[kictanet] Three days in Nigeria

Fri Oct 11 08:11:51 EAT 2013

John

I can't help but concur with you on the issue of public officers going (back) to Uni to teach and generally transfer all that knowledge and experience back to the next generation. If more officials would emulate Dr. Ndemo then we would have a better place to call Kenya. 

The trend to go to Uni to teach/lecture/conduct seminars is something that the West do well. Many of their retired presidents Generals, Cabinet Secretaries and other high ranking officers find their way back to academia.  

Ali Hussein

+254 0770 906375 / 0713 601113

"Kujikwaa si kuanguka, bali ni kwenda mbele" (To stumble is not to fall but a sign of going forward) - Swahili Proverb

Sent from my iPad

> On Oct 11, 2013, at 7:23 AM, "John Masiwe" <jmasiwe at bluegate.co.ke> wrote:
> 
> @Lizette,
>  
> I meant it on a very light note and certainly do not wish to alter even one word of this beautiful piece. Actually on further reflection and 2nd reading of the piece, which even Daily Nation could not resist and requested Daktari to be published, I saw some policy advise which we can do well to consider as a country in light of Westgate. “Public places including hotels are guarded by armed policemen.” While we presently do this to a certain degree, I’m sure it can now be more mainstream with places like Village Market, Junction etc guarded by 1-2 Recce Squad officers..
>  
> This essay can prove a useful guide to a first time visitor to Nigeria. I particularly like that it paints Nigerians as a non-stereotypical way: “They are gentler than I have read in Nigerian literature.  They were honest too with the fare to the cities.” This is eye opening and opens up the mind to better Pan-African interactions in the increasingly more interactive continent.
>  
> What is most striking though from all this is when public officials like Daktari leave the high demands and duties of high office, it frees them up to pursue such hitherto hidden talents. When former Minister Kiraitu was suspended, he also wrote a book on Poetry. Former Minister Anyang Nyong’o recently mentioned wanting to go back to University to study Theology. Maybe it is good for the country if after a certain duration, call it tour of duty if you like, officials take a richly deserved break and we the public discover their other talents.
>  
> “I tipped him $20 and bade him farewell.  He was stunned.” As a reader, I too was happily stunned. Very generous of you and a befitting considering the good experience you had in Nigeria.
>  
> Finally Daktari, as @Josiah, @Mark and other here have said, give us more of this kind of writing through a blog, book, talk show or regular column in Daily Nation! Congratulations on a beautiful piece again!
>  
> John Masiwe
>  
> From: Lizette Kraft [mailto:lfkraft at gmail.com] 
> Sent: Thursday, October 10, 2013 6:38 PM
> To: John Masiwe; KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions
> Subject: Fwd: Re: [kictanet] Three days in Nigeria
>  
> ---------- Forwarded message ----------
> From: "Lizette Kraft" <lfkraft at gmail.com>
> Date: 10 Oct 2013 18:34
> Subject: Re: [kictanet] Three days in Nigeria
> To: "John Masiwe" <jmasiwe at bluegate.co.ke>
> Cc: 
> 
> Hello!!!!! Can we not read someones experience and narrative ( Daktari wrote beautifully) without commenting on how or what he should have referred to. Everyone to write and refer as he pleases. What is with the culture of critising when there is no need!!! Please!!
> 
> On 10 Oct 2013 15:31, "John Masiwe" <jmasiwe at bluegate.co.ke> wrote:
> Daktari,
> 
> This is good prose. You should seriously consider a platform for this kind
> of writing where you weave a narrative with personal observations during
> formal engagements. A welcome break from your usual policy-style writing. As
> a parting shot, maybe you should have quoted the more contemporary
> Chimamanda Adichie instead of Achebe. :)
> 
> John Masiwe
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: kictanet
> [mailto:kictanet-bounces+jmasiwe=bluegate.co.ke at lists.kictanet.or.ke] On
> Behalf Of Bitange Ndemo
> Sent: Wednesday, October 09, 2013 11:54 PM
> To: jmasiwe at bluegate.co.ke
> Cc: 'KICTAnet ICT Policy Discussions'
> Subject: Re: [kictanet] Three days in Nigeria
> 
> Three days in Nigeria
> Standing outside Abuja Airport in the soaring temperatures you get amazed
> on how similar to Kenya Nigeria is.   This is Africa's most populous
> country.   People idling around and women talking animatedly with their
> hands akimbo and they are larger than you can see in Kenya.  I had missed
> the person who was to pick me up.  Oga! Those who walked by me remarked.
> I assumed it was some greetings to a brother.  Colours of their clothing is
> similar to ours and perhaps the only difference with Kenya is that more men
> wore multi-colour kanzus.  Open shoes, Akala type are more prevalent here.
> 
> I walk towards the taxis.  They are gentler than I have read in Nigerian
> literature.  They were honest too with the fare to the cities.  I had begun
> to settle down and give Nigeria the benefit of doubt but my mind takes me
> back to Odili, the narrator in Achebe's 1966 novel, Man of the People.  Also
> not forgetting the many stories told about Nigerians.
> 
> For a while I savor the beauty of Abuja scenery.  Green everywhere.  It must
> be within the rain forest.  Land is expanse and untilled.  I turn my
> attention to my driver Oku Moses.  An affable young man perhaps in his early
> 30's.  I tell him I am from Kenya and in Abuja for the CTO conference.  He
