Thomas Rogers Muyunga Mukasa on: The friends we make, can in turn make or break us!

I grew up like many of the people in Uganda. As a boy I took on roles as the eldest son and did indeed look after my own siblings. This followed the loss of our dear parents. I therefore did not enjoy the structured or expected life of a young man who comes out of University, Higher institute of learning or any such milestone in life to move on and get a job.

I managed to see my own siblings join Universities and go on to get work. This made me so happy. I felt this as a blessing. I also knew this was a message of hope and a reality of promise.

I have met friends and made good.....and bad friends. I am very good at community mobilization and organization. I have helped many groups win funding in Africa. I was approached by many to help them come up with winning proposals. Among these were the genuine ones as well as the crooks. The crooks left me regretting. But, I have since realized they never made it in life. Not that it is anything by way of consolation or a prayer one should in all sense wish for anyone. This was way back in years. But, I have since moved on. My advice: avoid friends who claim they can handle responsibilities and "that you do not need to bother about them." That statement became the bane of my life for a while until I met these friends and asked them to pay me back. They were all squeamish and ashamed. They failed in life even to date. One did go to South Sudan and there worked as an NGO-social worker. In the end he failed. Two others left Uganda briefly, went back and to date they are failures in life and are addicted to all sorts of intoxication.

But life goes on, we do not need to be pulled down by the bad friends. I still recall those days with shuddering.

As a human rights defender, I have advocated for respect and dignity of many persons in Africa. I was beaten and tortured for speaking out for the rights, respect and dignity of persons said to be"un-deserving." Un deserving is relative. I always approach people who are judgmental with caution. Not that am scared of them. No! But, I sense bias in certain attitudes. Any way, in one such experience I even lost many friends who feel my rubbing shoulders with different kinds of people who are undesirables. I told whoever would listen, I detest bigotry and comments by those who are not putting on others' shoes! For that reason those condemned also happen to be the butt of their comments. Wear the person's  shoes before you make comments about that person. For airing my opinion on this, I have made friends as well as lost many.

Life is an opportunity to engage in positive aspects. Martin Luther king Jr., says: " One of the most enduring questions that is still un answered is, what have you done to help another?" That is the question I leave you as well.

The question of stigma, Ebola and what can be done, insights by Thomas Rogers Muyunga Mukasa

Thomas Rogers Muyunga Mukasa tasted what it means to be on the receiving end of bigotry and stigma. He lost his job as a HOME HEALTH CARE worker in San Francisco when two of his clients kicked him out of their houses, saying that because he’s from Africa, they were afraid he might be carrying Ebola. For more read this link:

http://www.sfchronicle.com/health/article/African-immigrants-speak-up-against-harassment-5933192.php#/0

Thomas Muyunga shares with us this in this blog: Pope has issued a warning on what will destroy the world if it continues

Food and Agriculture Organization of the U.N.

Pope Francis addresses the Food and Agriculture Organization of the U.N. staff during the Second International Conference on Nutrition in Rome, Nov. 20, 2014.

God always forgives mankind, but the earth does not, warned Pope Francis on Thursday.

At the Second International Conference on Nutrition, the Pope cautioned that if men continue to be greedy about abusing natural resources to make a profit, the earth will eventually take her revenge, the Daily Mail reported.

"Take care of the earth so it does not respond with destruction," he said to representatives from 190 countries. 

The head of the Catholic Church also said "primacy of profit" and "market priorities" have obstructed efforts to fight global hunger and malnutrition. He commended the works of the World Health Organization and the United Nation's Food and Agriculture Organization for pushing for the adoption of the Rome Declaration on Nutrition and a corresponding Framework for Action, which not only address food access but also the issue of being overweight.

Two billion people lack nutrients like iron and vitamin A, according to the Daily Mail, while 42 million kids and 500 million adults suffer from obesity.

Read the coverage on the Daily Mail.

