Can The Bagarmossen Church Pray For This Kenyan?
A Botolo of whisky from the System
I thought I could continue reviewing 2008 from where I left but things just continue to happen and they need to be published at KSB. This is something which, if you have been in Stockholm, you may have encountered.
A Kenyan has two or even three mobile phones then you are gladly given all the numbers so that in case you cannot get him on one line, you can sure catch him on the other which could be dubbed “the hot line”. One could be a Nokia and the other one an Ericksson and just in case you think they were picked from the second hand portal, they are latest models. One day, you try reaching your pal on the “regular number” to check whether you could link up in town for one and discover that the regular line is not working so you try the “hot line” and that is when the problem begins.
The line you have called is the “Job line” which, the friend says, you should not call to avoid disturbing him. That is after you called it one day and the friend requested that he “call back” to prevent you from losing air time from your poor phone which, he suggested, could be Comviq, the type that expires after a few minutes of conversation before you even complete a sentence.
The main reason why he needs to call you back is because he wants to update you that it is the “job people” who pay for his air time, unlike you, a poor goat who gets worried about air time when you are on the phone. Sometimes, you ask the other end if he or she has a Comviq so that you can be sure you will be talking almost for free (you pay the opening charges and that’s all).
“You know my kind of job is such that you cannot just call anytime. Next time, send an SMS on my regular in case I don’t respond then I will call you back”, the friend warns in a moment of education about how his phone system works. You begin to wonder why you were told to phone “anytime”. You then begin to wonder why you were given both numbers in the first place and why last time, there was no problem when you called the “hot line”. May be, the guy wanted you to understand that both lines are active.
It is like “the Kenyan in us” not going away even after we have left the country and stayed abroad for more than one decade. In Kenya, don’t get surprised when you are accompanied by pals in a pub during those “back home moments” and after you settle down, your “guide” orders two extra glasses to hold both phones on the table as the swallowing begins.
The waiter is just happy to serve these special customers and as you begin to wonder, you are introduced. “This one lives in Sweden” (with hands pointing at you) is part of the introduction to the waiter so that there can be no mistake about the status of the table. Heads begin to turn at the neighboring table because the intro was done in high frequency.
The next example is a bit funny. There is someone who does not agree with you on what you are doing although he/she has never told you anything. Your close pals in Stockholm (or personal spies) report that nani an ku hate. You still don’t get it.
One day, the guy calls you when he is very drunk and begins what I can call verbal diarrhea. “And you Osewe, why do you write the blog? Do you know what a blog is?” You can notice the level of inebriation because his voice is dragging in typical drunken style but you take it easy and stay cool.
Just before that, the guy had said that he never reads the blog but now, there is something he came across at the blog and he was not happy. This type of exchange happened to me so it is not hypothetical.
The Guy Shown Dust From His Ex-Wife
“What is your problem with me writing the blog?”, I ventured politely. “You cannot write the blog and make money at the same time. You place adverts at the blog and people pay by clicking on them”, he roars. I then correct him to the effect that there is nothing fundamentally wrong with making money through adverts at the blog although I don’t do it because it has not been necessary. Then he jumps to another point.
“You cannot run a newsblog. According to the Swedish law, what you are doing is not correct blah blah blah”. Still on a very friendly note, I advice (although he is supposed to be a computer expert) about CNN, BBC and even our own Aftonbladet blogs which are all News based but still he doesn’t get it. He proceeds to say that I should write at my blog that he has threatened me. That is when I begin to understand that there must be something terribly wrong with his system.
“This is not a threat. It is an irritation”, I tell him. The saddest part is that this is a person I have had a lot of respect for. As the conversation deteriorates with him beginning a shouting match on the phone, I notice that he may have been drinking the whole day because he doesn’t sound like the real guy. I get a bit tougher and advice him to take his frustrations furthest.
“If you think that there is something illegal at KSB, make a police statement”, I tell him. I was on the verge of updating the blog and I din’t have a lot of time so I hung up.
The question which this sad experience exposes is how the system has crushed our people to an extent that even some of our best brains have broken down after opting for the bottle.
As usual, I take a break to do some research to find out whether there has been any dramatic development in the guy’s life of late in a way that could have pushed him to lose his senses completely after excessive inebriation. By ordinary standards, the guy should pass for an intellectual but now, his mind appears to have gone. That is when a can of worms opens up.
Bagarmossen
Bwaii! The guy had been shown dust by his ex and lost everything. He then tried reconstructing his life with different women and every time he made a move, something happened and he had to be dumped. He is currently in a huge economic crisis and when he called, it was like he was trying to dump his frustrations at KSB but I didn’t get it. I called one of KSB’s inspectors in the Department of Intelligence and after the briefing, I could begin to add one plus one to get a two because before, I was getting a three.
I could not bring myself to picture how a guy of this caliber could have sunk to an extent that he could make a useless phone call after he had been swallowing for two days in the name of New Year to begin to fumble.
