Yumbis after “engaging the militants in gun battle”. The statement urged “Kenyans to continue collaborating with security agents to ensure that members of this group who might have taken refuge among innocent locals are flushed out”.

Four days later, Kenyans woke up to reports that another Al Shabaab ambush in the same area may have killed up to two dozen police officers. The officers were responding to an earlier incident in which a police vehicle had encountered a landmine, slightly wounding the officers on board, all but one of whom had been discharged from hospital. This time the government, after initially telling journalists that up to 30 officers were missing and condoling with relatives of slain officers, reversed itself and declared that no one had been killed then declared one death. 

Even allowing for the inevitable fog that accompanies reports on events in such remote areas, the confused and confusing accounts are depressingly familiar. The media comes in for a bit of stick for rushing for the sensational headline without clarifying either sources or what information they had been able to independently verify. The government has already expressed its displeasure with Cabinet Secretary for Interior and Coordination of National Government, Joseph ole Nkaissery, telling journalists he was disappointed in their performance.

However, the Kenyan government would do well to first attend to the log in its own eye. For as we seen, a major reason for the confused reporting is a lack of reliable, accurate and timely official information. The communication efforts of the self-described “digital” administration have not exactly inspired faith in official narratives. On the contrary, many Kenyans have learnt to take its official pronouncements with a heap of salt. Its tales regarding terrorist attacks have invariably involved scapegoating and diversion, understating of casualties and problems, obfuscation of detail and exaggeration of the effectiveness of its responses.

This was as true during the four-day siege of the Westgate Mall in Nairobi 20 months ago as it was in Yumbis. The most obvious and startling example came on the eve of the attack on the Garissa University College when the President Uhuru Kenyatta pooh-poohed warnings of an imminent attack. This was in itself reminiscent of his shallow and poorly reasoned speech on the causes of insecurity last November which was delivered just hours before 24 police officers were murdered by bandits in the north-western town of Kapedo.

Further, as the attack in Yumbis was unfolding, his Director of Digital Communications was busy on Twitter berating Norway’s government for allegedly “supporting terror” by continuing to fund a Muslim human rights group which the Kenya government has blacklisted. 

Whoever one choses to believe, it is increasingly clear that Al Shabaab is able to operate within the former North Eastern Province with relative impunity despite government assurances to the contrary. It is clear that without a significant overhaul, the security apparatus is unlikely to significantly disrupt and deter similar attacks. One only has to remember that following the Garissa University College attack the then newly appointed Nkaissery, admitted to Parliament that the Kenya Defence Forces could not contain four Al Shabaab gunmen.

In fact, as I write this, there are reports that a group of Al Shabaab militants have been camped near Warankara village in Mandera County unchallenged for a week, causing residents to flee their homes. They have apparently been forcing those who remain to listen to their sermons. 

Yet in his Madaraka Day speech, President Uhuru Kenyatta could only promise “a major anti-radicalization strategy” had been prepared and would be rolled out “very shortly”. Of course, details on the strategy were conspicuously absent as was discussion on whether counter-radicalization is the same as counter-terrorism. 

It is unclear how the strategy has been developed and who has been involved. At least one prominent journalist has found that his contacts within the Interior Ministry appear to be in the dark about it. Also telling is that the strategy has been developed, and may be implemented, ahead of a planned regional conference on extremism during which, according to the Principal Secretary for the Interior Ministry, Dr Monica Juma, the government hopes to “understand the local architecture of terror networks as well as the narratives that promote ideologies of violence extremism”. It begs the question whether the government’s right hand knows what the left is doing.

This is not new. The Kenyatta administration has dealt with the rampant insecurity afflicting the country primarily as a public relations challenge, and sought to address it using token measures as opposed to fundamental reform of the security services. Many academics and security experts have echoed the maxim that Kenya lacks both the policy and security posture to successfully address the challenges posed by Al Shabaab. More importantly, a ravenous political elite, more interested in protecting its opportunities to “eat” lacks the will to address the systemic problems its greed has caused. 

