The takeaway from Governor Kawira Mwangaza’s impeachment is that the Senate has become an assemblage of political wheeler-dealers and male chauvinists.
Regardless of the facts, its singular mission was to eject Mwangaza, even knowing fully well that the matter was sub-judice. The Senate even ignored court orders that temporarily stopped her impeachment.
The Senate has become a political abattoir driven more by sentimentalism than the rule of law and principles as would be expected of an arbitrator.
The lack of logic during Mwangaza’s impeachment manifested in a simple thing as 27 Kenya Kwanza-allied Senators voted to impeach her, 14 abstentions, from the opposition, and only one vote against impeachment. It was that one vote that was representative of reason.
The general assumption among the populace, based on an internalised societal fallacy, is that leaders have superior intellect, that they are a cut above the rest.
It is for this reason that citizens, oft referred to as ‘ordinary citizens’, entrust elected leaders with the responsibility to think and act on their behalf.
If at their best leaders can be so base and despicable, what happens to the rank and file? It is no wonder then that with self-centered leaders, the quality of life among the indigent in Kenya and Africa’s basket cases like Somalia and the DR Congo is not fundamentally different.
Some of our legislators in the bicameral Parliament exhibit characteristics of morally deficient individuals to whom the end justifies the means. It would be debasing if true that senators were induced to vote in a certain way after intensely skewed lobbying by parties interested in Mwangaza’s gubernatorial seat.
It rankles chauvinists in our patriarchal political establishment that, as a woman and an independent candidate, Mwangaza effortlessly trounced her male opponents in the 2022 general elections, and she is a non-conformist. To them, it is a slight they are not willing to let slide. It is an affront to their inflated egos. As a safeguard, the threshold for impeaching a governor must be raised to preclude mischief and pettiness that often plays out during Senate impeachment hearings.
Outside Parliament, leadership vacuity is pronounced in the Education ministry, which comes across as one of the most shambolic in the country. Seemingly, the top honchos are so uncoordinated, they work impulsively, mechanically, with nary a consideration of how their actions impact the lives of millions of Kenyans. At the beginning of last term the Education CS made an announcement postponing schools reopening at midnight, just hours ahead of the opening day.
More recently the Education PS gave parents three days to register their children for the Social Health Insurance Fund. Clearly, these leaders do not appreciate the challenges people go through to get anything done in this country.
The ministry mandarins should know that not every parent has an android phone, ready access to the internet, electricity or even SHIF offices in their localities. They should have factored in time wasted and the frustration that follows system crashes when too many people try to log into a government system, especially.
It never occurred to the mandarins that it could take days before some parents even heard of the hurried directive. People are too busy trying to survive to keep monitoring the confusion at Jogoo house. The CS and his team must be sensitive, be organised and allow parents enough time to do anything required of them.
Leaders, in whatever category, must have the ability of forethought and be methodical. We are a poor economy in which the majority live from hand to mouth.
Sudden mandatory demands push many into frustration and depression. These, however, can be relieved by making health care and education free, at most, within reach of all. Money lost through sleaze and budgeted corruption can ease the cost of living in this country.
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