The Judiciary

The Judiciary - Governance and Operational Structures for Effective Judicial Service Provision - Osano Kute

1.1 Introduction and Background 

In pursuit to make my contribution to my beloved country - Kenya, I contemplated at one point, offering myself for the position of the Chairperson of the Commission for Implementation of Constitution (CIC) and my intention was to push for redefinition of the country’s governance and operational structures for effective service delivery in the Judiciary, the Executive and the Legislature. I shared my thoughts with my brother Kathurima M’Inoti – Chairman, Kenya Law Reform Commission and his advice to me was that, I should avoid suggestions to changes in the constitution at the early stages as this would be counterproductive to my course. It was also pointed out to me that the Chair of CIC needed to be someone who can be a Judge of the High Court (Trust Lawyers to create jobs for themselves while cutting off other Kenyans). I shelved my plans but this did not stop me from pursuing my course.

 1.2 Principles and Work Ethics attached to the Governance and Operational Structure 

In this write up, I share my thoughts on governance and operational structures needed by the Judiciary for effective Judicial Services provision. My thoughts come from the premise that, the agenda for running a country must be centered on the principles of: Inclusivity, Teamwork, Empowerment, Good Governance, Personal Integrity and Innovation. Teamwork would allow managers appointed to run government affairs to make an impact on Kenyans' lives that is far beyond the sum of each individual talent. Each public officer appointed will be required to concentrate on being a public servant for the whole country and not for his tribe with full responsibility to act and be held accountable.
 My thoughts have been informed by comprehensive studies I conducted to understand what Kenyans want as a people and finding out that they want Kenya to be a “Just, Equitable and Prosperous Society”. This is their DESIRE as a people.
It has also been informed by the outcome of the review of the heat generated by the Judiciary after a member of the Judicial Service Commission – Ahmednasir Abdulahi was taken to court by lawyer Philip Murgor citing conflict of interest, the suspension of the Deputy Chief Justice – Nancy Barasa, the recent removal from office of four (4) judges one of whom was a senior member of the Judicial Service Commission and the most recent allegation that Ahmednasir Abdulahi forged a signature to be admitted to the bar, which only served to convince me that, properly defined and understood governance and operational structures are needed to ensure that Kenya becomes a Just Nation.

1.3 The Erosion of Independence of the Judiciary

 I begin my discussions and proposals here, by focusing on Articles 106, 166, 168, 171 and 172 (1) (b), (c) and (e) and the Sixth Schedule of the Constitution, which clearly lend credence to the erosion of the independence of the Judiciary and shows that more thoughts need to be given to the composition, functions, operational and governance structure of the Judiciary so as to ensure that Kenya becomes a “Just Nation” as espoused in our National Anthem which indeed is a our prayer. While Article 106 of the Constitution stipulates that the Speaker of the National Assembly shall be elected by members of parliament in accordance with the Standing Orders of Parliament, Article 166 (1), requires the Chief Justice and Deputy Chief Justice to be appointed by the President (a person who is in fact the head of another arm of government – the Executive) with recommendations of the Judicial Service Commission and with approval of the National Assembly - that is after the next elections when the National Accord will not be in existence since Sub-article 29 (2) of the sixth schedule requires that new appointments be made by the President subject to the National Accord and Reconciliation Act after consultation with the Prime Minister and with approval of the National Assembly and all other judges would be recommended by the Judicial Service Commission to the President for appointment.
 Articles 171 (1) and (2) of the constitution establishes and outlines the composition of the Judicial Service Commission with the Chair being the Chief Justice and members being: one each of Supreme Court and Court of Appeal judges, one High Court judge and one magistrate, being of either gender all elected by their own, the Attorney-General, two advocates of either gender, a person nominated by the Public Service Commission, a woman and a man both not being lawyers to represent the public and finally the Chief Registrar of the Judiciary is the Secretary to the Commission.
 Article 172 (c) allows the Judicial Service Commission to: “appoint receive complaints against, investigate and remove from office or otherwise discipline registrars, magistrates, other judicial officers and other staff of the Judiciary in the manner prescribed by an Act of Parliament”.
 Article 168 (2), (3) and (4) outline the conditions under which a petition against a judge can be made and must be in writing to the Judicial Service Commission if made by “any person” other than the Commission itself while Article 168 (4) and (5) stipulate that the Judicial Service Commission would send petitions considered to have merit for removal from office of a judge, to the President from whence, the President shall within fourteen days after receiving the petition, suspend the accused judge from office.