It is into this maelstrom of incompetence, confusion and wilful negligence that US President, Barrack Obama, is due to fly in mid-July for his first visit as Leader of The Free World to the land of his father. The last time he was here, the then junior Senator described corruption in Kenya as a "crisis" which facilitates terrorism and breeds the "collective exhaustion and outrage" that makes our youngsters vulnerable to extremists.

On that score too, little has changed. Theft of public resources continues to be the touchstone of our politics. Corruption means students are abandoned to murderous thugs and their would-be rescuers stranded as police choppers are used for private joyrides. It means that army units sent into a city mall to rescue civilians instead loot it and when deployed to Somalia to fight the Al Shabaab, instead engage in illicit trade that fills up the militants' coffers. Corruption also means that no one is held to account for any of this and it will be interesting to hear what the US President has to say about it this time around.

However, there is a possible silver lining around his visit. It is not lost to many that pulling off a major attack in Kenya on or around that time would be a massive propaganda coup for the Al Shabaab. And while Kenya is vulnerable at precisely the time when it should be most ready, for an administration obsessed with image, such an attack would be a complete, and completely unacceptable, humiliation. There is therefore reason to imagine that the government will do everything it can to forestall such an eventuality. And in the process, its self-indulgence may afford its long-suffering people a fleeting reprieve from the depredations of the Al Shabaab. Fingers crossed.

Israel vs POTUS? No Contest!

It never ceases to amaze me the massive clout that Israel wields within American corridors of power. Remember this? Well, last week, when President Obama needed a reminder of who really runs things, the current Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, was only too willing to oblige. Only he decided to do it in front of the assembled press corps following a tense meeting at the White House.

The trouble started when Obama had the gumption to suggest in a speech that mid-east peace negotiations be based a return to the 1967 "borders" with appropriate land swaps to cater for Israel's illegal "facts on Palestinian ground" more commonly known as settlements. Many would have thought this to be a rather generous offer, one that rewards the Israeli's bad behaviour and disregard for both international law and Palestinian's rights.

Obama was by no means breaking new ground. Ever since the Oslo Accords of 1982, negotiations have proceeded on a framework of land for peace i.e. the return of occupied land for a permanent peace. Occupied land, as described in UN resolution 242 of 1967, comprises territory taken by Israel following the Six Day War, including the West Bank, Gaza, Syria's Golan Heights and Egypt's Sinai (which was returned following the Camp David agreements).

Obama's "proposal" also enjoyed the immediate support of the Middle-East Quartet which brings together the UN, EU, Russia and the US. Following th speech, the Russian foreign ministry quickly issued a statement saying the grouping agrred that "progress in dealing with borders and security issues could eventually lead to a final resolution of the conflict."

However, Israel evidently didn't get the memo. A fuming Bibi berated the idea as based on illusions and made clear that he expected Obama to renew pledges made to Israel by his predecessor, George W. Bush. He claimed that the 1967 lines, from behind which Israel had conquered 3 Arab armies simultaneously in less than a week, were now "indefensible" and said Obama could not sweep certain facts -presumably settlements- under the carpet.

That set the scene for the post-summit joint appearance before the world's press. Obama went first, making reconciliatory noises about disagreements between friends and his commitment to Israel's security. Bibi however, was in no mood for niceties. He gave Obama what amounted to a public dressing down, lecturing him on the Jews terrible history of persecution -something Obama's African and Irish ancestors presumably knew nothing of.

Then he really got into his groove, saying it was time to tell Palestinian refugees that their much cherished right to return to the homes their parents and grandparents were kicked out of in what is now Israel, a right deemed inalienable by the admittedly non-binding UN General Assembly resolution 3236, was yet another illusion. Just moments prior to invoking the (one can only suppose extraordinarily long-living) Jewish people and their millenia long yearning for a return to Palestine, thus wiping out the area's future as an Arab region, he derided Palestinian's 63 year cry for Israel to "accept the grandchildren, really, and the great grandchildren of ... refugees, thereby wiping out Israel’s future as a Jewish state. It's not going to happen."

A craven Obama listened studiously, only summoning up the courage to correct Netanyahu once -when he referred to the 7 million Israelis as "a much smaller people" in comparison to the 310 million Americans. " A great people," Obama corrected him.

