Kenya’s pernicious inequality: The underpinnings of an economic revolution

There is a simmering disquiet pervading the economically tyrannized of this once promising nation. This indefatigable class of citizens encompasses all tribes and both genders: the single mother in the informal business sector, the day laborer who treks many miles to earn a less than adequate wage, the many graduates from our universities and high schools who have no promising prospects of finding fitting employment, the youth-our brothers and sisters-who for want of a better life are drawn into nefarious and salacious activities and the rural peasants whose struggles to eke out a living are compounded by an unresponsive, predator government.
The economic oppressors are: the corruption laden government and its wily civil servants, the burgeoning middle class who are shielding themselves from the impoverished, employers who do not pay employees an adequate living wage and the primary oppressors, the politicians.
Background
According to a report (Pulling Apart: Facts and Figures on Inequality in Kenya) by the Nairobi-based Society for International Development (SID), Kenya is the 10th most unequal country in the world in terms of wealth disparities. Of Africa’s 54 states, it is the fifth most unequal
The 2004 report, using UN Development Program figures, states that Kenya’s richest earn 56 times more than its poorest: the top 10 percent of the population controls 42% of the country’s wealth, while the bottom 10% own 0.76%.
Inequality pervades every aspect of Kenyans’ lives, according to the report, citing enormous disparities - both in the capital and at national level - in almost every sphere of life: income; access to education, water and health; life expectancy; and prevalence of HIV/AIDS.
Kibaki’s role
Critics of Kibaki, who came to power in 2002, accuse his government of failing to address this inequality and of focusing instead on the economic growth seen over the past five years. Before he came to power on a wave of euphoria and hope after 24 years of rule under the autocratic Daniel arap Moi, Kenya’s growth stood at minus 1.6 percent. In 2007, it reached 5.5 percent and before the elections was predicted to hit 7% in 2008.
This growth has been concentrated in the service sector, with banks, tourism and communications companies making big profits. Prices of shares and property have also soared. But rather than trickling down to the worst off, this boom appears to have been very selective in its beneficiaries while the poor have seen the purchasing power of their Shilling shrink.
Critics argue that economic policies have not been pro-poor. This growth has been biased in favor of profits as opposed to being translated into jobs. Only a few have assets and property to participate in economic production.
With no collateral to obtain loans to engage in entrepreneurial activities, and with the unemployment rate at an estimated 40%, the restlessness and despair is an ominous precursor to an economic revolution that will pit the under-privileged against the landed if drastic interventions are not implemented.
Possible solutions
There is an urgent need to inculcate a new culture of living well as opposed to living better. Living well means having all basic needs met while existing in harmony with the natural world; living better seeks to constantly amass material goods at the expense of the environment.
We don’t need to compete for the necessities of life. We don't need to fight each other for them. We were bamboozled by the political elite at the last general election into violently engaging our neighbors while the instigators were not participants. Meanwhile the victors are those politicians that had positions created for them with accompanying motorcades.
We seriously need to ask ourselves how much is enough? A study was done by University of Illinois professor Ed Diener, and others, comparing the life-satisfaction scores of groups of people of radically different financial means. Scores were on a seven-point scale, with the happiest people scoring higher. Those on Forbes magazine’s list of richest Americans had an average score of 5.8. They were in a statistical tie, however, with three groups known for their modest lifestyles and strength of community: the Pennsylvania Amish (5.8) who favor horses over cars and tractors; the Inuit of Northern Greenland (5.9), an indigenous hunting and fishing people; and the Masai (5.7), a traditional herding people in East Africa.
Since the majority Kenyans will not be multi millionaires, we need to make do with less want of material items and settle for the necessities (to begin with) and a vibrant social life.
Here are some ideas we are working on:
• The formation of vibrant neighborhood organizations to address social issues. (This topic was addressed previously on this blog).
• More workplace democracy where people at the top are answerable to employees
• Worker owned cooperatives rooted in the community, producing for local consumption, hiring locally and reinvesting profits locally with some proceeds benefiting public projects.
• A localized barter system that would include a local currency and a system of swapping services provided for credits to access other services.
• A revolving informal loans program among member participants. This is widely practiced in Africa and has firmly taken root among Kenyans in the Diaspora.
• An overhaul of our education system to lean more towards technical training and entrepreneurship as opposed to passing exams and seeking employment without having any skills to start a business.( To be covered as a follow up article to an education one we did previously).
• Others including those that readers may deem workable.