 Article 168 (5) (a) stipulates that, if the accused Judge is the Chief Justice, the President is expected to appoint a tribunal headed by the Speaker of the National Assembly (a person heading a different arm of government-the Parliament and who will definitely have no time to Chair such a tribunal as his hands would already be full with his duties as the Speaker of the National Assembly). The tribunal would comprise three superior court judges of commonwealth jurisdiction, one advocate of fifteen years standing (this is very vague since one cannot have exactly fifteen years, in other words, does a person with more than fifteen years qualify to be in the tribunal?) and two other persons with experience in Public Affairs (this allows people like Jean Bokasa and Iddi Amin to fill the two slots).
 Similar misaligned issues mentioned above are apparent in Article 168 (5) (b) of the constitution which describe how the tribunal to handle complaints against judges other than the Chief Justice would be set.
 From the foregoing, it is clear that the President, the Speaker and institution of the National Assembly are overused in the management of the affairs of the Judiciary and clearly does not lend itself to true rules of separation of powers. It is also not clear how judicial officers are supposed to behave when hearing cases where a member of the Judicial Service Commission is appearing before them when the same advocate would receive complaints against the same judicial officer in case of complaints. 

1.4 Proposed Proper Governance Structure
 In order therefore, to have a meaningful governance and operational structure and true separation of powers between the Judiciary on the one hand and the Executive, and the Legislature on the other, It is my proposal that, the Law Society of Kenya (LSK), being the umbrella professional body of the legal fraternity, takes a leading role in the restructuring and management of the Judiciary.
I propose here as follows:

(a)    That, Article 171 (2) of the Constitution be amended to have the composition of the Judicial Service Commission as depicted in the diagram above as follows: “The Judicial Service Commission Shall consist of: (i) A Commissioner General
(ii) Chief Commissioners in charge of Finance and Administration assisted by (i) Commissioner in charge of Finance who is assisted by two (2) Deputy Commissioners and(ii) Commissioner in charge of Administration assisted by two (2) Deputy Commissioners
 (iii) Chief Commissioners in charge of Welfare and Benefits and Promotions assisted by (i) Commissioner in charge of Development and Promotions who is assisted by two (4) Deputy Commissioners and (ii) Commissioner in charge of Welfare and Benefits assisted by four (4) Deputy Commissioners
(iv) Chief Commissioners in charge of Complaints and Discipline assisted by(i) Commissioner in charge of Complaints is assisted by four (4) Deputy Commissioners and (ii) Commissioner in charge of Discipline assisted by four (4) Deputy Commissioners
 (v) An appropriate number of support staff

(b) That Article 172 (a) of the Constitution outlining the functions of the judiciary be changed to give interviewing, vetting and appointment powers to the Judicial Service Commission and should read: “interview vet and appoint persons to the position of judges”.

 (c) Article 172 (e) also be changed to read “draft, in consultation with relevant bodies such as the Kenya Law Reform Commission, Bills that will help in improving the efficiency and effectiveness of the administration of justice, for enactment in Parliament and implement the relevant Acts of Parliament in respect to administration of Justice in Kenya”.

 The 2 Chief Commissioners, 4 Commissioners and 20 Commissioners in charge of the Welfare, Benefits, Promotion, Complaints and Discipline should as a mater of necessity be advocates of the High Court but be given trainings in relevant areas of administration or management of human capital. The remaining commissioners can be people with relevant training in Finance, Administration or Management.
In this proposed structure, there would be twenty four (24) Deputy Commissioners assisting the six (6) Commissioners who are assisting three (3) Senior Commissioners working under one Chief Commissioner with an appropriate number of support staff to assist the Commission work effectively as depicted in fig 1.1 below.
Fig 1.1 – Proposed Judicial Service Commission

 1.5 The Stature, Remuneration and Benefits of the Commissioners 

On stature, remunerations, powers, compensation and benefits, I propose that the Commissioner General’s should be pegged to that of Supreme Court Judges, those of Chief Commissioners to Court of Appeal judges while those of Commissioners and Deputy Commissioners at the level of High Court Judges.
 I further propose that the Commissioners’ term be fixed to ten year limit before automatic retirement from whence they would not be allowed to serve in any capacity within the Judiciary save for being private practicing professionals.
In addition, members of the Judicial Service Commission should also not be allowed to practice as advocate during their tenancy in the Commission. This arrangement would ensure that there is no conflict of interest in reviewing salaries and benefits for the Judicial Officers by the Commissioners believing that they would benefit from the same while at the same time, have independence to do their work effectively with commensurate compensation and benefits.

