I have just checked the toothpaste tube today and it says ‘Made in Egypt’.
The matchsticks were made in China, and so were my radio’s batteries.
Yet, as far back as 1976, Kenya was manufacturing basically all its consumables. Foreign multinationals like SmithKline Beecham and Glaxo Wellcome were manufacturing all the drugs we needed right here in Nairobi and exporting all around Africa.
Thika was an industrial town that employed hundreds of thousands, with everything from tanneries to vehicle assembly plants.
As a result, UNTIL 1985, ANYBODY WHO REACHED FORM FOUR GOT A JOB AUTOMATICALLY. Educated guys were so in demand that to join the army or the police force all you needed to have was a Std 7 CPE certificate, and you got in without much fuss.
Ukiwa na certificate ya Form Four you could change jobs like socks - any time you want. If you joined the army/police you became an officer/inspector.
The economy was growing at an average of 6-7 per cent. Bread was two bob and beer was 3 bob, ta imajini!
That is until 1985 when the Moi kleptomaniacs kicked in and started looting like crazy after the coup.
I hear people here saying Jomo nyef nyef and want to cry.
Doctor Koech of KEMRI fucked millions of Kenyan and a few generations. If only he was diligent in his work, Kenya would be competing with India in terms of Generic medicine
Population increase in the 80’s did us in. An economy that was employing 200000 a year now needed to employ 500000 a year. Then Nyayo happened, a gentleman thrown amongst the wolves. His first few years was great then the coup happened and Nyayo from that moment decided to become a dictator and a billionaire in a few years. The economy suffered. The cold war ended, the west started ruling the world and SAP programs were forced on us as democracy package. The rest of the economy collapsed.
Moi was not an angel, but jomo had so much good will from the west, also remember we were more or less a colony even after independence and we should have been out of the wood by the time mo1 was getting to power - I liken jomo to kibaki, they knew how to make money, lakini very poor leaders and very green in matters politics and governance.
Mgalla muue na haki umpe, Jomo Kenyatta sowed the seeds of corruption and cronyism and denied Kenyans our identity by denying the Maumau and critics of imperialism their place in our history but on the economy the man was spot on 100%.
I like how he focused on the private sector whom Uhunye has totally neglected yet they are the real drivers of the economy. It is hard to do business in this country right now for huge entities and MSMEs alike and especially farmers, there is hardly any government support and/or protection, survival comes at huge costs. The NSE is a barometer of private sector performance, the last 3 years paint a rather bleak picture, an indictment of Uhunye’s ineptitude.
We can hardly feed ourselves, we cannot build basic infrastructure like roads and bridges, we are not even ashamed of ourselves bringing in the chinese to build highrise apartments, Uhuru ni ng’ombe.
The white Kenya was just fine…
People need help to end that brain washing.
It was just fine since millions of our grand parents were enslaved in their own country to produce and provide for a few white oppressors ruling our country. Not it was not just fine, it was genocide, rape, assault and economic deprivation of the majority for the minority.