Hailey LeeNews Associate

Thomas Rogers Muyunga Mukasa on Lake Lords, Lake Ladies, Air space Lords and Air space ladies in Africa: Case of Uganda

Old and New Tenure Systems in Africa:

Sub Saharan or the whole Africa before the trade with, Assyrians, Greeks, Romans and Phoenicians did know land was a symbol of status beyond demarcation and territories. It was negotiated, understood and bargained for using four points:

a. Ownership, location and ancestry e.g. Egyptians of the Lower Nile or Upper Nile.

b. Estate making and a factor of production e.g. basis of establishing home, address and forms of sustenance.

c. Component of holistic cognition e.g. among Baganda "Omutaka we Kyaggwe."

d. The firm ground on which water or other elements are held firm. It was a point of referral for claim of ownership e.g.the water next one's land subsequently belongs to the owner of that land. 

The shorelines and hinterlands of Africa gradually saw so much change as far demarcation of air space, marine and land went during the subsequent interactions with Greeks, Romans, French, British, Danes, Germany, Italy, Russia, USA, Portugal, Belgium and Spain: Africa has special territories belonging to these countries; after 1884 much of Africa was partitioned; the cold war brought with it the non-aligned movement and much of Africa seemed like a political invertebrate with ability to swing at west- east will.

Water body related disputes and misunderstanding in Africa:

-Tanzania, Mozambique and Malawi are fighting over a name for Lake Malawi or Lake Nyasa. Malawi claims the name should be Lake Malawi. Tanzania and Mozambique each want the name Lake Nyasa or Lago Niassa respectively.

-Uganda and Kenya had a near clash over Mgingo Islands.

-Uganda and DRC have contested the Albertine boarders.

-Nigeria and Cameroon had a dispute over Bakassi Peninsula. A boundary demarcation is the last step in the U.N. -backed process to end border tension between Cameroon and Nigeria. Much of it centered on the ownership of the oil- and fish-rich Bakassi peninsula that juts into the Gulf of Guinea. The situation escalated into military confrontation in 1993, when Nigerian troops invaded and occupied it.

Local Uganda lake related legislation:

Land tenure is understood by Ugandans today after it was introduced by the Colonialists as : 'Mailo or Communal' Land Tenure system.

Ugandans should understand or at least give much scrutiny to a form of lake tenureship that seeks to manage lake Victoria today. Government of Uganda has just completed plans to lease sections of Lake Victoria to boost fish farming. The Gov't of Uganda is set to lease parts of Lake Victoria to private developers interested in specialised fish farming. Fisheries state minister Ruth Nankabirwa said the move was aimed at boosting the country’s Gross Domestic Product and to encourage the development of cage fish farming and beaches, among others.

What will happen to the land at the bottom of the lake though? Does the lake lord or lake lady own the land below the lake and lies below the land that is below the lake?

What will happen to the air space above the lake? Who owns that?

Fears, Hopes and last words:

1. It is hoped that leases will be timed and not signed in perpetuity.

2. The land lords or land ladies or in this case lake lords or lake ladies should be trained to manage the lake as co-owners with other Ugandans.

3. Issues of trespass should be cleared through education and less of heavy handedness.

4. Marine industry and construction should be standard so that we do not have cases of concrete slabs breaking and ending up filling the lake with otherwise non eco -friendly substances.

5. It is hoped over 100, 000 people will be engaged in a form of employment once this takes off.

Will it be possible to walk the shores of lake Victoria as freely as one's relaxed mind would want? Shall we see beaches, lake side resorts and forms of lake related recreations or habitation thrive? These are the worries and prayers of hope.

Smart manufacturing and our future competitiveness

Thomas Rogers Muyunga Mukasa shares this blog with those who have Africa's development at heart and in their planning agenda. Enjoy reading.

By BITANGE NDEMO
More by this Author

The manufacturing sector is changing everywhere, except in Africa. New concepts like New Manufacturing Economy (NME) are emerging and leveraging the increasing number of highly educated young people.

