The Crisis of Education Systems in Africa: A Reply to a WhatsApp Post on “The Disappearing Whites”

A WhatsApp post has been circulating lately titled “The Disappearing Whites: A Hidden Lesson about Education and Power in Zimbabwe”. The thrust of the article is that “white” Zimbabweans educate their children to be owners of businesses, while “black” ones prepare them to be employees. The author calls for a change of mindset among “black” parents to enable their children to compete with their “white” counterparts. The author applies his/her observations and inferences in Zimbabwe to education systems around the continent, solely blaming them for the poverty of “black” people.

 

I do not wish to defend the education systems in contemporary Africa, because there is a lot that is wrong with them. For example, Kenya has changed its education system two times since its independence in 1963, the first time around 1985, and the second in the middle of the second decade of this century. Such frequent changes result in many problems, not least the cost of developing new learning materials, preparing teachers to facilitate learning, and, worst of all, destroying institutional memory which is key to the improvement of any system. Nevertheless, any critique of these systems that does not address the class dimension of education is dead on arrival.

 

The author of the article observes: “… because education in Africa is mostly designed to produce workers, not owners, it unintentionally favors those who already have something to own.” However,, it is not “unintentional” – it is the design of capitalism. Indeed, education systems are designed to preserve the status quo, in our case to retain the capitalist hierarchies that colonialism established to ensure that a tiny minority perpetually exploits the vast majority. Remember Paulo Freire’s observation that the education system reflects capitalist hierarchies? Let me quote an extract from my feature article titled “The Politics and Economics of Knowledge Production”:

“In The Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire memorably highlights the distinction between “banking education”, in which the learner is a docile and passive recipient of knowledge from the teacher, and which therefore reflects the capitalist power hierarchy, and “problem-solving education” entailing a dialogical approach in which both “teacher-students” and “student-teachers” teach and learn. Tragically but not surprisingly, six decades after formal independence, most schools and universities in Africa continue to deploy banking education in line with the capitalist power relations characteristic of the societies in which they function.”

 

In Social Science as Imperialism, Claude Ake observes that “The West is able to dominate the Third World not simply because of its military and economic power, but also because it has foisted its idea of development on the Third World through the institutions and activities of knowledge production.” Similarly, Samir Amin, in his “Understanding the Political Economy of Contemporary Africa”, asserts: “Current academic programmes in social sciences for African Universities have been prescribed by the World Bank and allied authorities in order to destroy any capacity to develop critical thought. Unable to understand really existing systems which govern the contemporary world, the brain washed cadres are reduced to the status of 'executives' implementing programmes decided elsewhere, unable to contribute to changing that world rejected by their own people.” I must add that the humanities are not doing much better, as many scholars in that field take great pride in their thorough acquaintance with Western canons and disdain efforts to research and apply the knowledge systems of our various peoples. For example, several of our own scholars of philosophy seem to disdain the late Prof. H. Odera Oruka’s Sage Philosophy project in which he set out to research the philosophical thought of individuals in our villages with no training in Western philosophy: they would rather display their prowess in explicating Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Descartes, Hobbes, among many other Western philosophers.

 

Later the author of our WhatsApp piece writes: “We want to find a job in someone else’s dream factory instead of building our own.” This, again, is misleading. Building a factory requires capital; and through slavery, colonialism and neo-colonialism Western imperialism has concentrated the capital in “white” hands for almost five hundred years now, as Walter Rodney’s How Europe Underdeveloped Africa graphically illustrates. Reforming education systems without addressing this historical fact cannot possibly be a game-changer.

 

Yet the author gets quite close to hitting the class nail on the head when he/she writes: “While the black student is perfecting academic theories, the white student is perfecting inheritance systems.” However, he/she sadly goes on to sing the praises of “white” post-high school training, oblivious of the fact that such training is enabled by access to capital for “whites” and made impossible for “blacks” due to lack of that very capital. Nevertheless, he/she later comes back to historical reality: “And the young white employer? He may not even have a degree but he has land, a workshop, capital, and experience.” Where, pray, did he get land in Zimbabwe if not the land of native Zimbabweans that his grandparents stole from the Zimbabweans?

 

However, the author later gets it terribly wrong when he/she writes about the “black” individuals who “suddenly” find themselves under the hire of “white” former schoolmates who may not have even gone to college: “The difference was never race it was training, timing, and mindset.” In this, he/she fails to see that capitalism is racist – it is a system designed by “whites” to rob other races. He goes on to assert that “… the real world doesn’t pay for how well you memorize it pays for how well you monetize.” He fails to see that “the real world” is not an objective fact, but a creation of Western capitalism from the age of mercantilism, slave trade, classical colonialism, and the current neo-colonialism.

 

Then he gets it right again: “The tragedy of African education is that it equips us to serve systems we didn’t create.” He/she goes on to admonish us:

“Until we shift our mindset from “I want a job” to “I want to create jobs, we will continue producing black graduates to work for white teenagers.”

The false assumption here is that good education will enable us compete at par with “white teenagers” – something that will not happen en masse as long as the “white teenagers” continue to hold the proceeds of imperialist pilferage.

 

All in all, the author of that article has fallen into the Western imperialist trap of keeping us busy hating ourselves, disparaging ourselves, all the while thinking we are engaging in constructive self-criticism, while we provide a totally undeserved alibi for the misdeeds of Western imperialism. As Steve Biko memorably observed, “The most potent weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.”

Scholars must resist intimidation from Industry: A Reply to Dr. Isaac Yae Asiedu

My attention has recently been drawn to an article by Dr. Isaac Yae Asiedu making the rounds on social media. It is titled “African Professors must stop counting publications - And start building nations”. While I appreciate Dr. Asiedu’s concern that we all do all that we can to improve the quality of life on our continent, I have real problems with his approach to the issue.