In the next article, we will cover the topic of Cooperative Economics as a community based, worker driven vehicle to deliver a sustainable equitable economy to our localities.
Conclusion
With the General Elections round the corner, we need to prepare to send our agents of regression to permanent retirement. Their next public appearance should be at a trail facing high treason for crimes against the state (the people of Kenya). The rulers of this nation either do not follow the mood on the ground and the web or are insusceptible to the groans of a nation that has given and given (taxes, labor, and even blood) so a few political elite may ride around in SUVs and bulk up while a nation starves. Let them heed this warning; our day to day struggles will only strengthen our resolve to grow stronger together regardless of tribe or political affiliation!
The ideas housed in this blog and others we are working on will form the basis of a new political economic movement whose manifesto will be geared towards implementing the strategies discussed here. We are tentatively set to register middle of next year. We are now able to state that one of our members will be vying for a civic seat in a ward outside Nairobi.
Reader responses welcome.

Inspired localism: Practical lessons in sustainability

In the previous two part series of articles, we talked about the ills of being dependent on foreigners for our economic well being.
So is there a way to bring development and progress to our rural areas minus foreign influence and an ineffectual government? This article will highlight residents from various developing nations who cared enough about their locality to engage in people centered progress. From the inspiring stories told here, we may take away several useful lessons in the development of local economies.
Kenya: local residents generate self reliance.
Residents of Kiangurwe, a rural community in the country’s central province, have started an electric company that is fueling a revolution. They are saying no to expensive kerosene imports and to the regional power corporation, Kenya Power and Lighting Company (KPLC). Instead, residents are harnessing their own natural resources through a small hydropower company called Gpower.
Local residents volunteer two days a week to build a hydro dam and help fund the project through weekly contributions. Once the project is complete, members of the community will staff the organization that runs the dam, and those who helped build it will receive dividends.
A local funding system aims to ensure sustainability. Eight percent of the project is paid for by wealthy coffee and tea farmers who have bought shares in Gpower Ltd. Donors and subscribers will pay the other 92 percent.
Gpower’s first dam was set to open in late December, providing electricity to about 110 people. By the end of 2014, a total of 11 hydro dams are planned to be up and running on the Thiba River, serving a total of 11,000 households, 13 schools and two hospitals.
India’s Anna Hazare: A soldier for rural regeneration
Where Anna Hazare lives, no one starves. There is no disease. The environment is clean and wooded. All children are in school. The farm economy is booming, and there are no social divisions, no caste system and no racism. Women are empowered, and nobody smokes, drinks or goes to see decadent movies. Hazare, together with the villagers, converted a drought prone land into flourishing farm land. He created an economically self-sufficient community while simultaneously inspiring the poorest of the poor to lead moral, dignified lives.
Background
Ralegan Siddhi was a drought prone 4 sq km land where until 1975, only 80 of its 2200 arable acres were farmed. The annual rain -- about 400 mm in a good year but mostly a third of that ran off the undulating land. The 2000 strong population sat and stared at a hopeless future. Children died early, men beat their wives and disease ran rampant and about the only businesses that made any money was the liquor stills - 40 of them.
The transition
When retired army driver settled in the village, he donated part of his pension settlements from the army to renovate a local temple. In that temple he sought to instill in the villagers his five economic and moral points. They were:
• Prohibition
• Family planning
• A ban on open grazing
• A ban on felling trees
• Voluntary labor
The temple today houses a ‘Grain Bank’. Any family in need can borrow grain from this Bank. It must repay it with a little "interest", for the village has decided that things obtained free are not valued. The "Bank" started with the growth of community spirit. The village resolved that every family which had surplus grain should contribute, and the assessment was done by the villagers themselves. There has not been one case of a family having "defaulted" on the "loan" for they all know that they are borrowing from themselves
A youth group, Tarun Mandal was formed. The group worked to ban the dowry system, caste discrimination and untouchability. Liquor distilling units were removed and prohibition imposed. Open grazing was completely banned with an emphasis on stall feeding.
All elections to local bodies began being held on the basis of consensus which made the community leaders complete representatives of the people.
A school building was constructed using the resources of the village. No donations were taken. Money if needed was borrowed and paid back. The villages took pride in this self reliance. A new system of sharing labor grew out of this infusion of pride and voluntary verve. People volunteered to work on one another’s land.
Water is systematically harvested today; by percolation tanks, by check dams, by wells being recharged. Of the 1700 odd acres of arable land, 1100 to 1200 acres are under irrigation. The village in which a fifth of the families got no more than one meal a day, now markets vegetables, grain and milk.
