Kenya Stockholm Blog

Awuor Should Stop Carrying Purity’s Hand bag

Naturally, the understanding is that as the Ambassador’s Deputy, Ms Jenipher Awuor is supposed to help her boss Purity with the day to day running of the Embassy. However, Awuor’s real job may have remained off-topic until a KSB commentator brought it up – carrying Purity’s handbag whenever the boss is on her numerous excursions.

Awuor (L) with the baggage: Notice how Purity is folding her arms as her bag remains on safe hands!

Probably, this makes Awuor one of the most expensive hand-bag carrying employee in the international world of diplomacy. In fact, it makes our country unique because “Only in Kenya” do we have “hand-bag carrying” as the basic job description of the Deputy Ambassador and there is photographic proof and repeated sightings by all and sundry.

To juxtapose the Awuor situation, it is like Kalonzo Musyoka always following Kibaki everywhere carrying the President’s briefcase. Worse still, it is like Musalia Mudavadi or Uhuru Kenyatta, the Deputy Prime Ministers, always following their boss Raila Odinga with his brief case.

By following Purity up and down even when she is on a shopping spree, the impression an observer gets is that Awuor is very idle in the office and whenever there is an opportunity of “going out”, she has to fix an excuse and Her Excellency’s hand bag is always part of the bargain. Look at it this way. If Awuor was a man, could he be following Purity everywhere with the hand bag on his hand as is the case today or could he be too shy?

Simple logic would have it that when purity is away, Awuor should be in the Office to take charge and to control staff members who may begin to behave badly by playing the mice when the cat is away. Conversely, a normal Office should have the boss sending her Junior to minor errands while reserving to herself the bigger and more heavier stuff like meeting the Swedish Prime Minister on behalf of the Kenyan government. While Awuor is to blame for playing the hand bag carrier, Purity too needs to be cast into the frying pan too.

She renders Awuor useless in the Office because she goes everywhere and never gives Awuor the opportunity to go and represent her anywhere. One day, she was invited to a Sudanese disco to represent the Kenyan government and instead of transferring the responsibility to her deputy or even another Junior like Kottut, she was at it, jumping to the staccato beats of the Sudanese rhythms in her Kitenge with hands in the air and hips swinging as Awuor waited patiently, keeping watch on Purity’s handbag.

At the Uganda independence day held in Kista some times back, Purity was invited and she was the first to arrive in her white Benz. When a Ugandan national who knew her tried to talk to her in Swahili, she refused to respond, pretending that she couldn’t speak Swahili. She abandoned the national language because she thought that the guy was a KSB spy. The Ugandan later called KSB to complain about Purity’s behavior.

Deprived of all opportunity of representing her boss anywhere, Awuor has decided not to sleep in the office. She follows her and the hand bag trick seem to be working because the other day, she managed to get close to former US President Bill Clinton at the Climate change conference just by carrying Purity’s handbag.

Awuor knows that the bag can take her to places but the key concern is whether she notices the damage she is doing to her reputation just by reducing her official duties to handbag-carrying at every opportunity. In as much as Purity needs to be recalled, Awuor should also grow up and stop Purity from converting her into a cheap “escort girl” whose job is to carry baggage. She needs to wake up!

Okoth Osewe

April 2, 2009 Posted by makozewe | News & Analysis | 7 Comments

A Case Of Mixed Identity Which Needs To Be Solved

I wish to distance myself from comments at Clay Onyango’s “Butdoisay” blog mentioning one Odero under the thread reading: “Are you suffering from HIV? Tony Odera Has Stretched His Hand to Help…” Posted on October 28, 2008. Filed under: Uncategorized.

A friend called me this evening saying that he had read a new comment by “Asha” mentioning the name Odero and not Odera, who was initially the person being discussed in the Heteroplus information. I immediately sent a text message to Clay at 20:28 saying:

“Sasa Clay. Somebody called telling me a comment on your blog for Tony Odera carries the name Odero and this is linked to the guy’s recent seduction of the commentator’s wife. May I request you to delete my name and correct it to ODERA because am not linked to Heteroplus. Thanks”.

I didn’t receive any response from Clay, therefore sent him an email stating this:

From: oderoxxxx
To: clayxxxx
Subject: Comment on your blog
Date: Thu, 2 Apr 2009 19:23:39 +0000

Hi Clay,

I have now checked and read a comment on your blog linked to Tony Odera which mentions Odero and not ODERA, whom the commentator claims was seducing his wife recently. I have requested on the SMS I sent to you this evening, to please delete the name Odero and replace it with Odera, becuase that comment could be mistaken to mean me, Odero. I am not connected to Heteroplus, which the head story dedicates to Tony Odera. Thanks.

Regards
Jared Odero

There was no response from Clay on my email either. I therefore went to www.eniro.se and got his home phone number which I called but nobody responded. I left a message on the voicemail stating that a second comment from Zip mentioning the name Odero has again appeared at his blog, after I had requested him on various media to delete and replace it with Odera’s name, who was the main person on the filed story.

If he felt that I was the one mentioned, then he should have allowed my full names with proof of the allegations, or the particular Odero being commented on.

Clay is solely responsible for comments moderated and allowed to be published on his blog. It is therefore unethical and unprofessional of him to allow comments using a name not related to the apparent topic.

Below are the two comments quoted from Butdoisay:

If I ever got the sickness, Mr. Odero would be the last person to approach for advise. He met my wife the other day in town and believe it or not, he started seducing her while he knows the risk. I will go to the real doctors for help, full stop.

Asha. April 2, 2009

@asha, oh my God.Who is mr Odero? What was your wife doing in town? Wacha maneno mingi.

Zip: April 2, 2009

Dr. Jared Odero

KSB NOTE: We concur. This looks like a matter of mistaken identity and because there is no other Odero in Stockholm, the risk is that the allegations may be personally damaging. Given the public profile of Mr. Odero, it is likely that his reputation may enter into serious disrepute and, under the circumstances, it is only prudent that the two parties (Clay & Odero) institute measures of redress so that collective fire can be concentrated on Ambassador Purity who needs to be recalled. Through KSB, Clay has done the same in the past to protect his name from being mixed with the travel agent who was conning people and we hope that this issue will be solved peacefully and without dramma.

April 2, 2009 Posted by makozewe | News & Analysis | 27 Comments