 1.6 Implementation and Self Respecting and Self Sustaining New Judiciary 

In terms of implementation of a Self Respecting and Self Sustaining New Judiciary, the following is proposed:

 (a) The Judicial Service Commission after being duly constituted as proposed above, should accept through the Law Society of Kenya, applications from a pool of honest effective and dedicated lawyers, willing to serve as magistrates and from this pool, potential magistrates can be further subjected to vetting by the Judicial Service Commission before appointment as magistrates.
 (b) Judges should be vetted by Judicial Service Commission from amongst sitting magistrates or practicing lawyers with relevant qualifications on application to fill vacancies or from the pool of potential judges whose applications shall have been accepted by the Commission and further be vetted for appointments as Judges. (c) The Chief Justice and Deputy Chief Justice should be elected by and from amongst all the vetted and sitting judges since he/she would just be, first among equals of the judges.

 1.7 Conclusion 

In conclusion, I wish to state that this proposal has benefited form six years of observation and lends credence from strategic thinking doctrine that having knowledge of what our problems are and with a vision of where we want to go as a people, we can craft a strategy and roadmap to assist us get there. It is therefore my honest view that this arrangement will ensure that the Judiciary becomes truly independent, will comprise of respected, honest and dedicated people, with allegiance only to their profession and service to serve the country and make it a Just Nation.

 The Law Society of Kenya should therefore constitute a team of vetted people from amongst themselves and include professionals from other fields of management, who are of good standing in the society, are honest, effective and dedicated and with sufficient number of years of experience and willing to serve to be appointed as Commissioners in the Judicial Service Commission to start this work of making Kenya a Just and Equitable Society.

 Osano Kute is a Strategy and Leadership Advisor based in Nairobi, kute@osanoassociates.com

Developing Strategies for Making Kenya

Chapter 1
Brief Reflection on the Past - History and Beginning of the Kenyan Problem
(Where did the rain start biting us as Kenyans?)

1.1      Background

History has it that the colonial rule in Kenya was characterized by punitive economic, social and political policies. Most outstanding among these policies was racial discrimination where huge fertile land was alienated for white settlement, and harsh labor laws were enacted to force the Africans to work at low wages on settler farms and public works. In addition, African political participation was confined to local government. The colonially divided Kenya, was in effect meant to ensure that status quo of milking the African is maintained.

It was against this punitive scenario that the African protest movements began in earnest from the early 1920s with several political associations being formed over the years to help the Africans advance their causes. The sticking issues and which formed the main grievances were: forced labour, low wages, heavy taxation, continuing land alienation, non representation in government and racial discrimination. The struggles intensified culminating in the declaration of state of emergency in 1952 which saw the arrest and detention of several Kenyan nationalists.

However, the state of emergency intensified political resolve for independence, forcing the colonial government to come up with constitutional proposals and under the Lyttleton constitution of 1954, Africans were allowed to directly elect their representatives to the Legislative Council with elections being held in 1957 where eight African leaders - Ronald Ngala, Tom Mboya, Daniel arap Moi, J Mate, Muimi, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, Lawrence Oguda and Masinde Muliro, were elected. These leaders stepped up agitation for widened representation and independence and after considerable discussion, it was decided that a mass organization to mobilize the people for the final assault on colonialism be formed, hence the birth of Kenya African National Union, (KANU) registered on 11 June 1960, as a mass political society.

1.2      The Ethnic Regions and Administration

However, as the success of the political freedom fight became evident, the colonialists were at it again. They told leaders from some communities that they would be dominated by the larger ethnic groups, and on June 25, 1960 these leaders formed the Kenya African Democratic Union (KADU) to cater for “their needs”.

