02/24/2006
GRANTS
WECHE MOKADHO
Molasses plant saga is Govt conspiracy
PLAINLY SPEAKING
By David Ochami The historical roots of the
poverty that afflicts Western Kenya can be traced to the Sessional Paper
No.10 of 1965 — African Socialism and Its Application to Development in Kenya.
This paper purported to spur
growth in Kenya by introducing a mixed economy in which the state would play
a major role. The basis of this growth would be the identification of so-called
high potential areas for intensive investment. It was supposed that investing
in the so-called high potential areas would spur growth and profits that would,
somehow trickle to the rest of the society. Mwai Kibaki, a technocrat
in the Kenyatta government, authored this paper that has been blamed for
the lopsided development that has afflicted Kenya for forty years. The Paper
planted the roots of the everlasting domination of the country by some sections
of the country and the unfettered marginalisation of others. Inherent in the paper are
Kibaki's flawed assumptions at that time that the Kenyatta government could
be trusted to address historical injustices created by colonialism such as
the land question in order to allow even the more benign aspects of the Paper
to be implemented. The Paper itself was an unmitigated
farce, doctrinally flawed and ill-motivated. The radicals within the Kenyatta
administration saw it for what it was—a shameless attempt to retain the colonial
state with all its trappings and an abrupt halt to the anticipated holistic
transformation of the structures of the Kenya nation-state. The Paper sought to legitimise
the emergence of a tribal capitalism headed by Kenyatta and his cronies with
the aim of expropriating national wealth for personal gain, and elsewhere
only to the extent that would assist the general goals of the ruling elite.
This is how Webuye Pan African Paper Mills and the retinue of sugar factories
in Western Kenya came to pass. Its conception and declaration
was the first cause for alarm among the more rational members of the Kenyatta
regime for it was setting the stage for the ethnicisation of politics. This
is the paper that entrenched stereotypes that some parts of Kenya and peoples
were more productive than others. Indeed 'evidence' of some
kind was created to prove that Central Kenya alone had the economic interests
of the nation at heart. That other people inherently lack the entrepreneurial
spirit of creative risk taking. Conveniently it became necessary to demonstrate
that Kenya only grew economically under Kenyatta with Kibaki as Finance minister;
and that the country degenerated when this pedigree of people were shunted
from power. Interested students of history
and political economy should refer to the learned paper authored by current
Planning minister Anyang' Nyong'o in 1988 demonstrating how the Gema clique
around Kenyatta plotted and came to dominate Kenya. An indirect and direct critique
of the Sessional Paper No. 10 and Kenyatta tribal politics, the Nyong'o critique
traces the roots of post-colonial commerce in Central Province and the Agikuyu
Diaspora. A picture begins to emerge explaining how people from one community
came to control all state corporation, the provincial administration, how
free capital was let loose on them, through corruption and other such structures
that would ensure their domination of the rest of the country The saga now facing the Kisumu
Molasses Plant should be seen from this historical window. The ideology of
marginalisation is inherent in the attempts to repossess the plant from its
current owners using diversionary tactics and suspect legal arguments. Poetic justice is at play.
If the Kibaki government agrees that the past regime was a legal government,
then she should recognise its authority in allocating the land on which the
plant stands to the molasses company. During the Moi years, Kibaki
who ironically played a role in the conception of the Molasses plant, fought
against the vast presidential powers, including those to allocate land, which
he is now struggling to retain. He is trying to retain them just because
he is Kibaki but is annoyed that Moi used them to facilitate the transfer
of land to the molasses plant. For the past two years, Kibaki's
true colours as Kenyatta without the flywhisk have been seen by the manner
in which he has filled every sector of the economy with his cronies and speed
with which he has re-embraced the old Gema school in the persons of Njenga
Karume etc. Economically, fresh forces
have been let loose on Western Kenya which, despite its vast potential has
been neglected and brought to its knees by the politics of the past regimes.
Earlier in his (Kibaki's) presidency, destructive forces were let loose on
Eldoret Airport; then the sugar and paper industries in Nyanza and Western
province. When Kibaki looks at the Molasses
plant he gets nightmares that the people he and Kenyatta plotted to put under
lock and key through Sessional Paper No10 are plotting to turn tables on Gema.
He can only imagine that Western Kenya, Gema's historical nemesis, is plotting
against the power he has waited to recapture for his people for 24 years.
One wonders how the Kibaki
administration feels on the fact that there is no single industrial plant
and factory worth the name in Kisumu, a city with greater potential than Nairobi
given its vast expanse, water resources, demography, trained manpower and
strategic location. The plot against the plant
is a long standing conspiracy against Western Kenya, Kisumu and the Odinga
family. Full-stop. Ka in gi mari moro ma di wandik ka to orni
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