Thread by @wmnjoya

I started reading this book a few months ago and the first chapter shocked me. Since I'm not an economist, I called a friend to ask if I'm really understanding the book correctly.

He said I had not misunderstood.

books.google.com/books/about/Un…

This is what I understood from the book.

At independence, the government had NO PLAN. I'm not lying. No plan on what to do with the 7m Kenyans then, except to go on with the British colonial plan of developing the country for the 1%.

We Africans were not in their radar.

So I asked: but my parents went to school, then I went to school. We were told that we were learning so that we could build the country. Kumbe the powers that be had no clue what they were going to do with us?

What were they thinking we would do after school?

My friend said: they were hoping that you might get a job, but if not, they would just pretend you don't exist. Maybe if you became too much trouble, they would send the police to shoot you and make you an example to others to shut up. But their plan was to ignore you.

I've just remembered that conversation reading this article on extrajudicial killings. For our political class, people in the slums do not exist. They are just supposed to survive, and be available for the rich when the rich want votes and cheap labor. theelephant.info/reflections/20…

So the possibility that there are people in Mathare, that they have dreams and dignity, does not even feature on the radar of GoK. I'm not exaggerating.

That's what police and extrajudicial killings are for: to make sure that young Kenyans don't dare dream.

And just in case mindu crass think this is just for people in the slums in urban areas, we were reminded by Kianjokoma that this applies logic to everybody. Emmanuel and Benson were students, and they were starting a business. The cops' JD was still the same. To kill dreams.

To grasp the madharau of the political class, remember that in the midst of the pandemic, our unemployment, the austerity from IMF, the politicians told us that "inclusivity" means distributing top posts among themselves and using 24bn for a BBI referendum to endorse the deal.

We the people are not in the radar of the political class. We just do not exist. The role of the civil service is to pacify us that we don't erupt. The real motivation is to protect the ship which it was given by the UK. What they call "policy" is really panel beating the ship.

When they planned CBC, @EduMinKenya really had not thought that we would have an opinion. I'm not exaggerating. They actually thought they would announce a new system and there would be no education questions. Maybe wakenya watalalamika, but just the usual adjustment complaints.

I started asking technical questions about CBC in 2017, even before it was implemented. To this day, and I'm not exaggerating, @KICDKenya has not answered even one question. Because the DNA of government is to not expect Kenyans to think and ask questions.

Another example: the expressway. This thing was planned as if we do not exist. It didn't matter what we thought, or how it would affect us. And when we raised questions, the government called us "sentimental." The audacity.

https://twitter.com/SpokespersonGoK/status/1187332234136686592?s=19

I even warned that the construction itself, let alone the complete project, would be violent. But of course, many Kenyans believe in this ideology of projects being more important than people. So they blasted me for saying this.

https://twitter.com/wmnjoya/status/1378933308122406916?s=19

Last example: tourism. Nowhere is the madharau for Kenyans of African descent more visible than in the nonsense @BrandKenya and @magicalkenya put out. Whatever the rest of government does with projects and words, tourism does with pictures. No shame.

This is a twitter album I put out showing how inconsequential Africans are to the colonial government of Kenya. We are missing from tourism pictures, and when we approach GoK officials privately, they are not even aware that there is a problem.

https://twitter.com/wmnjoya/status/1352891936064077824?s=19

I have now learned, after years of teaching, that the purpose of our education system is to prepare civil servants who have learned not to see Africans. We are taught to make Africans invisible. That's what @m_ogada confirms here.

https://twitter.com/wmnjoya/status/1376601016733466626?s=19

We are a country governed by psychopaths. It's politics of madharau. The one thing Kenyans must never tire of saying is that WE ARE HUMAN AND WE ARE HERE. But we need to also be aware that the civil service and our education system are completely decayed and need to be replaced.