First, what Dr Asiedu calls “nation-building” is properly referred to as “national development”. The former has to do with creating a sense of solidarity in a country, while the latter is about improving the quality of life in such a polity.

Second, Dr. Asiedu’s view that academics should be promoted on the basis of their innovations rather than their publications might appear impressive, but it reduces academia to the servant of industry. Dr. Asiedu’s disdain for theory is manifest, as he articulates the trendy idea of “market-driven courses” thus: “Each paper should be the beginning of a product. Each thesis should end with a tool. Each classroom should be a workshop.” However, such an outlook is a cheapening of academia spearheaded by wealthy college dropouts, many of whose wealth is the result of inheritance and fraud rather than genuine hard work. Tragic that even academics will listen to such while dismissing colleagues offhand.

Third, Dr. Asiedu needs to reflect further on the relationship between theory and practice, and to appreciate that there is often substantial innovation in the formulation of theory. Remember the Roman myth of the two boys who made wings for themselves and had successful flights? It took over two millennia for the two Wright brothers to step into history and invent aircraft. I know that the myth was not theory in the strict sense, but whoever came up with it did some theorising in the wider sense of contemplating a possibility and attempting to identify the means of turning it into reality. Be that as it may, the history of science is replete with theories that seemed impracticable or only minimally useful for centuries, only for them to eventually be put into phenomenal use. The ancient Greeks wrote about atoms, but the atomic bomb only appeared in the twentieth century; Aristotle, and the ancient Egyptians before him, theorised the laws of logic that are the foundation of contemporary computer science; the work of earlier physicists provided Einstein with a basis for working towards his even more all-encompassing relativity theory.

Fourth, how do scholars of the humanities and social sciences relate to Dr. Asiedu’s call to innovations that “change lives”? Does it mean they have no role in society if their work does not yield immediately tangible results? Is this not the thinking through which subjects such as literature, history and philosophy are dismissed as useless simply because they are perceived not to be immediately applicable to “the market”? Is life only about “the market”, and therefore devoid of emotional and social intelligence? Is this piece not simply a diluted latter-day articulation of pragmatism, with all its inherent weaknesses?

Fifth, Dr. Asiedu’s aspiration is for the countries of Africa to “industrialise”, meaning he/she subscribes to the idea that “development” means playing “catch-up” with the West. In this he fails to appreciate that there is substantial literature attesting to the fact that it was the Western imperialists who fabricated this very “development” narrative as part of their exit plan, so that they would re-brand themselves from “colonisers” to “development partners” in the current neo-colonial era.

This philistine narrative about the need for academics to churn out “innovations rather than publications” that address our immediate problems is now choking almost every aspect of our lives – public health, conservation, gender studies, human rights, etc. Even the disgusting question now posed to academics during promotion interviews as to how many grants they have brought to their universities is a manifestation of this sacrilege.

So let academics labour in theorising, and provide immediate solutions when they can identify them, but refuse to be intimidated by so-called “captains of industry” and their facilitators who threaten to send genuine scholarship to its grave.

Poor Leadership, Bad Followership, and Western Imperialism: The Three Sources of our Woes

Quite often, we are told that the problems in the countries of Africa are solely due to bad leadership. However, more recently, others have asserted that our problems are due to bad followership, since it is the followers who elect bad leaders. What if both those elected and those who elected them are not wholly to blame? What if there is a third factor that is seldom highlighted?

I have seen people condemn politicians for corruption, only for they themselves to act terribly corrupt in their own spheres – civil servants stealing stationery at work, teachers and lecturers sexually exploiting their students, middle class families grossly underpaying their househelps, etc. I have seen many people vote for a grossly incompetent and corrupt politician simply because he is from their own community. I have seen people maim or even kill their compatriots simply for holding contrary political opinions. I have heard them say that it is alright for their own to be declared winner even when all the evidence points to the fact that they actually lost but used state power to get themselves declared "winner".

Yet the high primium often placed on electing the right leaders is itself problematic because of the grossly flawed nature of our elections - an exercise riddled with red tape and outrageous requirements for big cash to run for office, reducing the masses to mere voting pawns. I have said much about this in "Elections: A Major Obstacle to Democracy in Kenya" ( https://www.theelephant.info/analysis/2022/09/30/elections-a-major-obstacle-to-democracy-in-kenya/ ).

Most crucially, I disagree with the "leaders-people" dichotomy. I have read theories of leadership and theories of followership, each of them claiming it is the solution to our morass. Nevertheless, both groups of theories ignore neo-colonialism which Kwame Nkrumah explicated in Neo-Colonialism: The Last Phase of Imperialism. Nkrumah pointed out that a neo-colony has all the trappings of sovereignty, but due to its economic dependency, its laws and policies are determined by the erstwhile colonisers. Neglecting to lay blame on neo-colonialism is partly due to the conflation of "independence" and "liberation" which is fuelled by the Kiswahili word "uhuru" used to translate both.

As scholars of decoloniality have pointed out, independence simply gives a country a flag, a national anthem, national anthem national currency, a national coat of arms, and a seat at the United Nations (note, for example, that traditional political formations in Africa had no flags and national anthems).

On the other hand, liberation enables a country to decide whether or not it wants a flag, a national anthem, a national currency, a national coat of arms, and a seat at the United nations, etc. In short, many analyses on leadership and followership ignore current geopolitics dominated by the West. For example, we have repeatedly seen leading candidates in presidential races in various countries on our continent dashing to Chatham House to “validate” their candidature.

