Ted Malanda - The grass is not growing, Your Excellency

Dear Governor Oparanya,


I was at a place called Emaraba, near Shianda, over the weekend and noticed that fishponds that were dug under the rapid economic results initiative when you were Planning minister have been abandoned.


When I asked why, I was told farmers got discouraged when thieves stole all the fish.


Now, although Security is not a devolved function of County governments, I think you need to take a very keen interest in it and shake things up a bit. The level of petty theft in most villages in Kakamega County is frightening.


People can no longer keep chicken because the louts brazenly break into chicken houses at night and go away with everything.


They harvest people’s crops and even cut people’s trees at night. This is stifling development. In many homes, anything metallic, including barbed wire fencing, has been stolen and sold as scrap metal.


The ironical thing about this is the thieves are well known but victims hardly report to the authorities because the culprits are kinsmen. Chiefs and assistant chiefs have lost their muscle and the police stationed at rural markets seem keener on shaking bribes from suspects than enforcing the law.


At Harambee Market where I come from, there is a spot where young men smoke bhang in the open. There is even a street called “Koinange”. The level of alcoholism, especially, among the youth is shocking.


It is a deep reflection of social and family breakdown whose origin can be traced to illiteracy, unemployment and lack of viable economic activities. Nearly every family has a son who is a thief and, or, addicted to alcohol, bhang, or both.


At the root of this is failure of agriculture. Our people are too beholden to sugarcane, which is a failed crop, to realize that they can grow food crops and keep livestock for cash. That is why, for instance, our vegetables, maize, fruits and chicken are sourced from other counties.


In the face of gross unemployment, we must seek ways of making farming sexy for these young people who are too busy wasting their lives on alcohol and drugs so that their only recourse is to steal people’s property to fund these habits.


For instance, and here I am making comparisons with other counties where pressure on land is more acute such as Nyeri, the tree cover in our county is low. If encouraged and facilitated to plant fast growing trees, these young men can harvest and sell firewood (lack of which is reaching crisis levels in many parts of the county).


In fact, Bw Governor, it would be excellent if you personally rolled out a tree planting exercise all over the county at the onset of the rains. There are no trees for timber in our County.


Because we are Kenya’s second most populous county, we must discard the old subsistent ways of doing things and embrace a more commercial approach. We insist on growing maize yet simsim, groundnuts and millet fetch better prices.


There is absolutely no justification, for instance, for us to continue raising chicken in the manner our forefathers did, when reality demands that we produce more for our tables and for sale.


Our uptake for high grade dairy goats, fish farming, irrigation, agroforestry, zero grazing, green housing and other aspects of ‘smart’ and intensive farming are pretty low.


You and other leaders must drive this change or we will be doomed.


Ni hayo tu, Bw Governor
Ted Malanda - Journalist/Environmentalist/Educator.