Of course it was not the first time he was being reminded who's boss. He's had plenty of lessons. During his campaign for the presidency, he was criticised for having the temerity to suggest that the US should actually be what it claims to be -an honest broker between the Israelis and the Palestinians. After he made it to the White House, the notional leader of the free world was again reminded of the limits of his power after he attempted to get Israel to stop its illegal settlement activity on occupied Palestinian land. Needless to say, that is now a subject he steers well clear of.

So what are we to conclude? The mightiest nation on earth is not necessarily the brute with the brawn. It's the historically and geographically challenged state that controls the brute's head.

No-Fly Zones

The Fat Lady Sings

What does Robert Mugabe have in common with 1990’s fake pop stars, Milli Vanilli? “Blame it on the rain” was the duos last number one hit before their lip-synching scandal broke. It also happens to be Uncle Bob’s go-to explanation for Zimbabwe’s food shortages. During his recent visit to the World Expo in Shanghai, China, the octogenarian president said his country’s poor harvests were as a result of “inclement weather.” Many would however blame it on his 20-year reign, citing the disastrous land reform programme which crippled the agricultural sector, the bedrock of Zimbabwe’s economy, and bankrupted the country. Mugabe, though, is not one to dwell on his countrymen’s misfortunes. He was later photographed engaging in some retail therapy in Hong Kong, where he owns a house and his daughter attends university. He reportedly spent the weekend shopping for high-end suits and shoes in the city's Kowloon district.

____________________________________

"When you're in love with a beautiful woman, you watch your friends" goes a popular 1970s single by Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show. Africa’s last absolute monarch, King Mswati III of Swaziland, should have been paying heed. While he was attending to State business in Taiwan, his childhood friend, Justice Minister Ndumiso Mamba, was nabbed in bed with the Mswati’s 12th wife, Queen Nothando Dube, a former Miss Teen beauty contestant. The pair were busted by state security agents, who had apparently been following them for weeks, at the lavish Royal Villas Hotel. Though Swazi laws prohibit dishonouring the monarch, this did not stop the agents snapping photos of Mamba emerging head first from underneath the 22-year-old royal's bed where he was attempting to hide. The images later made their way onto the web. Mamba was immediately arrested on the orders of the King, whose mother - the Indlovukazi or Great She-Elephant - has reportedly sent a delegation to Mamba's village to lay charges of "trespassing into another man's home". He could face the death penalty if found guilty, while mother-of-two Dube would be banished from the kingdom.

____________________________________

In 2003, on the eve of the US invasion of Iraq, the Dixie Chicks, a Texas based country group, declared: “We don't want this war, this violence." Seven years, and over a million Iraqi civilian casualties later, the last US combat troops have left the devastated country. However, 50,000 are staying behind to, according to their commanding officer, Gen. Ray Odierno, “prevent foreign powers from meddling with the new government.” Apparently the Americans do not consider themselves a foreign power in a country six thousand miles from home.

____________________________________

The US musical duo, Wilderland, and some top music industry veterans recently released a new song titled “Fragile Day” which was written about two years prior to the BP Gulf oil spill, and features lyrics about fish swimming and dying in an oil-filled ocean. To counter such impressions, US President Barack Obama had a White House photographer take a picture oh him and his daughter, Sasha, swimming in the sea off Florida last weekend. The official picture was intended to provide evidence that the region's beaches are back to normal. However, it soon emerged that the President was actually trying to pull a fast one. The private beach on which it was taken, off Alligator Point in St Andrew Bay, north-west Florida, isn't technically in the gulf.

____________________________________

South Africa’s journalists may soon be singing the blues following government plans to institute a so-called “media tribunal” as well regulate what can be reported on and what constitutes a state secret. The government claims the law under consideration is necessary to limit the damage caused by media houses and their newspapers which they claim represent only a narrow, predominantly “white” interest. Predictably, the controversial head of ANC’s Youth league, Julius Malema, who has been in the headlines for all the wrong reasons, declared that the media must be regulated because "they think they are untouchable". The move comes in the wake of news reports that Ebrahim Rasool, who in 2008 was fired as Western Cape premier partly because of allegations that he had bribed journalists to report favourably about him, had been appointed South Africa's ambassador to the United States.

