Covid: We ought to feel let down, angry

Police officers man a roadblock at the Eveready area in Nakuru town while enforcing the night curfew set in place to curb the spread of Covid-19 on March 27, 2020. [Kipsang Joseph,Standard]

And so, we went full circle and found ourselves right where we were a year ago; lockdown and more than 2,000 people dead, 100,000 infections and no lessons learnt.

For a moment, forget about the ghastly gaffes in President Uhuru Kenyatta’s address that portrayed the frightening miscoordination in the bureaucracy.

The bigger picture is that we seem stuck where the virus found us last year where the only remedy to stop its spread was simple solutions such as washing hands, wearing a mask and maintaining social distance. That only came in handy as the world groped in the dark.

Since then, most of the world has rolled out twin-pronged strategies in the struggle to save lives and livelihoods.

They offered a reprieve to individuals and households suffering lost incomes and facing economic stagnation; they have continued to dole out cash to cushion businesses – and thereby keep jobs; they have extended cash tokens to the most vulnerable in the communities to buy food, medicine, electricity and water and paid rent and persuaded banks to issue moratoriums on loans and mortgages. Don’t underestimate the multiplier effect of this on the economy.

Back in Kenya, though Covid-19 demonstrated to us that the socio-political and economic fundamentals weren’t as sound as we thought, we are stuck in a time warp. Rather than build shock absorbers to be stronger for the next wave of calamity, we sat back and bid our luck. Perhaps Covid would go away just like it got here.

The removal of tax relief measures in January this year was a signal for people to get on with life and make up for lost time and income. The government was simply telling its people you are on your own. Other than a few counties, most cannot account for the Sh350 million given to them for Covid-19 preparedness at the height of the pandemic in 2020. A Health ministry official whispered to me that a lot of the cash was blown up within the first two weeks as sitting and travel allowances. Nothing for the emergency wards and the ICU equipment.

In truth, five counties are on lockdown because hospitals and care homes in surrounding areas are full to capacity. Why is there a lack of a collective outrage against the politicians for messing up our livelihoods once again? If they were not eating the monies, they were holding super-spreader events to flex their political muscles and displaying their machismo by not wearing masks.

By any measure, a lockdown is akin to offering simplistic solutions to a complex problem. The pandemic is not just a health problem; it is an economic and social problem. The most effective intervention – besides a good treatment – is to put money in people’s pockets. This is not to underestimate the efficacy of a lockdown. Not at all. Curtailing movement of people helps in flattening the curve. Yet we must despair at the lack of thought and forward-planning. A lockdown without a plan for a rapid vaccination and to scale up the medical facilities while considering existing healthcare costs is a dead-end strategy. It delays our recovery and dooms our chances to stay up and strong the next time the wave hits us.

So when other countries were funding banks to offer liquidity to corporates and stave off lay-offs and bankruptcies while planning for future emergencies, in our wisdom, we got some bags of cash for car grants and other ill-thought-out expenditures. Why would a governor have more chase cars than the number of ICU beds in his county?

Meanwhile, as our leaders tweedled their thumbs, China, the country first to be hit by the pandemic recorded brisk business with its rapid recovery, overtaking America as the EU’s largest trading partner by exporting goods worth $454 billion in 2020.

As I pointed out in my article last week, in the 12 months to today, the scourge has hollowed out the economy, corporates are limping into the new year wounded, while many Kenyans fell into the jobless pit. The lucky ones are on reduced salaries.

But there is real anger boiling beneath the surface as the people feel enfeebled, left behind and poorer. Spare a thought for the person who woke up with a job on Friday and went home heartbroken, without one.

We should all be appalled by the level of unpreparedness and the folly of living hand-to-mouth. A year ago, I observed that Covid-19 was offering us an opportunity of a lifetime to uproot bad leadership.

Research shows that democracy provides an incentive for politicians to invest in public good sectors like education, health, roads and water. Our politicians have failed us miserably. Why won’t we act?

Forget BBI, Covid-19 ought to give us the much-needed turning point.

-Mr Kipkemboi is Partnerships and Special Projects Editor, Standard Group