Beware of many wolves wearing sheep's clothing

Njoroge Kinuthia

A wag joked the other day that God was so angry with some folks that he decided to stone Nairobi from the skies. But out of mercy, he changed his mind and altered the trajectory of the missile to a barren place in Thika.

Although his joke was a bit stretched, the wag did have a point. God must be angry with the daily worldly iniquities. Perhaps he has given Satan leave  to test us like Job’s case. The devil must be roaring with laughter. 

 Moral compass

PointBlank thinks, God is very angry with (some) religious leaders; the people supposed to be the light of the world — its moral compass. As you read this, a bishop has been arrested in Kitale suspected of killing his mother-in-law over a land dispute. Still in Kitale, a pastor has been arraigned in court on allegations of stabbing to death his pregnant student girlfriend. Last month in Mombasa, a Pakistani madrassa teacher was arraigned in court facing charges of sexually assaulting six boys.

There’s no doubt some shepherds have turned predator. It’s upon sane religious leaders and their flock to keep eyes open and purge the devil incarnate.

Mombasa’s  wiliest slickster

If you live in Mombasa beware, a wily confidence trickster is on the loose, and according to Mr Martin Makundi, “is taking advantage of the overly trusting nature of Coastarians and having a field day burglarising homesteads in broad daylight”.

“She’s a mature, confident, intelligent and elegantly dressed lady who in collusion with estate idlers gathers information about a family,” he narrates.

“Later, she uses the information to convince househelps that she knows her employers claiming to be either a relative, friend or workmate.”

Makundi says the trickster then sends the househelp on an impromptu errand, for example to buy medication, after feigning sudden illness. When the househelp is gone, she “assembles her group of thugs who sweep the house clean”. To reduce suspicion by neighbours, she colludes with locally known  transporters to move the booty to an old abandoned house”.

He says the trickster has in the last few weeks struck in Kiembeni, Mtopanga, Vescon, Mshomoroni, Mikindani, Bamburi and Bombolulu areas of Mombasa. “Unfortunately reporting to police has proved to be a waste of time,” he mourns.

Kenya’s lovely...but it stinks!

Although, Teresa, an Australian married to a Kenyan, has been in Kenya for seven years,  she can’t  get used to some habits.  She says it shocks her to see “how much vegetable matter gets disposed of alongside regular garbage. “But she says this can change.  “We’re a household of three people. We’ve managed to reduce our weekly garbage from three plastic shopping bags to one by spreading vegetable matter from the kitchen on the garden,” she reveals.

Teresa says, she is usually hurt when tourists make comments such as “.....Kenya is a lovely place, most people love Kenyans for their friendliness and hospitality, but it’s a dirty country.”

Mr Francis Ndung’u Waweru also has a big problem with waste management, particularly in Nairobi.

moral compass

“Waste has become a big problem and many estates are choking in garbage,” he says. “For example in the whole of Kawangware there is no place to dump waste. So many have resorted to putting waste in gunny and paper bags and dumping on roads and drainage systems,” he reveals. “What plan does the city council have to improve waste management?” he poses.

Speech? Don’t talk about it

Concerning our lead story on  Thursday Leaders can end giggles and guffaws over their gaffes) Mr Samuel Owiti is accusing PointBlank of advocating a mission impossible.

He says speech writers would have a hard time writing scripts for our “stand-up-comedian” politicians.

“Starting from the top”, he asks, “how would any serious script writer include words like ‘pumbavu’ and ‘mafi ya kuku’ in a speech? How would words like ‘ng’eff, ng’eff’ appear in a written speech?” Well, Owiti, those are some of the words that PointBlank would expect writers to expurge from speeches.

Council’s food for thought over dirty street dishes

Mombasa resident, Mr Justin Osey, had expressed worry that the Food Hygiene Regulation Act was being flouted with impunity in the coastal town (Dirt is not good on food, March 4).

“The law stipulates that eating houses, cafeterias, restaurants and private clubs should not prepare, sell or display food without a licence, which is only granted after a premise has been inspected by officials from the Public Health Department,” he had observed.

However, the law was not observed especially in Changamwe, Kisimani and Likoni areas where women and children cooked tasty snacks and laid them out in the open to gather dust raised by passing vehicles. We still want to know from Town Clerk Tubman Otieno, whether the council has  taken any action.