The very way of life and relationships within the village has been transformed beyond recognition. Twenty years ago, the village was rife with disputes, due to poverty and addictions. Today every family contributes voluntary labor of one adult every week. Almost everything new that one sees has been built and accomplished by community labor.
Guatemala: Revolution at Nuevo Horizonte
Nuevo Horizonte is a small village in northern Guatemala. The streets are nearly devoid of trash as well as the advertising so ubiquitous throughout Latin America. The houses are surrounded by fruit trees and flowers. The residents seem particularly proud of their efforts to preserve a small, 250-acre chunk of intact rainforest which they have recognized for its ecological value in preventing siltation of the local lake.
Background
In 1954, a U.S.-initiated coup that overthrew the elected president of Guatemala served as the catalyst to a thirty-six-year civil war that pitted a succession of military dictatorships against leftist political organizations. The Guatemalan government’s response to community organizing was to label the opposition as “Communist” and send in the army. During the 1980s, the government began targeting the rural Mayan people, burning fields, razing entire villages, massacring men, women, and children, and assassinating priests. After years of suffering political oppression, economic injustice, and racial violence, many of the Mayan farmers organized an armed resistance movement using the jungles as a base. Finally, in 1996, the peace accords between the rebels and the government ended the war and provided an opportunity for the revolutionaries to continue their efforts, but without their guns.
Transition
The cooperative community of Nuevo Horizonte was founded ten years ago. Residents found an old ranch that had been cleared and burned. Arriving with nothing but the rags on their backs, they began to forge a community based upon their revolutionary principles of social equality and communal land ownership.
Each family owns their house and farm plot, the co-op retains ownership of pasturelands, the forest, the lake, and plantations of pine, pineapple, and lime trees. The co-op provides free day care, primary and secondary education, adult vocational training, and operates a pharmacy and clinic, charging as little as twelve cents per visit. Nuevo Horizonte also maintains two pickups and a minivan for anyone’s use.
The co-op’s explicit economic goal is to provide alternatives to the Central American Free Trade Agreement and demonstrate how communities can be less vulnerable to the negative effects of globalization. To this end, the co-op provides low-interest micro financing. The community now boasts a welding shop and two corn mills, and maintains its own seed bank to counter efforts by corporations to control crop production.
The revolution of Nuevo Horizonte is no longer being fought with guns, but with education, sustainability, and the integrity of the natural and human community coming together in a cooperative effort to provide for all.
Brazil: The landless retake the commons and thrive
Thousands of displaced Brazilian families are taking back the land, setting up schools, homes, cooperatives, and organic farms. This revolution is being led by the Landless Workers Movement (MST)—one of the most successful land reform movements in the world.
Background
The MST arose 20 years ago out of a desperate need for land redistribution in a country where ownership of arable land is disastrously skewed. Entrenched are policies that favor large-scale, export-oriented agriculture and wealthy landowners who fraudulently take land with impunity.
Between 1965 and 1985, half of the Brazilian population streamed into the cities in search of work, and the influx continues today. Giant slums rose around cities, and many families fell into poverty, drugs, and hunger.
The reforms of the MST
The MST mobilizes landless people to squat on or near idle land, in MST “camps.” Those in the encampments, along with supporters, pressure the government to enforce the Brazilian constitution, which declares that land must be used for its “social function.” This means that it must be cultivated for production if it is not being preserved for ecological reasons.
As a result of this massive nonviolent movement, more than 300,000 families have won land, and many are now living in permanent settlements, farming, studying at MST-organized schools, and supporting others who are likewise working to move back to the land.
The MST has established an educational network of more than 1,000 schools that teach literacy, sustainable farming, and leadership, and prepares people for professions in such areas as teaching and health care for use at their settlements.
The students are MST members who come from impoverished rural and urban backgrounds. At the school, they divide their time between study, work, physical education, and reflection, discussion of current events, music, and volunteer work. Non-violence education is integrated into all courses.
Students stay at the school for two months, and then travel back to their homes in MST encampments and settlements for several months to use their newly acquired skills. They continue this rotation until graduation.
The schools run as cooperatives; resources are shared between everyone, and everyone has a task that contributes to the whole, such as baking or gardening. Ideally, the students rotate through all the positions before graduation.
There is another way
In the settlements, MST works to demonstrate that people can provide their own food instead of importing and exporting cash crops—a system that has led to a large increase in poverty and starvation in Brazil.