> smiles broadly and asked me what I thought of Nigeria as if he had read my
> mind.  I said so far so good and immediately I divert his train of thought
> to football.  I tell him Nigeria is the main hindrance to Kenya's quest to
> get to World cup.  We became friends instantly as he opened up to tell me
> more.
> 
> You see that road, he says it leads to nowhere.  Corruption is the only
> problem here he adds as his tone begin to sound angrier.  I calm him down
> and tell him it happens all over Africa.  The 50 kilometer super highway
> from the airport to Abuja is as good as it gets, actually better than
> Nairobi Thika highway.  The Hotel I am headed to, is called Chelsea, named
> after the English league team Chelsea.  Oku is a fan of Arsenal another
> English league team.  He knows all the players.  He asks which team I
> support and when I tell him none, he then says that is why you will never go
> to world cup.
> 
> At the hotel Oku bids me farewell and hands me his card.  Call me he says.
>  I will show you the best of Nigeria.  It is still hot and my room was
> steaming with heat.  This three star hotel does not have a centralized AC
> but I could do with an old cranky stand-alone cooling system.  As I cranked
> it up, it made more noise that I could not listen to news on TV.
> Then suddenly the lights went off - blackout!!.  Outside it was raining
> heavily.  I said Geez this is home but soon some generator boomed just
> outside my room to bring light.  I wished they had shut it down.
> 
> Dinner time I joined other colleagues, Sonia, Karin, Robert and John for
> Dinner.  Me and Sonia were the vegetarians and so requested for pasta, the
> only vegetarian dish on the menu.  Alas! when the food came there was
> chicken on pasta instead of tomato.   The young waitress tells me she
> decided on chicken since there were no tomatoes.   After a few exchanges
> she seems to remember something and says I can make it vegetarian.  Wala!
> like magic she comes back with pasta alone.  I said thank you but as I start
> to eat, I discover or rather the waitress had forgotten that the base was
> chicken and she had only removed the toppings of chicken.  She meant well
> and wanted to do well but she missed the point.
> 
> As I watched Nigerian channels that evening, I say to myself, Nigeria is
> Kenya and Kenya is Nigeria.  We were colonized by the British.  We attained
> independence at about the same time in the 1960s.  We have new constitutions
> with devolved powers.  Just like Kenya, Nigeria continues to experience
> longstanding ethnic and religious tensions.  Although in Kenya's 2008 as in
> Nigeria's 2003 and 2007 presidential elections were marred by significant
> irregularities and violence, but both countries are experiencing relative
> peace interrupted by the Al-Shabab and Boka Haram respectively.
> 
> On Nigerian TV as in Kenya politicians complain that they need more power to
> states and counties.  They seem not to understand that they are the ones
> with the power to change legislation and so when they complain, the masses
> have no representation.  They also need more money yet they are the ones who
> appropriate resources.  They complain about soaring crime yet they are the
> ones who have the mandate to bring better security legislation.
> On the roads, motor bikes ride on the assumption that every motorist should
> watch on them.  Careless and dangerous like in Kenya.  If you admire the
> cleanliness of Abuja while driving, you will for sure hit one of them.
> Public places including hotels are guarded by armed policemen.
> 
> In my speech at the conference I said I was glad to visit Nigeria, land of
> Okonkwo from Umuofia (one of a fictional group of nine villages in
> Nigeria, inhabited by the Igbo people).   Only a handful of the people in
> the audience who knew that I was referring to Achebe's 1958 novel, Things
> Fall Apart.  Later Funke, a prominent Nigerian businesswoman and friend
> tells me that intellectualism died in Nigeria.  There was a time in Nigeria
> prominent writers were the role model of society.  These were the people who
> put our oral history on paper but we decided to chase them away.  It is sad
> that Achebe had to die in foreign land alone without his people.  I tell
> Funke, it is so strikingly similar to Kenya that our prominent writers are
> getting old and wasted away in foreign lands.
> 
> Haruna is driving me back to the airport.  He like Oku is polite but with
> much better intellect than an ordinary driver.  His grasp of African matters
> is excellent.  Out of the blue he tells me, you worked with government.  I
> tell him yes and I quickly ask him why.  No I just wanted to know, he says.
> Then he tells me that he is driving a car (VX Land
> Cruiser) that he will never afford to buy in his entire life. I note the
> ambition in him and tell him that if you know then you are capable of buying
> the car.  I am not in government, he says.  I tell him you do not need to be
> in government to buy the car.  You see I was in government but I still
> cannot drive such a thing.  He looks at me then he says, it is by choice on
> your part.  I tipped him $20 and bade him farewell.  He was stunned.
> 
> I leave Nigeria with many fond memories.  It was three days but enough to
> grasp the dreams of other people.  Their desires.  Their hopes.  We are all
> the same and hopefully one day we shall change the stigma of corruption by
> improving the fortunes of our Africa.  God bless Africa.
> 
> 
> Ndemo.
> 
> 
> University of Nairobi
> Business School, Lower Kabete Campus
> 
> 
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