Africa has plenty of these graduates languishing in the streets, looking for jobs. What is lacking is someone to connect the dots and put Africa in manufacturing's driving seat.

According to Wikimedia, the NME describes the role of advanced manufacturing in the rise of the New Economy.

The term describes manufacturing enabled by digital technologies, advanced systems and processes, and a highly trained, knowledgeable workforce.

The new manufacturing economy integrates networks, 3D printers and other proficiencies into business strategies to further develop manufacturing practices.

In his column for the New York Times, Thomas Friedman references Lawrence F. Katz, who notes that hubs of "universities, high-tech manufacturers, software/service providers and highly nimble start-ups" are a needed economic development strategy.

This is very similar to NME even though that exact term is not used.

A Time magazine feature article, “What is Smart Manufacturing ?”, says that in the near future, the global manufacturing sector will look nothing like it does today.

Advanced manufacturing technology is rapidly transforming the global competitive landscape.

The companies — and nations — that act now to seize its promise will thrive in the twenty-first century. Those that are devoted to incremental change and fail to engage in smart manufacturing will rapidly fall behind.

Profound transformations are coming within this decade in the way goods are manufactured, changes that will fundamentally alter the worldwide competitive marketplace.

MANUFACTURING INTELLIGENCE

The Time article proposes that smart manufacturing technologies will drive these transformations in three rapid progressive phases:

1. The integration of all manufacturing data throughout individual plants and across enterprises will facilitate significant, immediate improvements in costs, safety and environmental impacts.
2. This data, paired with advanced computer simulation and modelling, will create robust “manufacturing intelligence” that will enable flexible manufacturing, optimal production rates, and faster product customisation.
3. As that manufacturing intelligence grows, it will inspire innovations in processes and products that comprise smart manufacturing’s promise — a major market disruption such as a $3,000 automobile or a $300 personal computer.

The article further emphasizes that the countries and companies that strategically start this journey toward smart manufacturing and are first to achieve “manufacturing knowledge” will earn long-term competitive advantages well into the coming decades.

A Wall Street Journal article, “Germany Bets on ‘Smart Factories’ to Keep Its Manufacturing Edge” highlights what the manufacturing of the future looks like.

The trouble with us is that we shall be in denial that old manufacturing practices employ more people without paying attention to the efficiencies that will make us more competitive than other countries.

SUGAR CANE IN MAURITIUS

The unions, without fully understanding exactly where the jobs would be lost and new ones created, opposed the use of machines in tea-picking, arguing that many people would lose jobs.

We are now paying for decisions that were not backed by any evidence. Our tea production is no longer competitive, and returns to farmers are dwindling.

The sugar industry is crumbling under the weight of escalating costs, lack of innovative production methods and the fear of any form of reforms.

We can borrow a leaf from other countries. Mauritius, which found itself in trouble with sugar cane production, is reversing its losses by focusing on large plantations after many years of producing sugar at $500 per tonne and selling it at $435 a tonne, reports the Inter Press Service news agency (IPS):

“To keep the industry alive, the government implemented drastic reforms. It centralised private sugar production factories and from the original 17 there are now four flexi-factories that crush cane, produce special and refined sugars, molasses, ethanol and renewable energy from bagasse — the fibrous pulp left over after cane is squeezed for its juice.”

ARCHAIC MACHINES

Soon they will also produce bio-plastic, reports IPS. The few smallholder farmers moved on while others were helped to set up eco-friendly methods that helped raise their incomes.

Any reforms that fall short of what the Mauritians did will be a waste of public resources. We lost the plot when we sold the molasses factory.

The Pan Paper mills, as well as our only oil refinery, are dead. The machines are too archaic and are only good for scrap metal. How did we not upgrade our production systems?

