PLO, win graft through action not tough arguments Updated: Wednesday, July 20, 2011 Story by: MEEME JOSHUA
Dear Patrick Lumumba Otieno aka PLO,
I salute your, sir! When you were appointed the anti-graft czar one year ago, many people breathed a sigh of relief but an equally large number were skeptical. Now it seems the skeptical were damn right and the optimists are frustrated. Indeed you have very little to show for this period and Kenyans are getting weary of your daily presence in the media pleading with the corrupt who have looted Kenya dry. Their scotched earth policy does not require negotiations.
On the face of it, your strategy seems to be based on the principle of stirring the waters to catch the fish, both large and small. But it appears you are avoiding catching large fish. In reality corruption and the corrupt are like very, very slippery eel. Sorry if I misjudge you, but you seem to have assumed office without a concrete principle or philosophy to deal with graft. To deal with ubiquitous nature of corruption, requires more than just blabbering: it requires an equally omnipresent nature of anti-graft crusaders. Not in the media but in the battlefields.
In the realm of power, PLO, you must prejudge your actions against the effects the actions will have on the people. You seem to enjoy playing the anti-corruption game on the publicity court. Playing to the media gallery does not add value to the war but only hardens the resolve of the corrupt. You irritate most of us when you take to the streets to protest corruption in the Lands Ministry; you irritate when you tell us that you are investigating ministers but six months later, there is nothing to show; it is boring to see you on TV everyday pleading with thieves. Please, engage your brain before putting your mouth on high gear.
You say you are not a hunter and there are no witches to hunt, and therefore cannot witch-hunt! This is besides the point. Corrupt people are more than witches and should be hunted. PLO, you are an archer: take your quiver, arrows and bow and set on a long journey to hunt the ogre that is eating the Kenyan future. We the Kenyan people trusted your ability and resolve to deal with graft. One year later, reality sinks; corruption is amorphous, faceless and a monster that fight back viciously. Nothing to show!
This is the reality check, PLO. Many people have died from preventable and curable diseases because money meant to buy medicine was siphoned to private offshore accounts; many Kenyan children's future is in mortal peril after unscrupulous people looted money meant for free education for poor pupils; many more are dying of hunger in a country that has so much potential it can feed itself and its starving neighbors because money meant for irrigation landed in private hands; the dead lament in their graves as pot-bellied merchants strut their huge bodies and parade their large limousines bought with graveyard's money; and the list is long. If you can't do anything, then you are not up to task.
PLO, just want to remind you a quote from Albert Einstein “problems cannot be solved from the same level that caused them.” It is unfortunate that your actions show that you are in fact at a lower level and therefore cannot reach the might-corrupt. PLO, corruption cannot be easily deciphered because it is enmeshed in a simulation of integrity and good morals. To deal with it requires more scheming and thinking than talking.
We the Kenyan people, sent a distress call when our house(Kenya) was on fire(corruption). You came but now seem to have no instruments to extinguish the fire and you have resulted to sideshows of chasing rats escaping the raging flames. PLO, you can do better!
Frustrated Kenyan,
joshmemento@yahoo.com
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