Change knocks when the old self becomes utterly unbearable

President William Ruto launches the Rironi–Mau Summit dual carriageway at the Total Junction in Mau Summit. [Kipsang Joseph, Standard]

My last week’s column on President Ruto’s Singapore dream elicited strong reactions. Many readers wrote to agree with me. Others wrote to condemn me, while some were outrightly abusive, especially those who do not like the President. Let me say from the outset that, as a scholar, I am paid to think by the people of Kenya. That is why I welcome all views.

I have operated in cultural studies for many years and gathered enough knowledge to facilitate social engineering. Literature, especially, has taught me many things in life, but perhaps its greatest gift is that it trained me to listen and to doubt my certainties. It has also taught me to appreciate the power of ideas in shaping both individual character and national temperament.

Reading literature opened my mind to the long view of things. It reminded me that nations, like individuals, are not transformed by sudden inspiration alone. Transformation happens through habits cultivated over time. Literature also taught me that every society carries within it a moral imagination, sometimes noble, sometimes compromised, which ultimately determines its destiny.

I have also read widely on how President Lee Kuan Yew changed the fortunes of Singapore. About fifteen years ago, while serving as Director of Public Affairs and Communication at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and adviser to the minister, I had the opportunity to read The Red Dot, a book that carefully narrates Singapore’s improbable journey from vulnerability to global relevance. That reading left a deep impression on me. The book does not offer a manual for imitation, but rather reveals how leadership, discipline, and clarity of purpose can reorder a nation’s priorities.

Let me be clear. I am not saying that Kenya should copy Singapore. History punishes those who imitate without understanding. It also mocks those who refuse to learn from it. Civilisations grow by borrowing wisely, not by pretending that their problems are unique. The question before us, therefore, is not whether Kenya can resemble Singapore architecturally, but whether we are prepared to confront the deeper question of character. How, exactly, do we fix the software of our nation?

In my last week’s reflections, I spoke of the hardware and software of a nation. Hardware is seductive. It comes in the form of roads, railways, ports, airports, and power lines. It can be commissioned, photographed, and branded. But hardware without software is a beautiful machine operated by a careless hand. Software is less visible and far more uncomfortable. It is made up of habits, values, discipline, attitudes to work, respect for time, regard for rules, and a collective intolerance for mediocrity of tribalism and corruption. It is the quiet code that determines whether institutions work or merely exist.

I have seen institutions brought to their knees because their leadership consisted of hopeless rent-seekers rather than people fired by the desire to birth a new nation. Nations, like characters in novels, are tested when obedience is costly and shortcuts are tempting. It is here that Kenya often falters. We know the rules. We even recite them eloquently. Yet we have cultivated a dangerous affection for self-subordination.

In our national story, the admired figure is often not the one who follows the law, but the one who outwits it. The hero is the man who jumps the queue, dodges the law, or “knows someone somewhere.” Over time, this admiration has corroded institutions. When self surbotage becomes culture, order collapses.

Fixing the software of the nation, therefore, begins with a sober recognition and acceptance of the problem. Only then does the journey begin. Culture does not change through persuasion alone. It changes when consequences become predictable. Singapore did not become disciplined because its citizens were morally superior. No. It became disciplined because indiscipline became expensive, socially and legally.

This is where leadership matters. I am not talking about leadership by speeches, but leadership by example and enforcement. In literature, protagonists shape the moral climate of the story by their actions, not their intentions. In the same way, national leadership sets the tone. When rules apply to everyone, they gain legitimacy. When they are negotiated, they lose meaning. Discipline does not sustain itself; it must be renewed daily.

Education, too, plays a tragic role in this contradiction. We teach children civic virtues in classrooms, yet expose them to a public culture that rewards impunity. You cannot tell one story in school and live another in society without breeding cynicism. Young people do not learn values from syllabi alone; they learn them from what society applauds.

To fix the software of the nation is, therefore, to accept discomfort. It means saying no where we are used to negotiating. We have to enforce rules even when they inconvenience us and recognise that development is not merely an economic project. It is a moral one too.

President Ruto’s dream is not the problem. Dreams are necessary. But dreams demand a corresponding willingness to endure the pain of transformation. Singapore paid that price. The question is whether Kenya is ready to pay it. Perhaps our greatest challenge is not ignorance. No. We know what needs to be done, but a lack of purpose and intention. We tire quickly of discipline and romanticise freedom without responsibility. We do not value meritocracy and that is why we hand over our institutions to hyenas to run them. Until we become tired enough of crude tribalism, greed, mediocrity and disorder and choose the pain of order, the software will resist every update.

Change comes when the old self becomes unbearable. The nation needs a Damascus moment. President Ruto has started the conversation, and that, in itself, is a form of hope.

Happy and prosperous New Year!