How come things worked well when Booker Tate managed Mumias? Is it too difficult for us to maintain, repair and innovate new ways of doing things?

Are we not able to learn from what the rest of the world is doing to be competitive? What is the benefit of the many benchmarking trips we make abroad when we cannot repair a leaking tap?

We need to answer all these questions when we take up positions of responsibility.

ENERGY NOT OUR ONLY PROBLEM

Until we take responsibility for our failures, even with a sound rescue plan we shall fall into the trap of blaming others for our own inadequacies.

This body of knowledge, about these manufacturing transformations around the globe, is not in our public discourse, including that of the Kenya Association of Manufacturers (KAM).

Indeed KAM has persistently sought to lower the cost of energy as if it is the only problem our manufacturing sector is facing.

According to the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics 2013 report, the manufacturing sector contribution to GDP worsened from 9.6 per cent in 2011 to 9.2 per cent in 2012, while the growth rate deteriorated from 3.4 per cent in 2011 to 3.1 per cent in 2012.

These adverse changes are attributed to high costs of production, stiff competition from imported goods, high costs of credit, and drought incidences during the first quarter of 2012.

WE STILL IMPORT 'MITUMBA'

Influx of counterfeits and volatility in international oil prices continued to affect the performance of the sector. Stiff competition and costs cannot just be dealt with piecemeal; we need to automate, be more creative with disruptive technologies and make bold policy decisions.

There is no justifiable reason why we continue to import mitumba clothes, cars and other accessories when we have preferential trade agreements like AGOA that can enable us to maximise on the economies of scale and lower the cost of manufacturing clothing.

We must wake up and make serious policy decisions like banning mitumba. New textile factories will come up with affordable clothing and no one will walk naked as a result of such a drastic policy decision.

What most people don’t know is the fact that majority of mitumba businesses are run by powerful cartels which benefit the most, while small traders hardly make any money.

DO THE 'OBAMA THING'

If we had the interest of people at heart, we would change technical schools into incubators or manufacturing hubs similar to President Obama’s National Network for Manufacturing Innovation (NNMI). It consists of regional hubs that will accelerate development and adoption of cutting-edge manufacturing technologies for making new, globally competitive products.

Over the last two years, he has acted to jump-start the network by launching four innovation hubs and initiating the establishment of four more, all by executive order while awaiting congressional action.

In my view, President Uhuru just needs to do the Obama thing through Executive order and we can start putting our youth to work.

I can attest to that fact because just last Friday, I took some of my 280 fourth-year entrepreneurship class students to the College of Agriculture and Veterinary Sciences, Upper Kabete, to show them opportunities in manufacturing with the research output from the college.

PASSIONATE STUDENTS

Our Lower Kabete campus is across the valley, barely two kilometres away, but these student have never been to Upper Kabete campus and hardly knew anything that went on there.

You could see the passion with which the students observed each pilot process. They want to design their own new products, but they will need an incubator to accelerate their ability to create new products.

The College of Engineering, where I have been working with Dr Kamau Gachigi, too has similar opportunities.

There is a need for a technology park, like in most universities, to accelerate new innovations through multidisciplinary approaches that remove silos that now exist even within one institution.

SHARE IDEAS WITH INDUSTRY

The role of universities is not just teaching and research; they also must foster synergies with the private sector as well as government to create a sustainable growth model.

Universities must provide the evidence for policy decisions, while seeking to understand the future direction of any industry through international collaborations and precipitate change at home.

There must be urgency to commercialise our research output through collaborative efforts, and share new ideas with industry. This how we can create the much-needed confidence to build competitive nations in Africa.

Julia Gillard, the former prime minister of Australia, said “Our future growth relies on competitiveness and innovation, skills and productivity... and these in turn rely on the education of our people.” We shall fail Africa if innovation, productivity and competitiveness are not part of our hearts and mind. 