Residents are proud to say that they practice 100 percent organic farming. When they first arrived they had the idea that they had to use lots of pesticides. With time, the community realized that they were spending more and more money on fertilizers and pesticides because the chemicals were exhausting the soil. The chemicals' side effects also caused illnesses within the settlement. The community decided to switch to organic farming. The settlements also raises cattle for meat and dairy, and fruits and vegetables.
Conclusion
Our economic fate as a nation will be determined by a system of cooperative development where all participants have an equal say in the decision making and implementation process.
Sadly we cannot rely on government, local or national, to bring any meaningful reform as it is laden with corruption and scandal. The rulers in power at this time will not bring progress by virtue of them being hold-outs from previous retrogressive regimes or thuggish opportunists lacking any agenda.
We are preparing a manifesto using the ideas we have garnered from around the world and housed in this blog and some yet to be published, to form the basis of a people’s political party tentatively set to commence operations next year. All are invited, regardless of tribe or political affiliation, to participate as valued members in this economic and social revolution. A brighter day and a gleaming future will only be brought about by ‘we the people’.

Tacit Imperialism: The bane of developing nations. Part 2 of 2

We will conclude this series by highlighting the role of multinationals and their quest to reap maximum profits in cohorts with fawning corrupt regimes. Their plunder of Africa’s natural resources has led to the degradation of the environment and has brought enormous suffering to local residents.
The Niger Delta: The ravages of insatiable greed.
The Niger Delta region comprises of nine states, 185 local government areas and a population of about 20 million. The region is rich in natural resources, including oil and gas, cash crops including oil palm, rubber, cocoa, coconut, a diversity of aquatic resources and fertile land which supports year round agriculture.
The Niger Delta accounts for more than 90% of earnings from oil and gas and about 60% of federally distributed revenue. But despite its rich resources, it has one of the most crushing poverty levels in the world. It is also Nigeria’s least developed region. Seventy per cent of the people in the area are on the poverty line and the poverty level in the region is well above African standards. Health indicators lag behind the national average. Infrastructure including Medicare is also poor and the cost of food is high despite its fertile land.
Shell’s Environmental Devastation in Nigeria
Royal Dutch Shell, (Shell) began oil production in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria in 1958. It has a long history of working closely with the Nigerian government to quell popular opposition to its presence in the region. Shell’s operations in the Delta have led to the deep impoverishment of the local people and surrounding communities in the Delta that rely on the environment for their livelihood, often farming and fishing for market or subsistence living.
Gas flaring
Natural gas is a byproduct of oil drilling. In much of the world, this gas is either used for energy or re-injected into the well. In Nigeria, Shell and other oil companies burn it in a process known as gas flaring. The gas burned in flares is not the clean natural gas used for heating or cooking; the gas is contaminated with toxic compounds and the flares send huge toxic plumes into the air. The chemicals, which end up in local waterways and fields through soot and precipitation, include carcinogens such as benzene, a deadly chemical that can cause convulsions, chromosomal damage and birth defects. Many of the flares are located adjacent to Niger Delta settlements.
Shell and other oil companies ignored all orders by the Nigerian government to end gas flaring, choosing to pay a fine rather than clean up their operations. As of December 2008, there were over 100 flare sites still operating in Nigeria.
Oil spills
An estimated 1.5 million tons of oil has spilled in the Niger Delta ecosystem over the past 50 years. Many of the spills have taken place in sensitive habitats for birds, fish and other wildlife, leading to further loss of biodiversity and, in turn, further impoverishment of local communities. The spills pollute local water sources that people depend on for drinking, cooking, bathing, laundering and fishing. They also release dangerous fumes into the air, sometimes rendering villages uninhabitable and causing serious illness for those who are unable to relocate. Many of the oil spills can are attributable to poorly maintained infrastructure such as aging pipelines. Cleanup of oil spills is often very superficial, sometimes involving little more than turning the land so that the oil remains just beneath the surface of the soil.
Honorable mention: activist Ken Saro-Wiwa on behalf of his Ogoni people
Mr. Saro-Wiwa, who founded the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni Peoples (MOSOP) in 1990, was one of Shell’s most forceful critics because of the damage done to the delta environment. He brought worldwide attention to the human rights violations committed against the Ogoni through international campaigning and his poignant writing. He was nominated for a Nobel Prize and awarded the Right Livelihood Award and the Goldman Prize for his environmental and human rights activism.