POTUS on Vacation

Indecision 2009

On Cartooning

Knife-edged and salient, there is no simpler or more effective form of journalism than the editorial or political cartoon. The message – usually critical – is instantaneous, and often funny. For over half a millenium cartoonists have exposed abuses of power, the corruption of government and the hypocrisy of society. Their works provide a running commentary on events, people, attitudes and preoccupations, and reflect momentary shifts in public sentiment.

But even earlier than that, in fact from the very dawn of his existence, man was using images to tell his story. The rocks of Africa, for example, are host to millions of images, some of which date back to 10,000 B.C. What makes the connection between these and later cartooning is occasional similarity between the way people are caricatured on the rocks and some of the cartoons that appear, for instance, in the Karonga Kronikal, a humour magazine created for and by troops fighting in the East African campaign during World War 1.

The word “cartoon” is drawn (no pun intended) from cartone, the Italian word for “pasteboard.” The Italian masters used pasteboard for rough sketches (cartoni), which were especially useful in preparing frescoes and tapestries. The word did not come to mean “an amusing sketch” until the 1840s when Prince Albert, who wanted to decorate the walls of the new Houses of Parliament in London with frescoes, opened a competition for their design. The cartoons for the frescoes, some of them absurd in their attempts to appear heroic, were exhibited in 1843 and parodied shortly thereafter in the English magazine Punch, thus earning the word its present meaning.

Political cartoons are for the most part composed of two elements: caricature, which parodies the individual, and allusion, which creates the situation or context into which the individual is placed. While caricature originated around the Mediterranean, with Leonardo da Vinci’s artistic explorations of “the ideal type of deformity” which he used to better understand the concept of ideal beauty, cartoons of a more editorial nature developed further north. During the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther condensed his message into simple broadsheet posters or illustrated pamphlets which were the distributed throughout population centres. It proved to be an effective strategy because the images would reach a large amount of people and, in an age of widespread illiteracy, enjoy the greatest possible amount of comprehension. As Barry Burden, assistant professor of government at Harvard University, puts it, “Satire was once the way for illiterate people to make sense of what was going on in politics.”

According to Ray Morris of York University, cartooning depends on the political system. In totalitarian regimes the artist is forced to praise the system and denounce its enemies. In authoritarian regimes some dissent is allowed, and when the regimes become brittle cartoonists mercilessly expose their rigid foolishness. In a Western (style) democracy during peace-time, cartoonists are watchdogs, keeping power-holders honest and accountable. “One might then generalize that cartoonists focus on office-holders and aspirants whom the public can hope to defeat in an election or a popular uprising. Cartoons focus overwhelmingly on the leaders of the party in power. Other government and business figures are in the minority.”

Cynthia Bailey Lee states in ‘A Semiotic Analysis of Political Cartoons’, a study of the visual images of presidential candidates portrayed in the editorial cartoons in the 2000 US presidential election campaign, “political cartoons are...successful in helping society to understand and make judgments about the extremely complex interactions at work in political systems.”

Over the years, the power of cartoons has been illustrated time and again. As Western culture diversified from its original religious foundation, new subjects became available for ridicule and the appeal and influence of cartoons on public life grew in proportion. In 1764, a series of four copperplate images inflamed tempers during the 1764 elections and ultimately cost Benjamin Franklin his seat in the Pennsylvania Assembly, the only election he was ever to lose. In 18th Century Europe, the cartoonists of England, Russia, Germany, Spain, and the United States generally declared satirical war on Napoleon, and so effective were they that Napoleon sent notes to the government of England requesting their suppression, equating them with murderers.

By the mid-19th century, editorial cartoons had become regular features in American newspapers. The continuing effect of political cartoons on public opinion was amply demonstrated with the demise of William Tweed, a New York politician in the 1870s, largely caused by the attention paid to him by cartoonist Thomas Nast. Tweed’s exasperated response speaks to the power of Nast’s cartoons. He demanded of his henchmen,“Stop them damned pictures. I don’t care what the papers write about me. My constituents can’t read. But, damn it, they can see pictures!”

