Does Kenya Know What She's Doing Dealing With China?

When the American and British governments speak with one voice, then it is advisable to take careful note of what they are saying and take some sort of action.

Both the US ambassador Michael Ranneberger and a visiting UK Attorney General, Lord Goldsmith have separately said the same thing albeit in different words. And that is that they are fed up with this governments' inaction on corruption. Many observers believe that the patience of these two governments has especially worn thin as a result of recent moves to warm up to the Chinese government who usually dish out assistance without asking too many questions. (An interesting aside here is how warmly President Kibaki was greeted by the Chinese compared to other African heads of state, during the recent summit in Bejing, as seen clearly on television clips of the event. Not even President Jakaya Kikwete of Tanzania, a country that has dealt with the Chinese for decades, came close to receiving the smiles and warm vigorous handshakes that President Kibaki basked in).

We can talk about being a sovereign nation and not bowing to neo-colonialism until the chickens come home. But that will not change the facts on the ground. The facts are that the US and Britain are powerful and influential western powers who can make decisions that will hurt us. Especially when they have their own growing concerns and agendas to urgently address.

Retired President Moi was an expert at playing this high stakes game of international politics. One of the favorite tactics of this amazing self-taught man who never saw the inside of a high school classroom, was to play foreign powers against each other. Notice that during his tenure it was very rare for both the British and American governments to agree on Kenya.

Is the current government skilled at playing international politics? Well, I wish I could reserve my answer to that question and get away with it, because as truthful and factual as it is, it can only be viewed as malicious. My honest impartial opinion is that this grandpas' regime has no idea what they are doing. You don't fool around with a 300-pound Gorilla and say that you have a strategy. Whatever your reasons, this is not a prudent thing to do.

Don't get me wrong. I am as anxious as any Kenyan keenly aware of the situation, to rid our beloved country of unnecessary foreign influence and interference. But the right way to do it is to put our house in order first (that includes dealing firmly and decisively with corruption). Only then will powerful foreign governments have less reason to wander into our kitchens.

Here are a few important facts to consider in warming up to the Chinese;

i) You don't want to mess around with the Americans and the British when the elections are just around the corner, because you will be organizing easy financing for the opposition. Do the Americans and British finance elections in Africa, I can hear you ask? Obviously this is not the sort of information you would expect to find on the official American government web site, or even on the CIA website. Don't be naïve, my dear brother. Don't be naïve my dear sister. Read a little world history and discover the shocking answer for yourself.
Rejoinder: Are The Chinese not also able to finance an election?
My answer: They are, although it has never been their style in the past, but you never know, I have to admit.

ii) One needs to ask themselves if they know the Chinese adequately. Better the devil you know well, than the so-called angel you never dealt with before. There is no such thing as a free lunch on this planet. These guys want something in return. Is flooding our market with cheap Chinese products the right way to go when we need to create millions of jobs like yesterday? (My apologies to China because, I am currently using a Chinese laptop to write this particular article, but did I have a choice? They're so cheap and increasingly reliable).

iii) One needs to ask themselves what became of countries that have been cozying up to the Chinese for decades. A good example is Tanzania. Just to give you one example. They're stuck with an expensive Chinese railway track into Zambia that cannot be linked to any other rail networks in the region, which are all British standard. They even have some Chinese hawkers in the famous Kariakoo area in downtown Dar-es-salaam. The answer to my question of what has happened to countries that have jumped into bed with the Chinese in the past, is that they get isolated. One quick route to isolation is thos governments recently announced official support of the Chinese position on Taiwan.

iv) The strategy of the Kenyan government seems to be quite simple. If your lover doesn't play ball, make them a little jealous and they will fall in line. The few times African politicians have tried that strategy in the past, they have met with more than just failure. One excellent example is the first Prime Minister of Independent Congo, Patrice Lumumba, who tried to play the Russians against Western powers. He was in power for only 3 short months. A western power (that I will not name) organized a little indiscipline in the Army that led to a number of white women being raped (imagine the impact and consequences of white women being raped by "black monkeys" in the racism infested 60s!). That gave them enough rope to hang Lumumba. After installing the then army commander Mobutu Sese Seko (the one who should have been most guilty for the rapes) into power and putting Lumumba under house arrest, the prime minister disappeared off the face of the earth shortly after that. Not only did they execute him in secret, they cut his body into many small pieces and then burnt the remains. Of course the whole operation was fronted by locals (from the mine-rich Katanga area who were bitter enemies of the young ambitious Lumumba).

It is clear from the latest statements from the Americans and the British, that the Chinese strategy will only succeed in putting even more pressure on the Kenyan government to address corruption and other evils. Which by the way is a very good thing for ordinary Kenyans.