The formation of the two major political parties divided the country into tribal enclaves of KANU and KADU area as the colonialists wanted, giving birth to what we now have as the eight ethnically divided provinces in Kenya today – See Map of current political boundaries. (Central) Kikuyu, (Coast) Miji Kenda, (Eastern) Meru, Embu, Kamba, (Nyanza) Luo, Kissi, Kuria, (Rift Valley) KAMATUSA, (North Eastern) Somali (Western) Luhyia.

The existing ethnic enclaves which were called provinces but now sub-divided into counties therefore, is the problem and were created by the colonialists to divide Kenyans along ethnic lines and set region against region, tribe against tribe and even brother against brother so as to allow white settlers continue to exploit Africans. If further, subdivided as proposed by our current political class, it is a real recipe for societal disintegration, with the underlying psychological “brainwashing” that ours is superior to all else.

1.3      Kenya Heading to the Ditch

It is known that Subsequent governments, opposition parties and political class after independence, have yet to come to terms with the sticky inequality in the country caused by this ethnic division simply because they benefit immensely from it. And since the Mzungu came to Kenya carrying the gun in one hand and the bible in the other and ensured that they got the best from the congregation, the amazing thing is that our religious leaders have perpetuated the ethnic division by ensuring that Bishops and Imams are posted only in the regions where they come from and are engaged in grand corruption (analyse the Bishops of the Kenyan Catholic and Anglican Church to see the trend). After retirements, these Bishops and Imams join tribal groupings as if God belongs to their tribes forgetting that they were supposed to take care of the congregation consisting of all tribes and colour.

Since the current political class become the new “colonialist/landlords”. They, together with their of-springs and friends have dominated all the major political parties today and using the same tactics employed by the colonialists of dividing the country into ethnically based administrative areas for exploitation. The so called 47 counties are just but delineation of people along ethnic lines so that a privileged few, can continue to exploit them at local level and this was planned in July 2009 when the government posted Senior Deputy PCs to take care of certain ethnic blocks in readiness for further subdivision of Provinces into smaller ethnic enclaves. However, when this plan failed, the constitution was changed to have 47 counties divided along ethnic lines to be governed by 47 tribal Governors as opposed to 8 Governors in 8 regions with each region having all members of parliament being members of the Regional Assemblies.

The historical injustices meted against the people since independence by those in positions of authority include inequitable resource distribution, skewed development pattern, employment to state jobs of those from only certain regions just because one of their own is the President, not to mention blatant looting in state corporations and departments. This is a pointer to what the so called leaders think of you Kenyan no mater what tribe you are. Whereas this is a clear recipe for total societal disintegration and is akin to attempting to put off fire using liquefied petroleum, those in positions of authority do not care and are only busy looting for the benefit of their families. But a close look at them, reveals that have no families to talk about since their children are social misfits.

Indeed the last four decades has seen Kenya headed toward a big ditch through the practice of tribalism, ineffective administrative arrangements and decreased competitiveness in many key industries which have led to weaknesses in critical sectors such as water, education, food, health, housing, communication infrastructure among others. This deficiency has increased our dependence on international sources of funding which have ended up enriching a few elite in our society. This has resulted in lowered standards of living, enormous debt, and great difficulty in feeding ourselves, let alone educating and giving health services to our children. This scenario makes Kenya as a nation fulfil the old Chinese proverb that says, “Unless you change direction, you are likely to arrive at where you are headed”.

All these are happening because the new “landlords” inherited in full, the privileges enjoyed by the whites and have ensured over the years, that no real change may be achieved, with only cosmetic ones introduced in piecemeal to appease the masses. The ordinary freedom fighters and nationalists then, and now, have therefore been dispossessed of any hope of retribution in the any dispensation save for an immediate and sustained national revolution starting with defining the vision for Kenya, then developing strategies for realising the vision including strategies of effectively defining the administrative, governance and management structures.

The next article I will attempt to define the desired Vision of Kenya and other operating principles for country.

God Bless Kenya and her people.

