I met Njoroge in one of the streets of Nairobi. He used to work for me many years ago. He had visibly aged, his suit had seen better days but he was still wearing it to give himself a veneer of respectability.
He lived in Kibera, was unemployed, got up, and walked to town daily, hoping to find a hustle that would give him a few shillings to put food on the table.
Every evening when he got home, his wife looked at him hoping that he had some money to give her.
She was often disappointed. By Friday, if he had not succeeded to make any money, even the phone I was using looked like food because if he grabbed it, he could sell it for a few thousand shillings. That would be enough food for a month.
Unfortunately, this is the state of millions of Kenyans today. Lest you forget, the Arab Spring that led to multiple revolutions that swept the Arab world from Tunisia to the Gulf started when a young Tunisian fruit seller set himself ablaze setting off the revolution in Tunisia.
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Today, Sri Lanka is in the same throes of a poverty-driven revolution. We are not far off and if we are not careful our country could burn too. Do not dismiss the protests over the rising prices of unga as inconsequential.
Raila Odinga speaks of the ‘Third Economic Revolution’ which is based on an economic agenda that focusses on growing the economy at the industrial level, the Jua Kali sector and the small mama mboga. He speaks of creation of a welfare state that is more caring and cognisant of the pains of the common man.
He promises four key welfare benefits: A Sh6,000 stipend to struggling families, free education all the way to university or technical college and medical care called “Babacare”.
He promises financial support to single mothers and interest-free loans to businesses largely run by women who sell by the roadsides. These tiny businesses support many families.
Most Western liberals don’t like the Welfare State. The World Bank is run by people who believe that welfare states will drag down growth and will encourage people to become lazy and they will take advantage of the system. The ones who suffer the most are the children, and they don’t have the choice to make whether to work or not.
Joseph Stiglitz, a Nobel Prize winner in economics believes that the welfare state is necessary and even desirable; that welfare money acts as an economic stimulus. There is no point of building the best infrastructure projects while our people are starving, are sick or losing out on schooling.
I worked for Citibank in the early 1990s. The bank was going through very difficult times. We survived when an edict came from New York demanding that every department cut its operating expenses by 30 per cent. It seems like an impossible mission, but we did.
Meanwhile, Kenya’s recurrent expenditure continued to grow from Sh1.55 trillion in 2018/19 to Sh2.2 trillion in 2022/23 budgets. If we cut even 20 per cent of our recurrent expenditure, we would find the funds.
It’s difficult but doable. Raila’s grand vision of a kinder, gentle nation is possible. Let’s get it done.
-Mr Shahbal was a member of the team that crafted the Azimio la Umoja’s manifesto