Bob Marley said that “you think you are living in heaven” but you are actually in hell. Without going into details, I ended the conversation but later, had to sympathize with the guy as I wondered about the hostility of the system. The guy put up a court case to try his luck against the woman but he lost because the woman was smarter. If this guy could come down to this extent, I am afraid because I am not sure whether he is trying a slow suicide.
The big problem is that there is no one I can approach to talk to him because I don’t know some of his closest friends. I was advised through Intelligence that his best friends have also deserted him because they believe that he cannot be salvaged. May be, the only option is to approach the Bagarmossen Church to pray for him. I feel very saddened to say the least about this Kenyan.
I appeal to Pastor Muirani and others to try and remember this guy in prayer because last year, we had an attempted suicide by a Kenyan lady who was saved. Life could be difficult here but we need to get together during the worst personal moments and help. This year seem to have began up side down for some people.
Okoth Osewe
Kenya Opposition Party To Be Set Up In Stockholm
After studying the situation in Kenya, a group of Kenyans have decided to call a meeting in Stockholm for the setting up of a Kenyan Opposition Party to address the political, social and economic crisis in our country.
Security police arrest comedian Nyambane at Jamhuri 2008 protest
Consultations are still underway and Mr. Martin Ngatia, a leading member of the group, told Mapambano Online, an information outlet of Kenyan politics, that the Coalition government has failed the people of Kenya and that in the absence of political opposition on the ground, it is necessary that Kenyans abroad begin to move in the direction of setting up an opposition Party which can rescue the country from the capitalist class rule whose unacceptable methods of leadership has resulted in mass hunger and deprivation, starvation of millions of Kenyans, homelessness, looting of the economy by the rich, passing of arbitrary and dictatorial bills and murder of innocent civilians using security forces with orders to “shoot to kill”.
The general view among Kenyans linked to the group is that Kenya needs a revolution and the main task of the proposed Party will be to address the needs of this revolution, how it can be organized and how the revolutionary struggle in Kenya can be waged to attain the fundamental goals of this revolution.
At the center of the political struggle in Kenya is how the masses of exploited Kenyan people can organize politically to defeat the Kibaki-Raila government of the rich and to replace it with an accountable government that can be able to serve the interests of millions of poor Kenyans instead of maintaing the current situation where the rich man’s government is serving the interests of both wealth grabbers looting the State and Imperialist agents siphoning the country’s resources abroad through multinational companies and other known economic saboteurs.
Kenya Is Ripe For Revolution
Mr. Ngatia told Mapambano Online that over the years, governments have come and gone while change that can transform the lives of millions of suffering Kenyans has been elsusive because leaders have either betrayed the struggle by choosing to serve imperialist interests or have been ill equipped politically to bring about the necessary revolutionary changes that could transform the lives of the poor in Kenya.
“A government that cannot control the prices of essential consumer commodities like unga or fuel by leaving such controls on private hands has failed in its responsibilities to govern and should therefore be replaced using the democratic methods available in the field of struggle”, Mr. Ngatia told Mapambano Online.
Mr. Ngatia said that it has become difficult to trust that the same opportunist leaders will be able to deliver the masses of the Kenyan people from poverty and human suffering that has reduced Wananchi to animals shamelessly scavenging for food across the country as the rich and their families continue to fill their stomachs using money stolen from State coffers through tax evasion, Grand Regency style mega corruption and other methods of theft and plunder of the economy inherited from the Moi and Kenyatta dictatorships.
Mr. Ngatia said that Kenyans need to forget about a change in their lives if they cannot accept the stark reality that the country is ripe for a revolution that can drive the thieving ruling class and their allies out of power to be replaced by a new breed of revolutionary leaders armed with the right ideas that can guarantee equitable distribution of wealth in the country. He said that once this understanding is reached by millions of suffering Kenyans, the next question will be how to organize the revolution. He said that a key objective of the proposed Party will be to participate in bringing about this understanding without which, he said, there will be no revolution in Kenya that could overthrow the rotten system of government also responsible for the current crisis today.
Further, Mr. Ngatia said that as long as Kenyans continue to pin their hopes for change on agents of exploitation represented by Parliamentarians who cannot even pay taxes, and who pass laws to muzzle the Media, they will continue to die en masse of hunger, treatable diseases and other conditions as the country’s wealth is either looted locally or repatriated abroad through a well structured, rotten and exploitative system of capitalism that has failed Kenya for the last fourty five years. Mr. Ngatia welcomed debate on the proposed Party and urged Kenyans interested to send mail to: debate(at)mapambano.com or to debate the issues directly at http://www.mapambano.com, a web site that has been set up by progressive Kenyans in Diaspora as part of the contribution to the struggle back home.
Okoth Osewe
Related:
Recent Comments
Lisa on Rude Shock at Bolero Bueno Caf… apolo toweet on Hard Evidence Of How Uhuru Ken… kenyatta land thief on Kikuyunization of Government S… defend democracy. on Uhuru and Ruto ICC Cases: Who… cheating woman caugh… on Kenyan Woman Battered By Swedi… NEW: COUNTRY STATS