In 1994, Ken Saro-Wiwa and other Ogoni leaders were prevented by the military from attending a gathering; at that very gathering, four Ogoni chiefs were killed. The military governor promptly announced that Ken Saro-Wiwa caused the deaths, and he and other leaders were arrested despite the lack of any connection between MOSOP and the deaths. A three-man tribunal was created by the Nigerian government to try the Ogoni leaders —known as the “Ogoni Nine”. The tribunal denied the Ogoni Nine access to counsel, a fair trial, and the opportunity to appeal the decision. The Ogoni Nine were convicted and were executed by hanging on November 10, 1995.
The case against Shell
Shell had a close relationship with the Nigerian military regime during the early 1990s. Shell was alleged to have provided the Nigerian army with vehicles, patrol boats and ammunition. The oil company requested an increase in security and provided monetary and logistical support to the Nigerian police. Shell frequently called upon the Nigerian police for “security operations” that often amounted to raids and terror campaigns against the Ogoni.
Beginning in 1996, the Center for Constitutional Rights (CCR), Earth Rights International (ERI), and other human rights attorneys brought a series of cases to hold Shell accountable for human rights violations against the Ogoni, including summary execution, crimes against humanity, torture, inhuman treatment and arbitrary arrest and detention. The United States District Court for the Southern District of New York set a trial date of May 27th, 2009.
In June 2009, days before the start of a trial in New York, Royal Dutch Shell agreed to a $15.5m (£9.7m) out-of-court settlement.
South Africa: unrelenting squalor beneath a façade of splendor
This year marks the 20th anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s historic release from prison after being incarcerated for most of his adult life by successive racist white governments and their abominable apartheid regime. But 20 years after Mandela’s release and 16 years after the handover of government from the white Afrikaner rulers to the African National Congress, the people of that naturally wealthy country still find themselves shackled. Not by apartheid masters, but by grinding poverty and a plague of social miseries. Official figures show that over half of the mainly black population lives in poverty, with an unemployment rate of 25 per cent. There’s more poverty, disease, unemployment, violence and crime than ever before.
The handover of power was not so much a surrender by a discredited regime, it was rather more of a choreographed changing of the guard in which the white rulers dutifully stood aside to let the ANC leaders take their place. But the understanding was that nothing of substantive change – in terms of economic policy and wealth distribution in that country – would take place. Key players in these choreographed, political musical chairs were US and British mining companies, with the blessing of their respective governments.
While Africa’s richest country is mainly known for its gold and diamonds, it is also the main repository in the world for “strategic minerals”. Strategic minerals are those metal ores that are essential to the manufacture of armaments, weaponry, ships, submarines, aircraft, tanks and missiles. These factors moved the US and British to engage with the ANC. The US and Britain have become the top two foreign investors in South Africa.
Thanks to the ANC’s broken promises of liberation, millions wander and languish in poverty, disease and hopelessness. South Africa’s black majority is free – free to be poor, free to be unemployed, free to be mugged, robbed, raped or murdered, free to die of AIDS.
Conclusion
It is abundantly clear that the economic fate of Africa is solely the responsibility of Africans. Western powers and their agents, the multi nationals, will plunder our natural resources with wanton abandonment and pilfer any remains if the opportunity avails itself. Unfortunately their stooges, who are traitors of the people, are foisted among us as leaders, replete with the greed of their masters. They would gladly and effortlessly sell their kinsmen for shiny carriages, sumptuous abodes and inordinate amounts of heady intoxicants.
We ardently entreat the people of Kenya, who are all our brothers and sisters, regardless of tribe or political affiliation, to make a clean sweep of this elite band of conniving fraudsters. After this general election, their malevolent inclinations to economically suppress us while ravaging public resources will be confined to history, tales of awe animatedly retold to while away the time at the local social outlet. The diatribe in this section is the rambling of irascible, impatient for progress patriots, seeking the mandate of the Kenyan people at the General Elections of 2017 or 2012 if we organize soon enough. The issues we have tackled have always been accompanied by possible solutions. In the following year we will be registering a party and implementing our ideas on the ground. All are invited to partake in this economic and social revolution.

Tacit Imperialism: The bane of developing nations. Part 1 of 2

In a previous article, we advocated for the adoption of protectionism to grow our infant industries. In light of several news stories from nations whose economies were set up to service a foreign market, we feel an even greater need to review Africa’s international trading pacts. We are of the opinion that Africa’s solution to its myriad of problems, both economic and social, will be solved by the formulation and implementation of home grown solutions. Solutions free from the imposed insidious international agreements that are perpetuated as ‘restructuring programs’ and ‘austerity measures’. In this vein, we will highlight the egregious machinations of multinational corporations and their western government sponsors that have kept Africa and other developing nations in economic servitude.