Osano Kute is a Strategy and Leadership Advisor based in Nairobi

kute@osanoassociates.com

The Social Dimension of ROI and why only the government should engage in provision of some services

(Osano Kute, Leadership and Strategy Advisor)

Dear Ramah Nyang, in finance, return on investment (ROI), can be defined as the ratio of money gained or lost on an investment relative to the amount of money invested. The actual amount of money gained or lost may be referred to as interest, profit/loss, gain/loss, or net income/loss. While the actual money invested may be referred to as the asset, capital, principal, or the cost basis of the investment. In finance, ROI is usually expressed as a percentage.

In my opinion and what is not considered by many people, there is the social dimension of ROI which unfortunately may be difficult to expressed as a percentage as in the case of finance but can generally be expressed in terms of the general feeling of a people in a nation or the general state of a people in terms of their prosperity, welfare, security etc.

The social dimension of ROI may be defined as the ratio of social capital gained or lost (raise/decline in standard of living of the people through high/low level of prosperity, welfare and security/insecurity of the people) on a government’s investment (say military intervention in Somalia to bring normalcy and peace in the country so that the citizens can do business in peace, or building of one new Girls’ National School and one new Boys’ National School in every constituency in the country to ensure that there is equity in provision of education to the people or building of a dam in the middle of nowhere to conserve water or the environment) relative to the amount of money, human capital, military hardware, efforts of a people etc invested by the government. In this case, the social capital gained or lost may be referred to as social interest, social profit/loss, social gain/loss, or social net income/loss. The money invested or effort made in the intervention may be referred to as the social asset, social capital, social principal, or the social cost basis of the government social investment.

Take the following two examples to see why I say that in public management, we cannot look at everything from a financial perspective only since social capital is also a very important aspect to be considered. My two examples are on cost of national water provision for domestic consumption and irrigation for the people which the private sector would find prohibitive particularly in the context of the rural population and the cost of going to war to protect property which nobody in the private sector can dare do but the government would even if it is one inch of the country as follows:

(1)          Whereas, it would cost the government a lot of money to build dams for environmental conservation and water provision for irrigation and domestic use by the people, availability of clean water for domestic use by the people leads to reduction of waterborne diseases and other ailments associated with lack of water, availability of water in abundance also leads to increase in agricultural activities (even if it is in small scale) in the country and this further leads to the people including children being well fed and led vulnerable to disease attack which further leads to the budget/cost of health provision going down and leads to the people being able to concentrate in their work while the children are able to concentrate in class and get better education, better understanding of national needs and be more skilled and knowledgeable as a workforce which leads to better ways of working hence a developed nation.  My experience in consultancy in the water sector tells me that all the Water Service Boards are finding it difficult to provide water to the people without government financial intervention and the private sector is only willing to invest in water provision in urban areas where people are able to pay for water but the government is for everybody including those in the rural areas.

(2)          Whereas the private sector may have title deeds to signify their ownership of land/property, if the land whose title you have along the boarder is invaded by foreign forces, a simple calculation of ROI of going to war would make a good businessman in the private sector run away and not go to war but the government will even if it is the rock called Migingo (ROI?).

I therefore still insist that some projects and capital investments are better left to the government and these include but not limited to: provision of water, security, education, mass movement of people and goods, development of major infrastructure like roads etc. I personally would not trust the private sector with these services.

In fact look at what the private sector has done and continue doing with fuel pumps and fuel prices, price of sugar and other essential commodities after the Kenya National Trading Corporation (KNTC) was killed by corrupt people in this country. Look at the what happens to the tea farmer in Muranga or Nandi who gets KShs. 40 per Kg of their produce and when the same product, reaches Mombasa in the hands of the private sector, it fetches Kshs. 280. Look at the high prices of fertilizer in the country yet in our national books, KENREN was supposed to have been built in the seventies.

The fact that some people who are currently supper rich in Kenya, engaged in corruption to swindle the people does not mean that the government cannot be made to be effective and efficient.

Please give me a chance to run this country as it CEO and you will see what I can do to make government efficient and effective. Thanks

Roles of Institutions in Education for National Development in Kenya

Roles of Institutions in Education for National Development in Kenya
(Osano Kute, Leadership and Strategy Adviser)

Organised crime is an illegal activity undertaken for the purpose of gaining profit, power or influence. It involves two or more people and requires substantial planning and organisation, or a systematic and continuing activity. Organized crime most typically flourishes when a central government and civil society is disorganized, weak, absent or un-trusted and involves those who can lie to the authority for the purpose of creating disorganisation and mistrust among the people.