Bitange Ndemo is a senior lecturer at the University of Nairobi's School of Business, Lower Kabete campus. He is a former permanent secretary in the Ministry of Information and Communication. Twitter: @bantigito

SUMMARY:

• The Pan Paper mills, as well as our only oil refinery, are dead. The machines are too archaic and are only good for scrap metal. How did we not upgrade our production systems?
• We must wake up and make serious policy decisions like banning mitumba. New textile factories will come up with affordable clothing and no one will walk naked as a result of such a drastic policy decision.
• Universities must provide the evidence for policy decisions, while seeking to understand the future direction of any industry through international collaborations and precipitate change at home.

Why Ndii’s view on Konza City and other projects is misleading

I like reading Dr David Ndii’s column and sometimes I agree with him on a number of issues. 

But in his November 8 column titled, ‘Human capital, not mega-projects, will turbo-charge economy’, he was dead wrong. I wish he had done a bit of research to know the impact of the Vision 2030 flagship projects. 

In my view, he should have spent his valuable time thanking former President Mwai Kibaki for an excellent job he did while he was at the helm and President Uhuru Kenyatta for showing maturity in continuing with these transformative projects. 

When historians come to write about Kenya, they will certainly recognise that it was the Kibaki administration that started what may be called indigenous thinking on how we can chart our economic future. 

MEASURED RISKS

Against all odds, President Kibaki allowed Cabinet ministers and senior civil servants to take measured risks to implement some of the most transformative projects in Kenya’s history. This is how we were able to implement the ICT infrastructure within a short period, giving rise to additional needs such as technology park that would help incubate start-ups and deepen our human capital.

The Konza City project did not drop from the sky, as Dr Ndii suggests. It was conceptualised in such a way that it would leverage on existing and future infrastructure. The expansion of the Mombasa highway into a dual carriage way and the Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) were meant to directly benefit Konza. The government was to spend funds on the infrastructure within the site and a few buildings to support the incubation of local start-ups. 

Most of the vertical infrastructure were to be built by the private sector. We took time to study how we could quickly diffuse technology and leverage on it to transform our economy. We travelled to India and the Silicon Valley, picked up the best practices and signed contracts with global technology companies to co-create and share intellectual property. This is how knowledge is sustainably transferred in modern days. 

(READ: Human capital, not mega-projects, will turbo-charge economy)

(READ: Of bullet trains and delusions of mega techno-cities)

FACILITATING INDUSTRY 

This was as a result of the fact that our university graduates were unemployable, and the private sector was stuck with archaic production systems with little research. 

Today, we see more failures in manufacturing than new companies because the government was not playing its role in facilitating industry and research institutions. Our aim was to create a development corridor similar to the Delhi-Mumbai industrial corridor — a State-Sponsored Industrial Development Project of the Government of India. The purchase of 5,000 acres in the Athi Basin marked the first step in the 1,000-mile project to see our own corridor that would spur the economy. 

The knowledge city was to incubate start-ups, pass the necessary skills to recruits and speed up their development into fully fledged companies that could provide skills and absorb many of our graduates, who, instead of utilising their knowledge, are selling second-hand clothes or running errands for politicians. Parallel to these efforts we asked the President to support the Open Data Initiative, which became the lifeblood of the nascent creative industry in Kenya. 

Indeed, he launched the initiative and more than 400 data sets were uploaded to the Kenya Open Data Initiative (KODI). We were laying the foundation stone for building a knowledge economy.

I was, therefore, perplexed by Dr Ndii’s article, which though it had the correct title, contained misleading content. How else can one develop human capital without the processes we were putting in place? I least expected Dr Ndii, a leading economist, to confuse human capital (the skills, knowledge, and experience possessed by an individual or population) and education (the process of receiving or giving systematic instruction, especially at a school or university). 

FUTURE WORKERS 

In fact, Korea’s success was as a result of its focus on development of skills within its several industrial parks and at technical and vocational education and training, which we have destroyed in favour of a theory-based education system.