Kenya: Political independence swathed in economic peonage
The struggle for the adoption of the multi-party system of government during the Moi regime reached a crescendo in late 1991. A November meeting of the Paris Club Consultative Group for Kenya, which included the IMF, the World Bank, the U.S., the U.K. and France, suspended $350 in quick-disbursing loans and applied additional pressure for economic and political reform.
On Feb. 12, 1993 the government agreed as a precondition to the resumption of foreign financial aid, to implement a number of drastic austerity measures that included the devaluation of the currency by 25%. However donors were not satisfied with the implementation of the dictated measures. In November 1993, the Consultative Group reconvened and offered the Moi regime $170 million on condition that human rights and governance improve and that the KANU provoked ethnic clashes end. The government started to meet some of those conditions but after a year Moi scrapped the austerity measures citing they had caused further economic hardship.
Vital sectors such as tourism took a serious beating due to government mismanagement. Others, such as textiles and manufacturing, collapsed completely, unsupported by inefficient government policies and bogged down by widespread corruption, tribalism, and nepotism. The Kenyan story of these two decades quickly became one of unemployment and underemployment.
Qualified graduates of the universities and secondary schools became idle and frustrated, or took up menial jobs in small-scale trading and other informal sector activities. High taxes to maintain the overblown public sector suffocated the already feeble private sector. A majority of Kenyans saw their standard of living deteriorate steadily beginning in the mid-1980s through the 1990s.
Today we are still mired in corruption with scandal after scandal being the order of the day. Ministry officials in the Education department have stolen donor funds meant for free primary education, Other Ministry officials in the agriculture department sold imported maize to a neighboring country when Kenyans were starving. We have even sold the National railway line to a foreigner with dubious financial standing! Where is the indignation?
Greece: The European Union disciplines a truant lackey
The European Union has shown its righteous wrath by stripping Greece of its vote at a crucial meeting next month, the worst humiliation ever suffered by an EU member state. The council of EU finance ministers said Athens must comply with austerity demands by March 16 or lose control over its own tax and spend policies altogether. It if fails to do so, the EU will itself impose cuts under the draconian Article 126.9 of the Lisbon Treaty. While the symbolic move to suspend Greece of its voting rights at one meeting makes no practical difference, it marks a constitutional watershed and represents a crushing loss of sovereignty.
Austerity measures include freezes on public sector wages and an overhaul of the tax system. Greece must also reduce its deficit from 12.7pc of GDP to 3pc in three years.
How it started
Years of unrestrained spending, cheap lending and failure to implement financial reforms left Greece badly exposed when the global economic downturn struck. This whisked away a curtain of partly fiddled statistics to reveal debt levels and deficits that exceeded limits set by the eurozone.
So what happens now?
Greece's credit rating -- the assessment of its ability to repay its debts -- has been downgraded to the lowest in the eurozone, meaning it will likely be viewed as a financial black hole by foreign investors. This leaves the country struggling to pay its bills as interest rates on existing debts rise.
Will this hurt the rest of Europe?
Greece is already in major breach of eurozone rules on deficit management and with the financial markets betting the country will default on its debts, this reflects badly on the credibility of the euro. If Europe needs to resort to rescue packages involving bodies such as the International Monetary Fund, this would further damage the euro's reputation and could lead to a substantial fall against other key currencies.
So what is Greece doing?
The government has hiked taxes on fuel, tobacco and alcohol, raised the retirement age by two years, imposed public sector pay cuts and applied tough new tax evasion regulations.
Are people happy with this?
Predictably, quite the opposite and there have been warnings of resistance from various sectors of society. Farmers have begun blockading roads to demand greater government subsidies, while on February 10th; workers nationwide staged a one-day strike closing airports, government offices, courts and schools. More strikes are expected to follow. Greek customs officials expressed their anger by kicking off a three-day strike, the first of many stoppages set to culminate in a general strike. Greek workers fear there will be a rise in unemployment if these austerity measures are implemented.
Lessons from Greece.
An export economy built on servicing the needs of neighbors, to the detriment of its citizens, will eventually fail because prices and terms are susceptible to outside forces. An economy structured to feed its citizens before exports can adjust to fluctuations quicker because the decision makers and the consumers are within close proximity and are both vested in the success of this local economy.
Conclusion
Although the Greeks governments need to belong and appease the European Union fueled the crisis, an enlightened citizenry did not passively accept the austerity measures. They expressed their opinions through civil disobedience and demonstrations.