In the tumultuous first half of the 20th Century, cartoons continued to be used to motivate soldiers and the citizenry. Cartoons in the Karonga Kronikal helped define the enemy, by depicting German soldiers comically, such as in positions impersonating African women or as cowards hiding behind African men. According to Melvin E. Page, in an article titled “With Jannie in the Jungle: European Humour in an East African Campaign” published in The International Journal of African Historical Studies in 1981, “the enemy in Europe was frequently painted in horrific terms, a Teutonic barbarian cruelly smashing the innocent and righteous.” By the WW2, the influence of cartoons was such that Hitler and Stalin surrounded themselves with large groups of “pocket” cartoonists who praised them extravagantly. They also destroyed or exiled cartoonists critical of them. During the “Battle for Britain” Englishman David Low, considered the century’s greatest cartoonist, was put on Hitler’s “death list.”

In modern times, political cartoonists, especially in the West, have fallen on hard times. Newspapers across the US, for example, are under pressure as readership declines along with advertising revenue, while more and more Americans get their information online. The dramatic decline in advertising dollars in a brutal economy has forced newspapers to cut costs by firing cartoonists, and turning to marketing syndicates for cheap cartoons. As a result, over the past three decades, the number of editorial cartoonists working in America's newsrooms has been cut in half. Prominent newspapers, such as the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times do not employ a staff cartoonist.

In East Africa, the situation is reversed. The number of working cartoonists in Kenya, for example, has more than doubled in a decade and newspapers are increasing in number, not decreasing. However this may be short lived as internet use spreads. Many cartoonists are paradoxically turning to the web for salvation. The opportunity to reach a wider audience and practice their art unfettered by the fears and inclinations of editors might yet prove to be a blessing.

However if the tradition of irreverent political cartooning was to disappear, the world would be the poorer for it. Editorial cartoonists are valuable to democracy because, as Pulitzer-Prize winning cartoonist Clay Bennet puts it, “democracy needs hecklers.”

“Let's face it, most people are just plain nice… reluctant to impose their comments or observations on others when those views are either unkind or unsolicited. Most folks will sit quietly in a theater (no matter how bad the performance) and clap politely… But in every audience there's a heckler—someone who's either fearless or foolhardy enough to publicly ridicule the flaws in a performance… Columnists and editorial writers are more like theater critics —studiously observing, then methodically reviewing the show with deserving praise or criticism. Editorial cartoonists, however, would be the hecklers—blurting out their complaints for all to hear, receiving scorn from some and approving nods from others in the audience. Although the critic and heckler basically serve the same purpose, the latter is much less concerned with the prospect of embarrassing others... or himself.”

Another famous cartoonist, the late Herb Block, who coined the term “Mc-Carthyism” and attacked the infamous anti-communist investigations of that era notes in his essay, “The Cartoon”: “Cartooning is an irreverent form of expression...If the prime role of a free press is to serve as critic of government, cartooning is often the cutting edge of that criticism.”

Rumble in the Jungle

Obama Comes To Africa

Not On His Watch?

This from Rosa Whitaker, former Assistant US Trade Representative to Africa, serving under Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush and now President and CEO of The Whitaker Group (TWG), a Washington, DC-based consultancy specializing in trade and investment in Africa. As the trade advisor to Congressman Charles Rangel, she was a prime architect of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) and continues to play a lead role in advocating for its enhancement and continued relevance. (Hat Tip: The East African)

As the Obama Administration develops its Africa and trade policies, it is critical that it resists pressure from some special interests and members of Congress to support legislation that extends the duty-free access to the US market enjoyed by African nations under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) to all Least Developed Countries (LDCs).

While the sentiment is commendable, the result of such a broad-brush trade policy would be disastrous for Africa, particularly those countries that have used AGOA to grow their apparel and textile industries and, in so doing, created more than 300,000 jobs across the continent. In 2008, apparel constituted Kenya’s top export sector to the United States, accounting for $247 million in export earnings.

Last year, the 48 countries of sub-Saharan Africa represented only 1.2% of the $95 billion US apparel import market. Bangladesh alone captured 3.8% – more than triple the trade of AGOA’s African beneficiary countries combined - and Cambodia accounted for 2.5% of the US apparel market, exporting over twice as much as African exports.