The Kenya National Examination Council (KNEC) has been engaged in a systematic and continuing activity to stop the Kenyan Public from knowing what is going on with examinations process with bizarre stories emerging every year just before examination results are announced about how examination cheating thrives with third parties being blamed and the need for more money to enhance computing power at the Council. This is obviously organised crime for all intent and purposes.

From the yearly examination malpractice dramatic stories, officers in charge of KNEC seem not to know what their mandate is and have spent more time devising ways of harassing third parties, misleading the public and not advising the relevant authorities on the right interventions in the education sector based on candidates’ results for the purposes of equitable national development.

KNEC officials are always quick to outline how exams are being “stolen” and condemn candidates for having devised “clever” ways of cheating in exams by writing answers in sleepers and shirts but they do not tell people who gave out the question papers in the first place, and of course, the correct answers. In my opinion, the KNEC officials are the main perpetrators of examination malpractice since for one to gain access to examination papers and engage in axam cheating, s/he must be in touch with the officials setting and keeping examination papers and these are the KNEC officials themselves.

In a story of 27^th February 2012, just before release of KCSE results, there is an outline of part of a report showing how one Mr Ndege received KSh 54,595 by selling examination papers and was jailed for one year without option of fine for engaging in examination malpractice while there is no mention of what happened to the teacher who bagged KSh 811,490 by engaging in the same act. The said report also recommends some Kenyatta University students to be suspended for one year for aiding in examination cheating. Neither these students nor Kenyatta University are under the management of the KNEC who should identify and punish the right culprits – their own staff for giving out the examination papers before hand.

It is worthy to point out that the destiny of a people is moulded through planning for National Development which is meant to raise the standard of living of the people by giving high level of prosperity, welfare and security of the people. This destiny can only be shaped in the classrooms in the form of education.

Education must therefore be aligned to the National Development Agenda which invariably relies on accurate short and long term predictions and projections of the country’s population. It is the results of calculation from the these predictions and projections that the Ministry of Planning feeds the Ministry of Education with the number and quality of Human Resource Capital and the Educational Infrastructure needed for national development and posterity.

The Ministry of Education through the Kenya Institute of Education (KIE) then develops curriculum in line with the national development agenda. The curriculum is then delivered by the Ministry of Education through the Teachers Service Commission (TSC) who are the employers of teachers, while the mainstream ministry on the other hand provides oversight through schools inspection to ensure that education policy is adhered to.

At the end of the curriculum delivery, the Kenya National Examination Council (KNEC) then comes to ascertain if the curriculum developed by KIE was covered through TSC as required by all the pupils. This is done through testing and examinations conducted by KNEC at the end of every year. The examination results are then supposed to be analysed and cross-tabulated to give accurate insight on the state of education service delivery in every county, constituency, wards and every school in the country. This must include state of infrastructure (classrooms, teacher’s houses, other buildings and equipment), books, teachers for all subjects etc), and a report giving details of what intervention is appropriate to ensure that the national development agenda in achieved in the long run.

If the managers of education sector in Kenya were to understand the above simple logic and the various institutional roles, Kenyans would not be treated to such bizarre stories of examination cheats every year. Instead, the Kenya National Examination Council (KNEC) would concentrate on designing ways of making examination simpler so as to find out if the curriculum developed in line with the national development agenda has been covered. The KNEC would then give proper feedback on the need for improvement or building and equipping of educational institutions based on the examination results.

I would expect that during the announcement of KCPE and KCSE results, the good professors at the helm of the Education Ministries with the help of able managers at the Kenya National Examination Council, Teachers Service Commission, Kenya Institute of Education etc, would prepare more meaningful speeches to deliver to the nation. The speeches will not be about the best or the worst student, school or county is, but the fact that we as a nation have achieved our objective in education which is that the right number of (Doctors, Nurses, Teachers, Policemen, Soldiers, Mechanics, Masons, Carpenters, Tailors, Watchmen, Bar attendants, House helps etc), will be produced by the end of say 12 years from the date of results announcement, since pupils who were being prepared to take their rightful positions in national development have indeed, acquired the right skills necessary to proceed to the next level.

