From: Leo Odera

From: peter oliver

GOSSIP-COLUMN

BY PETER OLIVER OCHIENG

Recently, I read a piece in one of Kenya’s daily papers under a banner heading, “What Africa thinks of Kenyans.” The article sampled a host of opinions on what Africans think of Kenyans from Rwanda, Botswana, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Southern Sudan, Zambia, Uganda and Tanzania.

Views sampled were as flattering as they were revealing. In the eyes of Rwandese, Kenyans are cute and politically aggressive. To the Botswanese, Kenyans are friendly, peaceful and have an unrivalled penchant for ‘nyama choma’.

Ndugu zetu wa Tanzania believe that we are conmen, daring and rude while Ugandans accuse us of being ‘business hungry’. It’s not in my making to support or condemn those views; I am a typical Kenyan, read on and find out how I carry myself on as a truer Kenyan.

I’m a Kenyan man; political bickering is what defines me best. Over glasses of alcohol in bars and other drinking dens, I assume the role of a speaker to coordinate debates on topics such as ‘The G7 political alliance is sending shivers along ODM ranks’.

I shall ensure that debates go on with zeal, authority and finality that can make Kenya a better country only if it can be replicated at other levels of nation building. As a rule, the debates always produce winners and losers.

Having lost hands down in a ‘verbal diarrhea’, I shall enlist the services of my beefy body to physically ‘teach’ my antagonist (s) a lesson. I will cause a brawl and ‘bottles shall fly’ as ‘innocent’ drinkers and drunkards leave the bar faster than they came with broken skulls, swollen faces and broken limbs.

I am a Kenyan councilor. We are meeting over a ‘small business’ of electing a city mayor. I am from Otonglo Development Money (ODM) party and other civic leaders have handpicked ‘their own’ – from their Ponyoka Na Ushindi (PNU) party. I am not amused. To express the displeasure, I take a starring role in ‘making chairs fly’ to my opponents’ direction. When they decline to bulge, I ‘flex muscles’ by throwing stones at them.

I am a Kenyan; I have peculiar calling habits and out of my strangeness, I do not own a phone but a Subscriber Identity Module (SIM) card. I am in a strange place full of strangers. I remember that I have to call my wife back at home. I proceed to the nearest stranger and quip, “I urgently need to call somebody but I don’t own a phone, could you please help me with yours?”

“But how do you know I have one myself,” he asks. ‘You look like you have one,” I fire back. He agrees to assist me on condition that I purchase mine soon. I take the phone; replace his SIM card with mine, call my wife and keep my card away without even saying thanks. I have no intention of buying a phone soon since ‘I must not own a phone to make calls’. With or without a phone, life continues in its true Kenyan fashion.

I’m a Kenyan; a political bootlicker, tail wager, sympathizer, crony and tribesman of a well known cabinet minister. There’s a vacancy at one of the parastatals that fall ‘in his ministry’. I do not come close to meeting the qualifications. In simple terms, I’m the owner of ‘a very short C.V’ but given that I have an ability to ‘mobilize’ voters, only a phone call stands between me and the position.

I am a Kenyan cabinet minister. The ministry I head has been rocked by a Nation shaking scandal. All evidence point to the fact I have to take political responsibility, ‘step down or aside’ and pave way for investigations. But what do I do? I call a press conference and swear by my tribal chief’s name that not even death can ‘make me step aside’.

“My community is being targeted. Money has been ‘poured’ to finish me and my community politically,” I swear with clenched fists at everybody and nobody in particular. Three hours down the line, I call another press conference to announce ‘my stepping down’. What happens next is that ‘political analysts’ have a word to say. “The minister’s decision was long overdue,” they chorus.

I am a Kenyan lady dating a Kenyan guy who is not so keen on settling down in marriage. I am on the wrong side of thirty; I have to ensure that I settle down soonest lest I ‘lose market’. So what do I do? I call to inform him that I shall visit during the weekend.

At the back of my mind, I know that I’m not going to visit but to stay. Come the weekend, I take my ‘self contained’ hand bag and head to his place. After three days, he seeks to know when I will be leaving but I flatly tell him that I have no intentions of leaving and that I actually ‘came to stay’.

“In fact, I’m heavy with your child,” I say. It dawns upon him that we have actually been eating the ‘forbidden fruit’ without protection. He grudgingly accepts to put up with me, but in real sense, he wasn’t ready for it. As expected, the ‘come we stay’ does not go beyond six months and the hassle for a ‘Mr Right’ continues.

I am a Kenyan; the owner of very lazy bones. I ‘fear’ work, sleep poor but expect to wake up damn rich. That’s why I shall deliberately skip a political rally where ‘sitting allowance’ is being given and attend a church crusade where people ‘speak, breath and smell miracles’ in God’s name.

I expect the pastor to perform miracles so that I become rich overnight. But as you all know, the era of miracles is long gone, it becomes even tricky by ‘demanding’ a miracle or two from the pastor when I know that he can’t produce it.

But do I know? I am just a mere Kenyan. Please pardon me for that.