Yet it is true that if we were more politically conscious, we would put a lot of shenanigans to a stop. Nevertheless, however committed to high political ideals we as citizens were, if the structures of Western imperialism remain intact in the realms of economics, politics, education, religion, etc., we will never get out of the woods. Remember Thomas Sankara telling an OAU meeting that if all countries in Africa rose up against debt slavery they would succeed, but if he alone tried to do it he would not even be alive to attend the next OAU meeting? Point? Western imperialism is always ready to eliminate those of our people who exhibit true, liberating leadership.

So let us be tough on ourselves and on those who hold political offices, demanding the highest standards of ethics from ourselves and from them, but let us not exonerate Western imperialism for the major part it has played, and continues to play, in our woes since the fifteenth century through four hundred years of slavery, about seventy of classical colonialism, and now more than sixty of neo-colonialism. Walter Rodney's How Europe Underdeveloped Africa is an excellent text in this regard.

In sum, it is not only bad leadership or bad followership or even both to blame for our woes, but rather leadership, followership, and, above both, Western imperialism.

Intellectuals and Academics: What is the Relationship?

We in Kenya live in a society in which titles are over-rated and misapplied, probably because we were colonised by the highly feudal British with their “majesties”, “Dukes”, “duchesses”, “Lords”, “Ladies”, “baronesses” and “Sirs”. In all kinds of contexts (from football matches to funerals, neighbourhood meetings to open air garages among many others), many people want to be addressed as “Professor”, “Doctor”, “engineer”, “Commissioner”, “Bishop”, “Reverend”, among many others. The strange thing is that even the British from whom we learned the hype have moved on, and prefer to work with first names even in contexts in which we would be extremely careful to acknowledge titles.

Over thirty years ago, someone who had just graduated with a Ph.D. degree wrote to his contacts, myself included, informing us how he wished for them to address correspondence to him henceforth, with “Dr.” as part of it: I was not impressed at all, although I now realise that correspondence, and particularly addressing postal mail that was dominant in those days, was a very formal affair.

A friend recently called me to vent her frustration. She, a professional in her own right, had attended a training curve for pension trustees to hone her skills. Among the trainees were two persons with the title “Professor” and another with the academic title “Doctor”. Yet they were attending the training to be taught, not to teach. However, some of the trainers were dazzled by their titles, and kept on giving them undue attention, holding on to their every word and frequently saying to the class “As Prof. has said, …” and “As Doc has said, …” – and the dons seemed to be enjoying it all the way. As a result, the other trainees were made to feel “small” and their participation less significant than that of the dons. I wholeheartedly agreed with my friend that my dear colleagues, whoever they were, from whatever universities they came, should have borne in mind that they were there to be taught, not to teach, and thus in that context they were equal to all the other trainees; for if they already knew it all they should not have attended as trainees but as trainers.

Yet the fawning behaviour of some of those pension trustee trainers is rampant in our society. It is based on the false assumption that those holding the academic titles “Prof.” or “Dr.” are highly knowledgeable and are thus points of reference in every gathering in which they appear. My friend went ahead to wonder if the three academics thought that their titles matched their incomes (a yardstick by which people tragically but frequently measure each other). She pointed out that despite the flamboyance of the three dons, most of the other trainees, working in the private sector, were probably earning more than double the best paid professor in their company.

Nevertheless, what is really worrying is the failure or outright refusal of such professors and doctors to acknowledge that the positions they hold obligate them to be servants rather than “bosses” of society. What is more, those who shower them with excess admiration are as guilty as they are, for they help reinforce their ill-conceived sense of importance. I sometimes remind people that when someone dies, the maggots never ask who was professor, who doctor, or who sweeper: to them just the arrival of more food.

The excessive deference to people holding the academic titles “Prof.” or “Dr.” that made that training curve nightmarish for my friend is partly based on the erroneous view that all intellectuals are academics and all academics are intellectuals. However, things are much more complex than that. How so?

The late Prof. Ali Mazrui famously defined an intellectual as “a person who has the capacity to be fascinated by ideas, and has acquired the skill to handle some of them effectively.” While this definition is helpful in highlighting “capacity”, “skill” and “ideas”, it allows people who are not actually active in the processing of ideas to claim to be intellectuals by dint of their “capacity” and “skill”. Thus a person who earned a doctoral degree ten years ago, but who has done close to nothing to keep reading, writing and engaging orally with those around him on the subject of his/her Ph.D. thesis and way beyond it would still fit Mazrui’s definition.

Indeed, Prof. Mazrui himself correctly observed that “People can be very intelligent without being actively intellectual. Intellectualism is an engagement in the realm of ideas and rational inquiry.” It is for this reason that I seek to improve Prof. Mazrui’s definition by proposing that an intellectual is anyone who consistently engages deeply with ideas, seeking to understand what they mean, how they relate to one another, and trying to determine the extent of their applicability to real life situations. To do so, one does not need certification from anyone else – one just has to have the ability and interest to pursue knowledge and insight. This means that there are many intellectuals in all manner of places – urban neighbourhoods and rural villages, large and small business outfits, among many others.

On the other hand, an academic is someone with post-graduate degrees pursuing a teaching/research career in a university or working in a research institute. Tragically, many of those in such places have been in the academic echo chamber for so long that they genuinely believe that they are the crème de la crème of society by virtue of their degrees and their publications, the waning status of universities in this era of neoliberalism notwithstanding.