I would expect to hear that pupils in Garsen who did not perform well due to lack of facilities in schools will not be penalised but be given a chance to excel by providing those needed facilities with extra tuition being accorded, so that they can cover the syllabus and not be left behind in education due to government’s failure. I would expect to hear that the Ministry of Education has recommended for the immediate upgrading of impassable roads in Tana and Holla to enable pupils to go to school normally and that electricity will be installed in all schools in Ikolomani to enable school children to go for preps just like their counterparts in Muranga.

I would expect to hear that poor performance of pupils due to lack of math teachers will be no more since more math teachers will be hired and posted to schools in Nyatike that performed poorly in math in the year 2011. I would expect to hear that, the boy in primary school, who was found by his teachers to be good in carpentry and who scored 195/500 and the girl who scored 215/500 in KCPE but was found to be good in art will not be termed as a failures but would have been prepared over the years through counselling by the teachers to be given a chance to pursue their talents in a polytechnic or college in readiness for their contribution to National Development just as the boy or girl who scored 480/500 will proceed to the other school to be prepared for their contribution to National Development in whatever capacity they would have been prepared for by their teachers.

Indeed, this kind of speech from the Minister and Permanent Secretary during the KCPE and KCSE results announcement, would ensure that development of the country is uniform and equitable and that all pupils are being prepared to take their rightful positions in national development for the sake of the entire country. There will be no failures and no losers as every child would have been given a chance to cover the syllabus and prepared to play his or her role in the society based on the inert talent each child has.

Further, the teacher being the engine through which the child is trained to contribute to National Development must be respected and not ridiculed by the KNEC officials due to their own failure to devise an effective way of setting and printing examinations online and using high speed digital printers closer to the schools in every constituency and ensuring that all papers are marked in centers in each constituency to avoid the delays occasioned by the current arrangements which is another source of examination cheating. This kind of recommendation is what is sometimes referred to by KNEC officials as futurist and speculative - lack of imagination and innovation indeed.

If as a nation, we accorded respect to our teachers and adequately equiped them to work including being given proper and commensurate remuneration, we will reap the full benefit in the long run. We should for example appreciate that early childhood development is the most important period in the development of a child therefore recommend that the kindergarten teacher be remunerated with the highest amount to encourage proper early childhood development followed by the primary school teacher and the secondary school teacher in that order.

Giving respect to the teaching profession in general and the teacher in particular, is of outmost importance. The teacher is the only one who is well trained and prepared, complete with child psychology skills and who also spends more than nine (9) months out of 12 in a year with the child, and who can deduce what the child should grow up to become. The government should therefore educate everybody to allow the teacher to give advice to our children and parents alike on careers for the benefit of our nation.

Finally, KNEC and the nation at large should note that life is full of ups and downs and that is why one can start as a Nurse and end up as Professor in Medicine, one can be discontinued at the University of Nairobi and come back to become the chairman of the department that discontinued him and rise to be a Vice Chancellor of a major university in Kenya. One can also start as a primary school teacher and get a second chance to rise to be come a professor and become a Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Education.

Let us thank God for the talents our children have, appreciate them for who they are and prepare them for national development so that Kenya can be a, ”Just and Equitable Society”.

Just,Equitqable and Prosperous Society

Goodmorning fellow Kenyans, there is an old Chinese saying -
 “Unless you change direction, you are likely to arrive at where you are headed”. We are headed into a ditch as a result of the deliberately pursued negative ethnicity by the colonialists and successive regimes from Jomo Kenyatta, to Moi and now Kibaki. It is therefore necessary to stop and think of the solutions needed to steer Kenya into the right direction and not into a ditch. I therefore propose that we state the National Vision for Kenya to be a “Just, Equitable and Prosperous Society” and work towards achieving it by ensuring that we have

 (i) Visionary Leadership that involves people in planning and development which will lead to
 (ii) Planning for Equitable National Development which leads to
 (iii) Effective execution and management of both our financial and natural resources leading to
 (iii) Effective Service Delivery to the people leading to
 (iv) Better Living Standards for One People belonging to One Nation and this leads to 
(v) a Just, Equitable and Prosperous Society.