In Kenya, the greedy political elite kow-tow to western imperialism to their benefit but to the detriment of their own people. They visit upon us villainous after villainous scandal yet there is not a sliver of rage from the docile electorate. Where is the furor? It is imperative that we hold to account and banish to political oblivion these pernicious agents of regression. We will no longer bandy around recycled agents of former oppressive regimes. It is time for new untainted leadership from patriotic men and women prepared, with comprehensive plans, to propel our nation forward.
In the final part of this article, we will study the Niger delta as an example of the ill effects of imperialism. We will also study the economic state of South Africa, 20 years after the end of apartheid rule.

Cooperative Learning: an alternative to rote regurgitation

The Ministry of Education recently announced the results of the KCSE exam at a ruckus event that would have been mistaken, by the casual observer, as an announcement of a great scientific discovery such as a cure for an aggravating malady. The brouhaha displayed by the winning team, the boys, was enough to drown the shrieks and wails of the losing team, the girls. Read the full story HERE.
Competitive rote learning as advocated by the Kenyan education system, should be eschewed and totally discarded in favor of cooperative learning. The aim being to teach all equally, every student contributing, their worth being recognized and rewarded.
What is rote learning?
Rote learning is learning which avoids understanding of a subject and instead focuses on memorization. It emphasizes learning by repetition; the idea being one will be able to quickly recall the meaning of the material the more one repeats it.
Rote methods are routinely used when quick memorization is required and it is frequently used to prepare quickly for exams.
The disadvantages of rote learning are:
• Whilst this is useful in learning some basic things, such as the times tables or the alphabet, it is narrow and restrictive and does not teach children to think or how to apply that information.
• If exam papers are not well designed, it is possible for someone with good memorization techniques to pass the test without any meaningful comprehension of the subject.
• It favors the proficient retainers by heaping egregious attention on them while shunning the students at the bottom of the 'league standings' who may have proclivities in other areas
• It is not likely to produce innovators and entrepreneurs because such an education system produces people who have been trained to think in the same way.
Rote learning is a way of imparting basic information, but teaching a child to think, experiment and question are all part of the education necessary to produce a well rounded individual.
Learning Circles
Learning Circles is a form of cooperative learning whereby small diverse, democratic groups of people meet regularly over a specified period of time to focus their different perspectives into a common understanding of an issue or problem. The discussion takes place in an atmosphere of mutual trust and understanding. The goal is deeper understanding by the participants and their efforts are often directed towards the construction of a final product or recommendation for a course of action.
Learning Circles as an education tool
Learning Circles can be used with learners of any age. After the basic learning stage, learning circles can be used to help students develop trust and respect for diversity of experience, and develop both listening and speaking skills among peers.
Learning Circles can bring together classes from large urban settings and geographically isolated rural areas and from around the world via the internet. Students with a wide range of educational, physical, and social abilities can interact with one another without regard as to how high the school is ranked nationally.
Theme Based Learning Circles
Themes are used to emphasize critical thinking and problem-solving approaches. Each classroom sponsors a section in one of the themes and their work is published in a review to be shared with other participants. Let’s examine some of the themes used in this innovative style of teaching and learning.
Places and Perspectives theme
The Places and Perspectives theme encourages students to explore regional history, culture, government, and geography by sharing their knowledge with people from different locations. The goal is to expose students to places beyond their own schools and communities in order to expand their outlook on life and broaden their views. For instance, a classroom studying history may interview native inhabitants or the elderly, or describe the historical attractions of the area. A classroom studying government might sponsor one of these sections: Examining local constitutions or monitoring Elections. Their final work will be published in the Places and Perspectives review.
The Society's Problems theme
The Society's Problems theme provides students the opportunity to explore problems that confront their communities and to work together as teams to propose effective solutions. The students research issues and discuss the impact of similar problems in diverse local communities. By comparing problems across different communities, students gain a deeper understanding of the complexity of these issues, and work together to propose solutions to them.
Learning Circle participants produce a final publication called Investigating Society's Problems covering a broad range of topics. The students may want to investigate teenager-related problems such as drugs, alcohol abuse, teenage pregnancy, abortion, school dropouts, runaways and academic pressure.
The Global Issues theme
The Global Issues theme focuses discussion on a broad range of environmental social, political, and economic issues which affects the Earth's entire population.