In addition, several other successful countries such as Germany put more emphasis on three areas — pre-employment skills development to prepare future workers, in-service training to upgrade the work force’s skills and active labour market training programmes to reintegrate the unemployed and disadvantaged.
The ecosystem of Konza was to provide these three critical missing components in our economic development.

The injection of 5,000 mw into our national electricity grid will be a drop in the ocean if we persistently pursue skills development as I have stated above. 

With the advent of 3D printing and a motivated youth with computer literacy, we can change the world. 

A liberalised energy sector would be more meaningful than attempting to protect small and inefficient operations that would never bring down prices of goods. Such free thinking will enable our economy to leapfrog others and not just grow in the linear format that Dr Ndii favours.

This linear business model that Nobel laureate Amartya Sen censures in favour of rationalism, is a Western empiricist mentality that my brother Dr Ndii buys as wholesome truth. Western economists themselves admit that their economic modelling does not fully explain our growth patterns. That is how they created Development Economics, a branch of economics that deals with the developing countries.

Dr Ndii should focus on a growing body of research that has been emerging among development economists since the beginning of this century, focusing on interactions between ethnic diversity and economic development, particularly at the level of the nation-state. Wikimedia says that while most research looks at empirical economics at both the macro and the micro level, this field of study has a particularly heavy sociological approach. 

ETHNIC DIVERSITY 

The more conservative branch of research focuses on tests for causality in the relationship between different levels of ethnic diversity and economic performance, while a smaller and more radical branch argues for the role of neoliberal economics in enhancing or causing ethnic conflict. 

This will be more relevant to our situation just like the contribution of Amartya Sen to welfare economics that highlighted the plight of the poor in his native India.

Back to Vision 2030 Mega Projects. The Standard Gauge Railway benefits far exceed the costs. I do not know if Dr Ndii’s modelling factored in productivity gains to Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and Kenya. It takes more than two weeks to transport goods from Mombasa to Kampala and three to four days from Mombasa to Nairobi. 

It is cheaper to transport a container from Durban to Mombasa than from Mombasa to Nairobi. Also, the Mombasa-Malaba road is constantly damaged by heavy vehicles and needs repair all the time. These vehicles are not just the major causes of accidents, especially when they stall on the highway, but are also heavy polluters. 

It is a shame when Dr Ndii suggests that the Thika Superhighway should never have been built. The completion of this short distance highway has attracted more foreign direct investment than the cost of constructing it. Garden City would never have been built at Ruaraka if the road had not been expanded. 

In fact, three more major private mega-projects are about to come up. These projects create employment and an opportunity for farmers to supply their produce.

Dr Ndemo is a former PS for Information Communications and Technology

SUMMARY:

• The Konza City project did not drop from the sky, as Dr Ndii suggests. It was conceptualised in such a way that it would leverage on existing and future infrastructure.
• The knowledge city was to incubate start-ups, pass the necessary skills to recruits and speed up their development into fully fledged companies that could provide skills and absorb many of our graduates, who, instead of utilising their knowledge, are selling second-hand clothes or running errands for politicians.
• Dr Ndii should focus on a growing body of research that has been emerging among development economists since the beginning of this century, focusing on interactions between ethnic diversity and economic development, particularly at the level of the nation-state. 

Of bullet trains and delusions of mega techno-cities

• his country, and much of the continent, is in the grip of a cargo cult. It is now an article of faith that grand infrastructure is the fairy ship that will deliver all the goodies we have ever dreamed of possessing. What else are we to make of this?:
• The underperformance of our railway service has nothing to do with the gauge of the track. Neither is it on account of the low speed or load capacity. The single most important reason for its underperformance is lack of trains. 
• Over the last decade, the economy has expanded by about 60 per cent. Electricity consumption has increased by about the same. These figures are based on the current GDP, which we expect to be revised upwards shortly. 