I was recently discussing this very issue of the relationship between academics and intellectuals with some colleagues, when one of them wondered if academia was not a cult: I replied that it actually is. I pointed out that one of the core elements of a cult is the conviction among its members that "We are the only ones who know and who are right." This is the very attitude which makes many academics believe that there is know intellectual activity outside academia, despite the fact that most highly influential ideas and innovations were and are still spawned far away from the corridors of universities and research institutes.

In view of the foregoing observations, it is manifest that some intellectuals are academics and some are not. Besides, there are many essentially non-intellectuals in academia – people preoccupied with academic activity only so that they can be promoted by their universities. Talk to them about emerging issues such as pandemic politics, enhanced digital surveillance, debates on “the climate crisis”, or the quest for alternative models of governance, and they will exhibit boredom, if not hostility. Happily, there are also academics who understand that the ultimate goal of their learning is service to humanity at large, but this recognition is not limited to academics. Consequently, the concept of the public intellectual is growing in popularity, anchored on the appreciation of the fact that anyone who engages the public in seriously thinking through the pertinent issues of the day fits the bill, whether or not he/she is a career scholar.

To be sure, there are situations in which titles are not just permissible but actually appropriate. For example, it would be utterly improper for a master of ceremonies to use first names to refer to the Vice-Chancellor and other dignitaries officiating a graduation ceremony. It would also be improper for students to refer to their lecturers by their first names due to the teacher-student relationship. Besides, in many instances, lecturers are the age of the students’ parents, so in our cultures it would be awkward for such students to refer to them by their first names. Similarly, the “Professor” or “Doctor” titles are relevant when the people holding them are submitting a book proposal to a publisher or bidding for a consultancy because the skills signified by the title are relevant to the matter at hand. However, there is absolutely no reason except an unhealthy ego for such people to require a gentleman who takes care of their home, or their mechanic, or the lady who sells vegetables in their estate to refer to them as “Professor” or “Doctor” because the relationship does not demand it.

From the 1970s to the late 1980s, long before the pressures of performance contracting and ISO certification invaded our public institutions, the University of Nairobi, where I am privileged to serve, was well known around the globe for highlighting the fact that intellectual activity is not limited to its corridors, but is also to be found in abundance in our villages. This recognition gave rise to pioneering work in oral literature, oral history and sage (oral) philosophy. Such work only flourishes when the professors and lecturers engage the non-academics all over our country with a demeanour of genuine respect for them instead of tacitly or overtly demanding preferential treatment because of the Western-type certifications that already afford them affluent lifestyles at the expense of the tax-paying masses. Only then will people like my friend at the pension trustee training appreciate that academics have something to offer society.

The Horrors of Shakahola: A Reply to Onyango Makagutu

On 6th May 2023, The Elephant published my article, “The Horrors of Shakahola: Which Way Forward?” Onyango Makagutu was kind enough not only to read my article, but also to prepare a written response to it titled “where do we go from here”. Below I reply to his response. To my assertion that part of why people are religious is that they have a hunger for the spiritual, Makagutu says there are many human beings who have no hunger for the spiritual – who do not have “the God-shaped vacuum”. It is not possible to resolve this matter conclusively here. All I can say is that I have met many who claimed to be avid atheists, only for them to begin talking about God in their sunset years, suggesting that their atheistic assertions might really have been acts of trying to silence the vacuum - forgive the rather dissonant figure of speech here. While Makagutu states that I made an argument about “the God-shaped vacuum”, I only made a statement about it, and there is a vast difference between a statement and an argument. A statement is a single assertion, while an argument is an assertion based on other assertions. Besides, while he claims that my argument is false, arguments are never true or false, only valid or invalid, inductively weak or inductively strong. Makagutu then takes issue with my assertion that those who fall into the Shakahola-type deception have not studied their Bibles well. He claims that there is no objective standard for distinguishing true from false prophets. He even refers me to Ezekiel 13:1-7, where Yahweh condemns false prophets, to which I say, “Well done!” If we begin from the presumption that the Holy Bible is the inspired, inerrant Word of God, then it does give very specific criteria for distinguishing true from false prophets; but if we deny the veracity of the Holy Bible, then we arrive at Makagutu’s inference that there is no reliable criterion for distinguishing true from false prophets. In my case, I believe that “All Scripture [the Holy Bible] is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness; so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work” (2 Timothy 3:16-17, NASB). Makagutu’s response to my answer to my second question, namely, whether there is any difference between political and religious fanaticism, is unclear, so I hope he will make it clear in due course. On the third question of what is to be done, Makagutu is emphatic that I provide no answer - that the self-regulation I propose is no answer. I disagree: self-regulation based on clear guidelines is an answer which protects the public both from state tyranny and religious fanaticism. Makagutu claims that as an academic I should have proposed education that encourages critical thinking, as well as ridicule of some religious beliefs as a way forward. Pointing to my position as an academic is engaging in ad hominem - attacking the person rather than his/her ideas. What is more, Makagutu’s proposing of recommendations that he thinks I should have made is to suggest that I ought to think as he does, and this looks to me like an element of intolerance. All in all, while I disagree with most of Makagutu’s responses, I am delighted that he has contributed to this important public debate, and I thank him once again most sincerely for this.