The final publication for this theme is the Global Issues Review. Students may choose to study sociological issues such as worldwide starvation and poverty, harmful and persuasive media, racism, or terrorism. Some science-related issues include nuclear weapons, protection of natural resources, pollution, changing weather patterns, and genetic engineering.
Possible government issues include: national conflict and cooperation, the role of the United Nations, the development of emerging democracies and international trade agreements.
Cooperative learning for adults
Cooperative learning, which embraces the learning circles concept, is a relaxed, simple, low-tech form of gaining an education and understanding of issues in an informal, egalitarian setting. It reflects a growing conviction that there is a collective wisdom in groups. In study circles, participants learn to listen to each others ideas, not as points to debate, but as different experiences that each individual brings to the table.
In the study circle, each participant feels empowered to think for themselves. All are free to say what they think, to sit back and relax, and enjoy learning and thinking. Participants are encouraged to speak their minds freely and to engage in friendly disagreement.
Equality
Unlike the traditional classroom - where inequality affects not only the student/teacher relationship, but the relationships between students -in a study circle, a person with a doctorate has no more status than a person with a high school diploma. Value is placed not on having mastered someone else's ideas, but on generating and communicating ideas of one's own.
Most often, there is a facilitator whose job is not to have mastery over the subject the group is discussing, but to keep the discussion going. Facilitators need be "expert" only in managing the group so that all are heard and the conversation stays lively and on topic.
Democracy
By managing the process themselves, participants practice democracy. What is democracy? It's a system of shared power, a system in which individuals feel they can affect the outcome of political decisions. In the study circle environment - where there is equality, respect for others, and excitement about the exchange of ideas - people are engaged in the most fundamental aspects of democracy. They will come to conclusions or make decisions through talking, listening, and understanding.
Connection
In study circles, "connection" is central. Participants seldom take part just to learn objective facts. The importance of what they learn lies in its connection to their lives, their own experiences, and the real problems and issues they face. A study circle is "education for life."
And, of course, the participants themselves are connected. When people talk about their lives, share their feelings, and listen to each other with respect, there is connection and a sense of community, a sense of belonging.
Education as transformation
Today, conventional education focuses more and more on careerism, seeing education in the narrow role of helping people get jobs. Study circles focus on self-realization and social transformation by encouraging participants to blossom as individuals and to bring about change in society.
Study circles bring people together to talk, to feel part of a community, and to practice acceptance of diversity, promote equality and engage in democracy.
The way forward
The learning circles method of education would probably be suited to students in the final stages of primary school and beyond. Here are some points to consider as we seek to not only educate but to also empower:
• Class sizes should be divided into groups at some time during the school day where a free flow of ideas is indulged. All the students can be given roles in the group when it is time for working on a project. Examples of roles could be: an illustrator, a model maker, the presenter, the researcher, the facilitator and so on.
• Instead of final exams, why not have presentation of material that students have researched and put together?
• Beyond high school, educators should think about prompting students towards vocational and technical schools. There are many bright students who may not be able to memorize and recite facts but have an inclination towards the trades.
• Take students on field trips to potential work areas where they may establish a mentorship with professionals.
• Educate students from every day examples. Lessons may be taught from the newspaper where students question news stories and the teacher uses this opportunity to impart a valuable lesson. Take for example the recent news story about the stolen funds donated by the United Kingdom for free primary education. This would become a lesson on the workings of the Ministry of Education, its budget, employee salaries, and the work of different officials and so on. An enlightened student bringing this information home to his parents would more than likely influence how his parents would vote at the next elections.
This section welcomes input from reform minded educators from Kenya and from around the world
Conclusion
There is material that goes further as to how to conduct a learning circle in detail but we will not dwell on this area in this article. We only seek to introduce this new way of learning and thinking. It will be a welcome departure from the vacuous rallies our rulers subject us to that are agenda less, replicated at varying venues with different needs and do not bring about any progress.
The progress and development of neighborhoods and localities will not be brought about by this corruption ridden government. It will be brought about by people getting to know each other, discussing their problems and mutually adopting a consensual solution for implementation. Rural dwellers share and have more in common with their neighbor than with that elite tribesman whose grandiose lifestyle, swathed in ill gotten trappings, does not reflect our experiences or struggles.
Full disclosure: The opinions expressed in this and other preceding articles will be part of the manifesto of a political party to be known as The African Economic Democracy Party that will be seeking the mandate of the Kenyan people in the general elections of 2012. We will continually strive to present solutions with substance to issues affecting fellow Kenyans in order to uplift the living standards of this generation and bring prosperity to future generations.