During World War Two, the erstwhile isolated, poor South Pacific Islanders of Vanuatu (then known as New Herbrides) enjoyed a brief episode of prosperity. 

This was on account of the Western Allies establishing military bases there. 

With the bases came bounty beyond belief, as well as jobs. Ships and aircraft brought supplies regularly. Western goods became commonplace. 

Then, as suddenly as it appeared, the prosperity vanished. The war had ended. The soldiers left. The ships and aircraft stopped coming. 

This episode gave rise to the most famous of what anthropologists call cargo cults—religions that have sometimes emerged when hitherto isolated people are suddenly exposed to western consumer culture.

Charismatic religious entrepreneurs took to promising the villagers that they could restore the flow of cargo, which they claimed was actually sent to them by their ancestors. 

They devised cargo summoning rituals that involved imitating military practices such as marching and building symbolic life-size replicas of aircraft, control towers and even airstrips. 

WEALTH AND PROSPERITY

The cargo did not come, and many of the cults soon died out. The most prominent survivor is the John Frum movement practised in the island of Tanna. 

Its adherents believe that John Frum, a messianic figure usually depicted as an American soldier, will return and bring back the wealth and prosperity of the good old days. 

Asked by a western reporter how the movement has survived so long, one of its leaders quipped: “We’ve only been waiting for our prophet for only 60 years. You’ve been waiting for 2000.”

The term cargo cult has become a metaphor for misguided modernisation ventures that confuse form for substance. There is no shortage of such delusions in recent history, perhaps none more deluded than Mao Zedong’s Great Leap Forward. 

Mao believed that industrialisation could be speeded up by producing more grain and steel, so the Chinese government seized all the resources it could marshal to produce them. 

Agriculture was collective by force. The government set a target of doubling steel production within a year and overtaking Britain’s steel production in 15 years. 

Villagers were instructed to set up backyard furnaces to produce iron. People’s pots, pans and other metal possessions were seized to provide scrap metal for the furnaces to meet production quotas. Trees were decimated and even furniture burned to fuel the furnaces. It did not work, but it claimed between 20 and 40 million lives. 

In his irreverent classic The Trouble with Nigeria, Chinua Achebe attributes underdevelopment to a cargo cult mentality of ruling elites. 

“One of the commonest manifestations of under-development is a tendency among the ruling elite to live in a world of make-believe and unrealistic expectations. This is the cargo cult mentality that anthropologists sometimes speak about — a belief by backward people that someday, without any exertion whatsoever on their own part, a fairy ship will dock in their harbour laden with every goody they have always dreamed of possessing,” he wrote.

This country, and much of the continent, is in the grip of a cargo cult. It is now an article of faith that grand infrastructure is the fairy ship that will deliver all the goodies we have ever dreamed of possessing. What else are we to make of this?:

“Bullet trains flashing from capital to capital in just a few minutes. Happy passengers waving goodbye to their relatives on the platform… The vision is one of techno-modernity: even you Africans can jump into the modern world. Fast passenger trains! Even fast goods trains!”

You will probably have guessed correctly what this is about, but I doubt very much whether you can guess where the quote is from. It is not from a letter to the editor of one of those weekly tabloids.

BURDEN OF PROOF

It is an excerpt from the report of the Parliamentary Transport Committee in defence of the standard gauge railway. I will leave it to you to contemplate what evidence and analysis the committee considered to arrive at this conclusion, although perhaps the better question would be what herbal product they had with their lunch.

Here are the sober facts. The underperformance of our railway service has nothing to do with the gauge of the track. Neither is it on account of the low speed or load capacity. The single most important reason for its underperformance is lack of trains. Where did the trains go? We “ate” them. 

Nothing remarkable. I mean Kenya Railways was “eaten” like many other state corporations such as the defunct Kenya National Assurance Company, among others.

Another red herring is that the railway lost business to the road because trucks are faster—the argument being that faster trains will shift freight back to the railway. 