Valentine’s Day Celebrations: Another Opportunity for the Sons and Daughters of Africa to Remain Poor

Dear Sons and Daughters of Africa Today is 14th February, 2022, and so many among us are excited about celebrating a European festival whose history they do not even know - St. Valentine’s Day. Like them, I have not done my utmost best to find out its history until a few moments ago, when I have consulted an online encyclopedia – Encyclopedia.com, which says: According to tradition, St. Valentine is the patron saint of courtship, travelers, and young people. One story says that he was a Roman priest who became a martyr because he helped persecuted Christians around a.d. 270. Sent to prison, he restored the sight of a blind girl, who fell in love with him. According to another tale, Valentine was a young man awaiting execution. He loved the jailer's daughter and signed a farewell message to her "From your Valentine." What is clear from the above exerpt is that the origin of the day is not really known. Nevertheless, there is considerable information on how it has developed to what it is now. The Encyclopedia.com Goes on to note: Early celebrations in honor of St. Valentine took place in the middle of February, around the time of an ancient Roman pagan festival known as the Lupercalia. It was customary for men to draw the name of a young girl from a box and celebrate the festival with her. The Christian church substituted names of saints for the women, and individuals who picked them were supposed to draw inspiration from the lives of the saints. During the Middle Ages, St. Valentine's feast day on February 14 became known as a day for lovers. The custom of sending valentines to a loved one on St. Valentine's Day may have come from the belief that birds begin to choose their mates on that day. What is most worrying about the excitement with European festivals is that it is a symptom of deep-seated mental colonization. In The Invention of Africa, the celebrated Congolese philosopher, V.Y. Mudimbe, memorably wrote: “colonialism and colonization basically mean organization, arrangement. The two words derive from the latin word colére, meaning to cultivate or to design.” Mudimbe goes on to point out that the colonists (those settling a region), as well as the colonialists (those exploiting a territory by dominating a local majority) have all tended to organize and transform non-European areas into fundamentally European constructs. This is evident in many facets of our lives, not least the numerous European festivals that many of us celebrate - Christmas, Boxing Day, St. Valentine’s Day, Easter (not Passover), Fathers’ Days and Mothers’ Days (there seems to be two of each), and even Halloween. My brothers and sisters, sons and daughters of Africa, what many of you have not realized is that capitalists passionately love the way you celebrate these European holidays because they are opportunities for transferring cash from your bank accounts to theirs. Thus although you have hardly recovered from your unwise spending decisions just two months ago during the Christmas season, you are again splashing today, and will be splashing yet again over easter - less than two months from now. Yet this kind of reckless spending is part of why you remain poor, for expenditure on luxury items rather than on ventures that multiply your cash will never help to build up your financial resources. A Jewish wise man made this point thus: “He that loveth pleasure shall be a poor man: he that loveth wine and oil shall not be rich” (Proverbs 21:17). The worst form of colonisation is that of the mind, because whoever is colonized that way does not have what it takes to resist the one putting him/her down. As Steve Biko correctly observed, the most powerful weapon in the hand of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed. Thus to borrow Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s famous saying, we need to decolonize the mind.

Why Boarding Schools are Incurable Monsters of Colonialism

For at least three years now, I have run the hashtag #AbolishBoardingSchools in response to the mayhem in those institutions. One of the things I have said repeatedly is that boarding schools are part of the ignominious British colonial heritage. How is this so? First, as the renowned Congolese philosopher, V.Y. Mudimbe explains in The Invention of Africa (1988), the terms ‘colonialism’ and ‘colonization’ basically mean ‘organization’ or ‘arrangement’, having been derived from the latin word colere, meaning ‘to cultivate’ or ‘to design’. He then makes the important point that Western colonialism organizes and transforms non-European areas into fundamentally European constructs (p.14). He elaborates on this point as follows: … it is possible to use three main keys to account for the modulations and methods representative of colonial organization: the procedures of acquiring, distributing, and exploiting lands in colonies; the policies of domesticating natives; and the manner of managing ancient organizations and implementing new modes of production. Thus, three complementary hypotheses and actions emerge: the domination of physical space, the reformation of natives' minds, and the integration of local economic histories into the Western perspective. These complementary projects constitute what might be called the colonizing structure, which completely embraces the physical, human, and spiritual aspects of the colonizing experience (p.15). Furthermore, scholars in Africa have for long explained that the Western European colonisers used a three-pronged approach to achieve their domineering goal: 1. Violence to subdue the peoples whom they invaded. 2. Religion to soften the subdued peoples to minimize the cost of a sustained military operation. 3. Formal education to provide a justificatory ideology that would sustain the colonial structures for decades, if not centuries. Boarding schools were crucial to the implementation of the third plunk of the strategy: • Take away children from their homes for long periods of time, thereby reducing their parents’ influence on them. • Teach the youth separated from their parents the culture of the colonizer as though it were objective truth – modes of dressing, eating, talking, along with a Eurocentric formal education meant to convince the young minds that there was no knowledge in Africa prior to colonialism, and that, therefore, colonialism was a “savior” rather than a destroyer. • Send the brain-washed young minds back home with a false sense of superiority, thereby grossly diminishing the authority of their parents over them: they now believed that their parents were ignorant because they had not attended the coloniser’s ‘education system’. Those who run today’s boarding schools are the direct or indirect products of the colonial boarding schools, and so continue to perpetuate the colonial ideology which says that Africa is backwards and needs ‘development’.

The Place of Homeschooling in the Re-opened, Post-COVID-19 Kenyan Basic Education Sector

Memorandum
To
The National COVID-19 Education Response Committee
MINISTRY OF EDUCATION
REPUBLIC OF KENYA
From
Reginald M.J. Oduor, Ph.D.
Senior Lecturer in Philosophy
University of Nairobi
22nd May, 2020


TITLE:
The Place of Homeschooling in the Re-opened, Post-COVID-19 Kenyan Basic Education Sector

1. Background
I present this memorandum as:
A. A trainer of high school teachers with thirty (30) years experience teaching Education Students in the Kenyan public university system at both undergraduate and post-graduate level.
B. A citizen deeply concerned about the unfair and unreasonable treatment that home-schooling parents have received in Kenya since the passing of the Basic Education Act No.14 of 2013.