Yes, Bangladesh and Cambodia both suffer the scourge of poverty, but the difference is one of economic trajectory and divergence. Africa continues to be the only region of the world getting poorer and not converging with developed economies. AGOA offers hope and has demonstrated progress in reversing these trends. Apparel has been the entry point into manufacturing for all countries including the US and China. To cut Africa off as it is entering this labor-intensive sector is homicidal for the region.

Extending AGOA benefits to other LDCs, like Bangladesh and Cambodia, would almost certainly be the death knell for Africa’s very promising, but still nascent, apparel sector. Already, the continent’s clothing exporters, faced with the global recession as well as super-competitive, low wage producers in Asia, are under severe stress.

Last year, apparel exports from Africa to the US dropped by over 10%, a decline over three times greater than the contraction in the overall US textile and apparel market. When you consider countries like Bangladesh, whose apparel and textile exports in 2008 grew by 11% to about $3.5 billion; or Cambodia, which exported over $2 billion in apparel and textiles to the US, it is easy to understand the necessity of maintaining AGOA’s special benefits for African countries.

As Paul Collier points out in his "Bottom Billion" book, Bangladesh and Cambodia have created hypercompetitive garment industries and trade preferences are clearly not needed for the "hypercompetitive" but for the most vulnerable and fragile. If one believes trade policies should have a developmental impact, as I do, then trade preferences have to be targeted.

When Asia broke into these markets it did not have to compete with established low-cost producers, because it was the first on the block," Collier writes. "For [Africa] to break into these markets they need temporary protection from Asia."

With a new Administration and a new Congress in Washington, it is a good time to open up the discussion of how the US can develop a trade policy that serves our both economic and development objectives. It is critical that we don't succumb to superficial, feel-good policies that could have devastating consequences for the very people we mean to help.

AGOA was enacted by President Bill Clinton and enhanced three times under President Bush with consistently strong bi-partisan support. This key pillar of US policy towards Africa—which was endorsed by all 48 sub-Saharan African countries and the Africa Union must not be diluted or destroyed under the Administration of America's first African-American President.

I have always believed in and worked for more certainty and clarity in our trade preferences programs. Certainly there is room for improvement in our trade relationship with all LDCs, but as Washington's retail interests try to dilute AGOA's apparel benefits under the banner of lifting all of the world's poor to prosperity – and in the process sacrificing 300,000 African workers and their families – I hope that President Obama will simply reply: "Not on my watch."

Preaching Water, Drinking Wine

EUconomic Recovery

The EU has a population of close to 500 million and, taken as a single economy, is the largest in the world with a GDP of $19 trillion. It is also the largest exporter of goods, the second largest importer, and the biggest trading partner to several large countries such as India, and China. Given all that, it is surprising that it's major contribution to resolving the current global economic downturn consists chiefly of criticising US policy. 

Last week Mirek Topolanek, who is running the EU presidency despite the collapse of his government in the Czech Republic, described Barack Obama's spending proposals as the "road to hell." Now, I am no lover of President Obama's pork-laden, anti-trade, nationalisation in the guise of stimulus packages and bailouts. Our own experience in Kenya amply demonstrates that the heavy hand of government rarely inspires innovation and accountability. 

However, it does occur to me that the EU has fared little better in this regard and has failed to step up to the plate. It still choses to hitch its wagon to the moribund US economy instead of using its economic muscle to chart a new course, one where the rest of the world doesn't head to the ICU when the US catches a case of the sniffles.

The Handover

Is it a sign of white America's nervousness with an Obama presidency that they summoned all living former (and soon-to-be-former) Presidents to the White House to advise him on the challenges he will soon be facing? Such a gathering had not happened there in 27 years. 

Or is it simply a recognition of the humongous hole George W. Bush has dug them into and the fact that his successor would require all the help and advise he could get?

Election Dance-Off

Crumpin' you can believe in!

The Absurdity of Hopelessness

First we were the only country in the world to declare a public holiday to honour the election of a foreign head of state. That was bad enough. But our national obsession with Barack Obama knows no bounds. 