Ha! A 2010 study put the truck travel time from Nairobi to Mombasa at 30 hours, a stately 16km per hour. To be fair, this includes 21 hours of stops comprising of nine hours of weigh bridge and police checks and another 11 hours referred to as “other driver delays.” 

This leaves nine hours of travel time which works out only 55km per hour if the trucks travelled non-stop. But since there have to be some stops, let us assume a best case scenario of cutting the stops by two thirds to seven hours. This still works out to a leisurely 33km per hour.

So how is it that trucks which are more expensive and not any faster stole the business of the railway? Simple. Railway public. Trucks private. In one case I know about, Kenya Railways won a tender to transport government imports. Immediately, the permanent secretary concerned got a call from very high up directing him to give half the business to a trucking company. Simply put, road haulage is part of the eating of the railway. 

The SGR is not the only lunacy in town. I’m told of a mad rush to install 5000MW of electric power generation within the next two years. 

Here’s the math. Over the last decade, the economy has expanded by about 60 per cent. Electricity consumption has increased by about the same. These figures are based on the current GDP, which we expect to be revised upwards shortly. Once that happens, we will find that the economy has become less electricity intensive.

SERVICE DRIVEN ECONOMY

If the GDP is revised upwards by 20 percent as I expect, this will mean that we are using 10 per cent less electricity to produce one unit of GDP as we did a decade ago. This should not be at all surprising. Everyone is trying to be more energy-efficient. Our economy is also increasingly becoming service-driven and services are not very power-hungry. How long will it take us to double the size of the economy? Best case scenario, growing at 7.5 per cent per year, 10 years. This translates to a requirement of at most 2700MW five years from now.

So where did this 5000MW target come from? What is the economic rationale? I have not heard a single one that makes sense. The one I hear most often is that we will need a lot of power to electrify trains. Amazingly, many smart people believe this crap. 

Not too long ago, these contraptions ran on firewood. What kind of technological progress would it be that they now require a whole power station to run? Just sizing up a diesel locomotive will tell you that it is no bigger than the stand-by generator that you find in a normal office building. 

For the record, a regular electric train needs the equivalent of three litres of diesel to move a tonne of cargo from Mombasa to Nairobi, or as much power per passenger as a light bulb.

POOR RURAL ROADS 

The long and short of it is that the belief that 5000MW will bring investors in droves is as fantastic as John Frum’s second coming. If we achieve it, which I doubt, it will steeply raise the cost of electricity as the installed but unused capacity will have to be paid for. 

Why do we need these sensational targets? What is wrong with normal, sober, scientific planning for the capacity that we actually need? Who are we trying to impress?

Do we need infrastructure? Yes. Lots of it. There is not a single city or town in Kenya, and East Africa for that matter, with adequate sewerage. We lose a quarter of our meagre harvests to poor rural roads and lack of proper storage. 

Before London built its iconic underground, it first built the world’s first modern sewerage system. Before Japan industrialised, it reformed governance and modernised and massively expanded education. The East Asian Tiger economies industrialisation was preceded by the Green Revolution. What is wrong with our leaders? 

Franz Fanon: “In the colonial countries, the spirit of indulgence is dominant at the core of the bourgeoisie; and this is because the national bourgeoisie identifies itself with the Western bourgeoisie, from whom it has learnt its lessons. It follows the Western bourgeoisie along its path of negation and decadence without ever having emulated it in its first stages of exploration and invention, stages which are an acquisition of that Western bourgeoisie whatever the circumstances. 

“In its beginnings, the national bourgeoisie of the colonial countries identifies itself with the decadence of the bourgeoisie of the West. We need not think that it is jumping ahead; it is in fact beginning at the end. It is already senile before it has come to know the petulance, the fearlessness or the will to succeed of youth.”

Enough said.

Dr Ndii is the Managing Director of Africa Economics. (ndii@netsolafrica.com)