Home-schooling in Kenya: The Legal Environment
The term “home-schooling” refers to a situation in which parents take direct charge of their children’s formal education. Homeschooling is not a specific curriculum, but rather the delivery of any curriculum by the parents themselves. Several Kenyan families have home-schooled their children from the early 1990s using a variety of curricula, including 8-4-4, I.G.C.S.E., and Accelerated Christian Education. A number of Kenyan children have completed their high school education through Home-schooling and have been admitted to universities inside and outside Kenya, and several are already employed, while others have ventured into entrepreneurship.

The Constitution of Kenya recognises the right of the child to education. Article 43 (1) (f) lists education as one of the fundamental rights of every person. Furthermore, Article 53 (1) (b) states that every child has the right to free and compulsory basic education. Nevertheless, neither of the articles limits education to the school environment.


However, Home-schooling Kenyan parents have lately been alarmed by the fact that the Basic Education Act 2013 includes provisions that presume that education can only be attained through institutionalised schools. For example, Article 28 of the Act, titled “Right of Child to Free and Compulsory Education”, states that “The Cabinet Secretary shall implement the right of every child to free and compulsory basic education” (Article 28(1)), but the tenor of the Act is that such education can only happen in the context of an institutional school. Indeed, several homeschooling parents have been arrested, and in at least one instance, charged with violating the provisions of the Basic Education Act 2013.

Rationale for Facilitating Home-schooling in the Era of COVID-19
The advent of COVID-19, with measures such as social distancing and enhanced hygiene, requires that the government undertakes an objective evaluation of its position on homeschooling.

Home-schooling, as a viable model for formal education, is justifiable on the following grounds:
1. Education is the equipping of the young with requisite knowledge, skills and attitudes that enable them to participate in the life of the society.
2. Despite the rise of formal school education, the responsibility of providing education primarily rests with parents. Consequently, parents who take their children to school are merely delegating rather than abdicating this responsibility, and this is evident in the practice of schools regularly meeting parents to brief them on their children’s progress.
3. The ideal model of education is one in which the child gets maximum personalised attention. By the very nature of the size of a typical family, a home-schooled child gets much better personalised attention than a child in a typical institutional school. As such, parents who are willing to provide such personalised attention at home, often at great sacrifice to themselves, ought not to be denied the right to do so.
4. The personalised attention referred to in (3) above is critical for exceptionally gifted children, as well as for children with disabilities. For example, the public school system is grossly ill-equipped to provide education for children with autism, but some parents of such children are diligently working to provide them with high quality education in the home environment. Consequently, criminalising home-schooling, as the Basic Education Act 2013 has done, violates the right of such children to high quality education in contravention of Article 54 of the Constitution.
5. Allowing parents to take their children to private schools while denying others the right to educate theirs at home is discriminatory contrary to Article 27 of the Constitution.
6. While many have the false impression that homeschooling is unstructured, most homeschooling parents use curricula that are closely monitored by highly qualified personnel, thereby ensuring the maintenance of high standards of curriculum delivery. In addition, some of the curricula used in homeschools require that parents get prior training in their use.
7. While many have the impression that homeschooled children are isolated, their parents form networks that facilitate regular joint activities among the children. Besides, the parents enroll their children in various activities outside their homes such as football, swimming, and music lessons. In addition, there are joint annual events for various home-schooling groups.
8. There is no evidence that children who have gone through homeschooling are disadvantaged in comparison with those who have attended institutional schools.

Recommendations
I therefore passionately plead with your esteemed Committee to help secure the rights of parents who wish to take up the noble task of personally being in charge of their children’s formal education, thereby contributing to the much-needed space for social distancing in our schools. Towards this end, I recommend the following specific measures:
(1) That the Government facilitates rather than frustrates parents who are both willing and able to provide home-schooling for their children. Such facilitation includes making online resources developed by the Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development readily available to them.
(2) That the Government moves with speed to amend the Basic Education Act No.14 of 2013, with a view to expunging from it all provisions that explicitly or implicitly criminalise home-schooling.
(3) That the Government initiates a process through which the home-schooling community formulates guidelines to ensure the provision of high quality education in all instances in which parents choose to deploy home-schooling.

Time to preserve our sanity in the Midst of the Covid-19 Pandemic

Dear people, one potential damage of the Covid-19 crisis is the deterioration of mental health, with possible long-term negative effects on individuals and society at large. Too many people are glued to their mobile phones, computers, TV screens or radios waiting for the next thing that is said about the pandemic whether from medical experts, journalists, privately produced video clips, or even what I would call bad old social media gossip. Imbibing all this material is causing many to be preoccupied with the pandemic, and hence to be unproductive. In effect, we are increasingly having people experience mental paralysis - an inability to act due to fear of infection and possible death, keeping them from being useful to their families, friends, colleagues and to themselves. It is certainly wise to regularly update oneself about what is happening: watching or listening to the main news programmes on TV or radio is useful. Reading and/or watching a few well-chosen pieces is also helpful. However, spending the whole day watching and/or listening to Covid-19 talk is an addiction, and every addiction is harmful. Let us remember that most patients recover from this thing, and neither will everyone catch it. What will we do when 30 years from now we find ourselves around, but having been mentally wounded from dying a Thousand times before we actually die? When one seriously considers the current palpable mass anxiety, one would imagine people never die from road and plane accidents, terminal illnesses, chronic conditions, crime, among others. Let us please find a balance between information-gathering and maintaining sanity. A lot of the time spent reading every posting and watching every video could actually be fruitfully spent with family, making money online, or completing a project or two that were just not making progress in the normal hustle and bustle of life. Come on! There will be life after Covid-19, and many of us will be part of it; and whether or not we shall be, it does not make sense to spend these crucial days in fruitless anxiety. Instead, let us take each and every precautionary measure recommended by experts, but let us protect ourselves from becoming mentally ill. Let us arise and be productive: spend quality time with family; call and cheer up family and friends who live alone; clear that clutter which you have wanted to get rid of for years; read that book which you have always wanted to read, but have not found time to do so; complete that research paper; write that newspaper article, poem, novel, play or song; explore new business opportunities online, among many other things waiting for your attention; and if you find these thoughts helpful, pass them on!