Our MPs have declared their intention to hold a thanksgiving prayer meeting at Uhuru Park, Obama's grandmother has netted an international job as Ambassador-at-large for some algae and newspapers are full of reports of an expected economic bonanza heading our way. Prime Minister Raila Odinga and his pet poodle Otieno Kajwang' are both claiming to have played "crucial" roles helping secure Obama's victory in the expectation, I wager, of invitations to visit with the future First Family in the White House or Cabinet posts in the new Administration. I wonder how many kids unlucky enough to be born this year will forever carry monickers such as Kogelo, Whitehouse, Election etc.

And when the party is over, when all euphoria has dissipated, we will be the same divided Kenya. After celebrating another peoples' milestone on the road towards true unity, we will ourselves retreat from the call of History and head back into our tribal cocoons, sharpening our pangas in readiness for the next round of bloodletting masquerading as election campaigns.

Or, perhaps, just perhaps, we can change?

Yes we can! But we won't.

A Kenyan Obamanation

Not content with intimidating those alleging that Kenya is arming Southern Sudan, the government has now inserted itself into the US presidential campaign by arresting and deporting the author of a book critical of Barack Obama. According to Xinhua,

Jerome Corsi, who authored "The Obama Nation; Leftist Politics and the Cult of Personality", was arrested at a Nairobi hotel on Monday minutes before launching the book meant to advance a negative campaign against the U.S. Democratic presidential candidate on his ancestral soil. The book questions the Illinois senator's character, his links to Prime Minister Raila Odinga and attacks Obama's fitness for the White House.

Corsi was grabbed as he entered the venue of the press conference and his books and copies of the media statement grabbedand later whisked to the Immigration department for questioning. In a statement he issued inviting journalists at the book launch, left no secret of the intention to hurl dirt at Obama and undermine his campaign from his ancestral home.

"Dr. Corsi will also expose details of deep secret ties between US Democratic presidential candidate Sen Barack Obama and a section of Kenya government leaders, their connection to certain sectoral groups in Kenya and subsequent plot to be executed in Kenya should Sen Obama win the American presidency," the statement reads in part.

Since when did it become a crime in Kenya to criticise Obama? And isn't this the height of irresponsibility? Not only does this harm Obama and open him up to accusations of intolerance, it also creates enemies in the one place we do not need them. What should happen if John McCain should  ascend to the US presidency? Won't our government have compromised our future relations with the most powerful nation on earth?

In fact, such action seems unnecessary considering, according Wikipedia: 

Corsi's book has been criticized for inaccuracies by news organizations such as The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, U.S. News and World Report, the Associated Press, Time magazine, Newsweek, The Daily Telegraph, Editor & Publisher, The Guardian, CNN, The Independent, Politifact.com, and The Boston Globe. According to The New York Times, "several of the book's accusations, in fact, are unsubstantiated, misleading or inaccurate." Peter Wehner of Commentary wrote: "conservatives should not hitch their hopes to" Corsi's book because "it seems to be riddled with factual errors — some relatively minor (like asserting that Obama does not mention the birth of his half-sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng, in Dreams from My Father; Obama does mention her), and some significant (suggesting that Obama favors withdrawing troops from Afghanistan; he wants to do the opposite)."

Not that its accuracy should be an issue for the government absent a libel complaint from concerned individuals (yes, libel is still criminalised in our statutes.)

On the other hand, perhaps this has nothing to do with Obama and everything to do with politicians covering their asses. What exactly was Corsi going to reveal during his press conference? According to Classic FM, the book "paints some local politicians in a bad light."

This is just more evidence that the Kibaki-Raila administration is not interested in promoting free speech.

UPDATE:

MSNBC, quoting a "senior immigration officer", Carlos Maluta, is reporting that Jerome Corsi "was picked up by police Tuesday for not having a work permit."  He is due to be deported tonight. 

He was briefly detained at immigration headquarters before being brought to Jomo Kenyatta International Airport for deportation, said Joseph Mumira, head of criminal investigations at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport.

Hmmmm?! Does one need a work permit to adress the press? Does one need a work permit to promote the sales of a book (which sales generate tax revenue for the government)? Does Nameless need a work permit to go to the US and hold concerts to promote sales of his CDs?