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Julius Njogu 'working smart' in the 42-Kilometer race Photo: Courtesy
I am a deeply perturbed man, considering how callous Kenyans have become. We have sunk so low that we are now punishing those we should be honoring. A man travels from Naivasha all the way to Nairobi, practices how to execute a 500-metre dash and then wakes up very early on a Sunday morning, when mere mortals like you and I are nursing hangovers and haggling with ourselves whether we will go to church later, to complete a 42-kilometre race. Only that he completes the race in only a matter of meters being a keen follower of the “working smart” principle.
If the world were a fair place, Julius Njogu would be feted. He would be driven around in a fuel guzzler and even have his stuff ferried on a Sh109,000 wheelbarrow. Every evening, he would be bathed using the best of oils and soap worth about Sh37,500 per bar. He would be an honorable member of our hallowed institutions of governance, earning a huge salary, mileage allowance whenever he goes home to his employers, the constituents, and a sitting allowance for reporting to work for a job he campaigned for. Unfortunately, foresight is not our best of strength.
Instead of choosing people who are go-getters, we go for those who hide their activities in nefarious bills and motions. Mr Njogu, I dare say, is a courageous man who did what many are afraid to do and did it in spectacular fashion; in front of TV cameras, shoulders upright, chest out, chin up and head high. He is a man who hoped for a medal position after a grueling race with no sweat. What is so wrong in a patriotic Kenyan engaging in the two most national of our pastimes, running and seeking to reap where they did not sow? Instead of ridiculing the fellow, we should be making noise on Facebook and Twitter.
The hashtag #KenyansforJuliusNjogu ought to have been trending for the last one week. Unless, of course, we are so envious of a fellow Kenyan’s guts that we decide to put them on the pillory and subject them to ridicule.
If the man must be charged in a court of law, then let us be lenient and charge him with being inept and for getting caught. Maybe we can also charge him with distracting our national psyche, after all our primary school children need to get back to orgies in the clubs, while their secondary school counterparts revise stolen national examinations and those in campuses engage their brains in masterminding bank robberies in faraway places like Othaya.
After we charge him with failing to not get caught, he will go to court and humbly submit that he was just taking a Sunday morning stroll before he was accosted by race officials, who wanted bribes, accusing him of being a fraudster. We all know this is Kenya, where an innocent statement - like a politician stating the obvious fact that people must die of joy - is taken out of context by the frivolous media. In fact, I wonder if there is any smart “wakili” out there who has seen a defamation suit taking root here. How dare they expose a man to scorn simply for being Kenyan?
