The trouble with Masaku 7’s

Chinua Achebe in his book “The trouble with Nigeria” tries to figure out why Nigeria despite all it resources doesn’t seem to make strides in economic development. He clarifies that the reason is not due to the food they eat, weather, schools attended or anything else in the environment. He concludes the trouble with his country is the leadership and its followership. And also the notion that one day a ship will dock at their harbor laced with goodies that will make good all their ills. I guess this holds true for most of the other African countries and the Masaku 7’s tournament. That is what bedevils us.

I know a lot has been said about this rugby tournament. And before you cover your ears imagining am giving another moral angle to it, I am not. I did not attend it and had no intention to. I am a mere consumer of the written reviews and pictures that arose after it happened. I don’t believe all the things said about it were true, neither were they all lies. You see our Kenyan society has a knack of magnifying the negative out of proportion and living out any details of good tidings.

See, all those going to Masaku 7’s somehow had means of transport to get there. The fact that we did not hear anybody having walked from Nairobi to Machakos 50 kilometres away already starts sieving the kind of people who attended the function. The attendance was in many forms; physically, psychologically, emotionally, by hear say, osmosis e.t.c. The other aspect to consider is the amount of money spent in Machakos. The figure given is 50 million shillings on that weekend. Never mind that a big part of the party happened enroute to Machakos- a lot of people never even got there thanks to all the functions that were going on. I believe the drinks that the youth were imbibing were actually legal hence no deaths were reported from illicit brews. 

Most of the people who had planned to go and did go to Masaku 7’s are part of what would be known as the young urban elite. They were pursuing the ever elusive happiness and fun. The vanity of youth; who could blame them? Nairobi is rather stiff with its lack of anonymity. A majority of this people have parents and relatives who are alive and are ordinarily normal people.  They attend our colleges and universities, others work for organizations (this group hosts a lot of parasites, wannabes and groupies-).

Now most of us wish that the morals we assume their parents and larger society had taught them had stuck on them .Well it didn’t and they acted on their impulses and it was terrible. But like I said I carry no moral high ground to go that way. Our society me and you included, has set us the wrong precedents. No one can truly speak and give direction for our character benchmark is quiet low. 

Do we have national role models? People we can look at wholestically even without knowing them personally and deciding that we would like to be like them? I was amazed during the infamous Larry Madowo, Vera Sidika interview where she says she is not a role model. I wondered at what point you choose not to be a role model. The memory that lasts most in mind is from what is repeated often. Vera Sidika’s name in the last months has been repeated so many times that I feel a great number of our youth must think she is a phenomenal person(Your guess is as good as mine whether she is or she is not) A 30 year old can choose logically who they want to be like and why but what of a drunk 20 , 21 or  19 year old ?

In my search to figure out what role models our society defines for us, I followed two lifestyle magazines True Love east africa and Drum east Africa. I assumed their target market was any working youth. I set out to see the kind of people they put on their cover to inspire, educate or entertain us. Those they have featured in the last six months include Yvonne Okwara, Lilian Muli, Carol Mutoko, Size 8, Jeff Koinange, Rachel Shebesh, Fiedel Odinga, Liz Manduli& Nana, Valerie Kimani, Daniel Adongo, Nini Wacera. In other words, you either works in media are a politician (wife, child or husband to one) and the odd one out is the sports personality to make to the cover.  I think something is wrong with that mix unless the magazines are printed with only the media in mind. A lot of readers repeatedly ask why not bring in Scientists, Doctors, Grandmothers, Teachers and other cadre of people who make society tick but the answer would be would we buy this magazines if this happened? 

My two cents is this, that Society as a whole slowly but surely colluded to let the Masaku 7’s happen. We are in the habit of keeping quiet and then trying to solve problems by Crisis management. Remember the “Weka condom mpangoni” advert? That cheating was so commonplace and critical in Society that we needed to remind this cheats to protect themselves and their families? Is that surely the solution? I digress; the advertisement was met with tones and tones of opposition from all and sundry. It went away into oblivion, It came back quietly we were so busy no more noise was made about it even by the church which was overwhelmingly against it.

I feel we have kept quiet for too long, we imagine things are going to be okay since we have turned a blind eye and closed mouth to the things around us. What is broadcasted on our local televisions, radios, newspapers, magazines? What is taught in our nurseries, schools, colleges and universities? What books do we digest? What conversations do we hold? What are we all about? What makes us? Until we truly and deeply think about this, the trouble with Masaku 7’s will not end. In fact we are looking at a reloaded scenario soon. I guess we are waiting for the ship laden with morals and character to dock at our harbor!

Think again,

Sojourner.

My last word is a quote from the late Prof. Wangari Mathai “Just use the anatomy that matters…And that is from the neck up.”