Exalting Legality above Morality is Moving Us Closer to the Law of the Jungle

Many Kenyans love to cite legality in total disregard of morality. Thus you will hear a Kenyan politician celebrating his/her victory in an election petition, knowing very well that he/she perpetrated the election offences that gave rise to the petition. Similarly, you will hear striking workers whose industrial action causes untold suffering to thousands, or even millions, insist that their strike is justified because they gave a strike notice within the stipulated time.

 

Nevertheless, legality is subordinate to morality because, ideally, society’s laws emanate from its moral orientation. Except in cases of dictatorship, law is really society effecting greater enforcement of the core of its moral dictates using the coercive instruments of state. Thus morality precedes law because a society’s laws are inspired by its moral outlook. For example, the idea of human rights, which many lawyers have enthusiastically embraced, is essentially moral rather than legal. This is why sound human rights theorists will tell you that a right is something inherent in the bearer of it, and can therefore not be granted by a constitution, but can only be recognised or violated by it.

 

Could it be that the current loud cries of “Haki Yetu” (“Our Rights”) without a corresponding insistence on “Majukumu Yetu” (“Our Responsibilities”) is the result of the mechanistic approach to rights characteristic of our Western-oriented legal system, with its undue emphasis on the rights of the individual in almost total disregard of his/her responsibilities to society? Here I am reminded of a quotation associated with a prominent lawyer in Kenya: “If the law is on your side, bang the law; if the facts are on your side, bang the facts; if neither the law nor the facts are on your side, bang the table.” Note that there is nothing here about paying attention to the voice of conscience, but rather an obsession with winning a case “by all means necessary”.

 

In considerably homogenous traditional societies, the distinction between morality and law is minimal if not non-existent. Thus in my own Dholuo, there is a single word, chik which is most easily translated as “rules”, but which covers both moral rules and legal requirements. The same is true in several other Kenyan languages with which I am familiar, including Gikuyu, Kiswahili, and several Luhya languages (remember that “Luhya” is an umbrella term, popularised in the early 1920s, for more than ten ethnic groups). However, in a morally plural society such as twenty-first century Kenya, there is often a disconnect between morality and law, with several modes of behaviour that are considered to be morally wrong by a sizeable proportion of the population making their way into the list of what is legal to do.

 

Nevertheless, the fact remains that a person who is guided by conscience seldom cites the law on matters that touch the good of society, insisting on the higher law of conscience that restrains human beings from doing wrong whether or not someone is watching. In this regard, the British poet, Matthew Arnold, famously asserted that morality asks us to be self-governed at the feet of law. In other words, for Arnold, one who is morally mature does not really need law, since he/she is committed to doing the right and shunning the wrong without any threat of force characteristic of legal sanction.

 

The central concepts in morality are “rightness of action” and “virtuousness of character”, both of which are determined by the conscience. On the other hand, the core notion in law is “legality”, which simply means anything that is in harmony with the body of legislated rules. This body is best described as shifting sand, as we have witnessed with Kenya’s election laws which have been amended several times over the past ten years. Even the Constitution of Kenya (2010) is likely to be amended fundamentally before the next elections, if media reports about introducing an executive Prime Minister and a one-term, seven-year figurehead presidency are anything to go by. Older Kenyans will also recall the numerous constitutional amendments that were made between 1964 to 1982 to increase the power of the Presidency, leaving the former supreme document in legal tatters, or, to use a different figure of speech, resulting in a mongrel out of the original federalist and parliamentary system that was meticulously negotiated in the Lancaster House conferences.

 

One of the darkest days in Kenya’s history was the one in mid 1982, when the de facto one-party Parliament voted to turn the country into a de jure one-party state: the amendment was legal but immoral. Nevertheless, those who waved the legal card in favour of the amendment insisted that it had been done in accordance with the law - that due process had been followed. Those enthusiastically waving the legal card over the moral one in matters such as elections, industrial action (strikes, go slows, etc.),  and disputes over property had better quickly realise that they are thereby helping to accelerate the pace at which our society is disintegrating. People of conscience do not harp on legality, but rather strive for amendments to the law of the land to better harmonise it with sound moral principles. Only in this way do they slow down the coming of doomsday, when the law of the jungle replaces the moral law which restrains a sizeable proportion of humankind from committing unimaginable attrocities - the day in which we no longer pay attention to morality enjoining us to be self-governed at the feet of law, but instead are free to use legal technicalities to trample as many people as possible in our march towards “self-actualisation”.

In Support of Capital Punishment for Rape: A Response to Edwin Kamau’s Counter-arguments

Between 24^th and 25^th February 2018, Mr. Edwin Kamau responded to a number of tweets that I had posted in favour of capital punishment for rape. My tweets were in response to media reports that a fifteen-year old girl in Wajir had been gang-raped for three days. I asserted that perpetrators of such outrageous crimes are not fit to live. Mr. Kamau was of the view that contrary to my assertion, rape does not deserve the death penalty. I commend him for staying with the issue and offering several counter-arguments to which I wish to respond below. The paragraphs below are not edited to my usual standard, but I have decided to post them here as I find it easier to respond to Mr. Kamau in this way than in a series of tweets. The reader will make greater sense of what I say below by first going through my conversation with Edwin Kamau and Mutinda Kitana from 24^th to 25^th February 2018.