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Quick question; This government is basically doing a lot of things in exactly the same way that former President Moi's administration did them. If you find that you were quick to castigate the Moi regime but are in fact defending the current regime when they do exactly the same things, then it means that you can only be one thing and one thing alone, a bloody ?????? (See answer below written backwards). If you get the answer correct give yourself a big part on the back. If it were possible to samabaza kshs 5 cell phone credit, I would have offered that as my big prize for all the correct answers. But for now make do with a pat on the back from yourself.

ANSWER:
tsilabirt

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Intimate interview with Alnoor Kassam reveals astonishing business secrets that can be applied in Kenya or anywhere else in the world.

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Why is it that Raila seems to know all this top-secret government meetings and goings on? Remember the Artur brother's saga? (Incidentally Raila says that one of them is back in the country). Does Raila have a mole in the highest echelons of government and if so, who is it?

The answer to these questions is shocking and too sensitive even for this blog. So I have answered it in great detail via email to my subscribers.

You can join my Kumekucha Confidential list and read the absolutely amazing answer to this question. Just send an email now to kumekucha-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

You will receive an email asking you to confirm your joining the list. Please make sure that you follow the confirmation instructions to be included.

In Loving Memory Of Smith Hempstone 1929-2006

Sometimes fate chooses a person when they themselves are not fully aware of why they are at a certain place at a certain time and why they are so prepared for the task at hand. Smith Hempstone's passing on seems to have gone largely unnoticed by the World. I am yet to find a single American newspaper that reported it.

To them he was just some journalist who was once posted as Amabassador to some banana republic.

To us he was a man who rose to the occasion at a particularly difficult time in our history and risked his life for a better Kenya. We as Kenyans should feel ashamed of ourselves because so few of us are prepared to do what a foreigner came and did so willingly. It seems that the curse of Kenyans is to always think of selfish interests. The people who seem to mention the interests of the nation are looters of national coffers who just make empty rhetoric while pretending that they are patriotic. It just makes me sick…

Kumekucha salutes you Smith Hempstone, on behalf of the ordinary, still voiceless, people of Kenya. Our fallen true hero of the Kenyan cause.

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Alnoor Kassam Of TradeBank fame speaks to Kumekucha in an exclusive interview about Moi and Biwott and what he has in store for them.

Breaking News/STOP PRESS: Smith Hempstone Is Dead

Smith "Nyama choma ambassador" Hempstone: Kenyans will never forget you.

"Nyama Choma Ambassador Is No More"

Information that reached this blogger just a few minutes ago (from impeccable sources that I cannot name) indicate that a man who made a major contribution to the noble fight for the second liberation in Kenya in the 1980s and 90s, former US Amabassador to Kenya, Smith Hempstone, is dead. My source reports that the man Kanu hawks loved to contemptuously call "nyama choma ambassador" passed on, Saturday 18th November 2006 in the United States.

Quite ironic that he dies on that date because that was the eve of the ODM Kenya organized so-called prayer meeting at Kamukunji grounds which was broken up by police. Hempstone's support helped multi-party crusaders hold several rally's at Kamkunji (most of which were broken up by police) and there were even times that the main organizers drove directly to the venue from the US embassy then situated at the corner of Moi Avenue and Haile Selassie Avenue. This was the embassy location that was bombed by Al Quaeda terorists in 1998.

Younger Kenyans may not be very familiar with Smith Hempstone's role in the struggle for the so-called second liberation, but the Kenyan people owe a great debt to this man who single-handedly refused to look the other way as the Moi government did everything in its' power to put down the campaign for multi-party democracy at a time when opposition parties were illegal in Kenya. Probably the most dramatic moment of the Hempstone tenure was the time in the 90s when he used his diplomatic immunity status to get Lawyer Gibson Kamau Kuria into a plane and on to exile in the United States right under the watchful eye of the then Special branch police who were more than eager to get their hands on the lawyer.

Hempstone also wrote a controversial book based on his Kenya assignment, Rogue Ambassador (which was banned in Kenya as Moi sued Hempstone, the publisher and the local book distributors (Text Book Center) in Kenya in 2001. Moi's big issue with the book was for its' alleging that he was involved in the murder of foreign minister Robert Ouko.

It is no exaggeration to say that without the contribution of Hempstone, at great risk to his own life (there were at least two attempts on his life) it could have been difficult for the country to have achieved what it did in terms of democratization and success in finally ousting the dictatorial Moi and Kanu from power.

I am deeply saddened at the death of Hempstone.

Interested in Laptop batteries and adaptors (available in Kenya) at reasonable prices?

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Why is it that Raila seems to know all this top-secret government meetings and goings on? Remember the Artur brother's saga? (Incidentally Raila says that they are back in the country). Does Raila have a mole in the highest echelons of government and if so, who is it?

The answer to these questions is shocking and too sensitive even for this blog. So I have answered it in great detail via email to my subscribers.

You can join my Kumekucha Confidential list and read the absolutely amazing answer to this question. Just send an email now to kumekucha-subscribe@yahoogroups.com

You will receive an email asking you to confirm your joining the list. Please make sure that you follow the confirmation instructions to be included.