 

Dear Mr. Kamau

You asked if we were not justified to use insights from other jurisdictions such as the US and China. Using the US and China for insight is justifiable as long as we remain responsible for our decisions independently of theirs. The trouble is that many lawyers feel dutybound to treat precedents from overseas as infallible. The Us uses case law, common law, and so do we; but for us this is the result of colonialism, and part of our intellectual emancipation must surely be the endeavour to get rid of colonial baggage that hinders us from striking out in our own path.

 

Applying case law from other jurisdictions without taking cognisance of our own value system does compromise our sovereignty. Never forget that a people’s legal system ought to reflect their ethical value system. Yes it is alright to borrow from the West; but we ought to adapt rather than adopt. Even the Bill of Rights in the Constitution of Kenya 2010 is so terribly individualistic in a most un-African manner: our peoples are communalistic: where are the group rights?

 

You cited “Freedom from cruel and unusual punishment”. Yes this is in our constitution, but the people made the Constitution, so they have a right to interrogate and amend it. The idea of “cruel and unusual punishment” is strange because all punishment has an element of what is being termed “cruelty”: you cannot punish anyone by serving them their favourite meal: you always subject them to something that causes them discomfort. In sum, punishment is, by definition, uncomfortable, and anything uncomfortable can be construed as cruel.

 

Is capital punishment for rape a cruel and unusual punishment? Yes according to Western liberalism; not necessarily so according to our societies that have a communalist orientation.

 

You say in some cases capital punishment is justified to maintain order: I think rape horribly disturbs order and tranquility by causing emotional trauma, often spreading deadly diseases, and sometimes resulting in unwanted conceptions.

 

You say the justice system is for maintaining order but not reparation to the aggrieved? Really? What is the basis for this assertion? Why would capital punishment be justified for treason, murder and terrorism but not for rape? I wonder how many women would agree with you on this one. I am not a woman, but I certainly do not agree because rape destroys order in society. What is your basis for excluding rape from this list? Male bias for a political system dominated by men, and caring little for the plight of women who are usually the victims of rape perpetrated by men?

 

You assert that the justice system is not based on subjective individual’s perception of justice in relation to grievance”? What makes this very assertion objective rather than subjective? Is objectivity even possible in view of the fact that all of us are subjects rather than objects?

 

You cited a US ruling that rape does not deserve the death sentence. I disagree with that ruling because it ignores the plight of the victim, probably on the false assumption that her plight has minimal negative effect on society.

 

You posed the question: “Does rape make [sic] irrepairable damage to the life of the victim”? Some men might say “No”; most women, and some men would say “Yes” – lifelong emotional trauma, unwanted conception, exposure to deadly infections, crisis in the marriage of the rape victim, etc.

 

You said that rape victims can still be productive despite heineous crime. By whose standards? Productive for who? I guess you would be satisfied if she is still able to report to work; but would she be equally satisfied? The idea that only rape which results in death deserves capital punishment puts undue emphasis on physical death, paying inadequate attention to lifelong damage on the victim and on the society of which she is a member.

 

You said my position that rape deserves capital punishment is emotional. In my view, there is nothing like an emotional argument, because an argument is composed of propositions rather than emotional expressions. You claim emotions are affecting my thinking: who can truly say their emotions do not affect their thinking? Would that not suggest two persons in one – an emotional one distinct from a rational one? I do not see the error in the argument as you have summed it up. You only think it is faulty because of your presumption that rape does not deserve capital punishment.

 

I am aware that many now find my position out of place, but I think this is due to the vigorous campaign against capital punishment both in the Western-dominated academia and media rather than due to the actual demerits of retaining Capital Punishment. Let the sober discussion continue!

Luo Concepts of Time and Numbers: A Response to Oby Obyerodhyambo

I am not on facebook, but my sister Janet Osiro has drawn my attention to our brother Oby Obyerodhyambo’s excellent Facebook Post on the Luo concept of time and numbers.

 

In my blogpost on Friday 30^th December 2016 titled “Why I Do not Make New Year Resolutions” (http://kenyancrossroads.blogspot.co.ke), I sought to demonstrate that the idea of a “year” is always religious, and that the January New Year is foreign to Africa: this fits well with Oby’s point that in Luo cosmology there is no twelve-month cycle.

 

Oby’s highlighting of the Luo use of base 5 rather than base 10 has confirmed what I had suspected for some time.

 

Oby’s exposition of the Luo focus on seasons rather than years is “right on”. In my blog post I had also highlighted the fact that even the ways in which weeks are understood all over the world is religious. We have three popular weeks in Kenya - the Muslim one beginning on “Juma Mosi (moja), the biblical one beginning on the so-called “Sunday”, but which the Bible calls “the first day of the week”, and the civil week which begins on Monday “Wuok tich” (“the day people set out for work”), “tich ariyo” (literally “work two”), “tich adek” (“work three”), “tich ang’wen” (“work four”), “Tich abich” (“work five”). I would appreciate any information on the Luo week, if even such a thing exists!

 

Oby’s outline of the way in which the Luo divided the day is excellent: it agrees with what our late maternal grandmother, Posia Yiembe Odera, had told me when I was doing my oral literature research for my A levels and undergraduate work in the 1980s. My only reservation is with his use of “saa” which is a semitic word (“shaa” in Hebrew, “saa” in Arabic”). I would therefore simply delete “saa” from the divisions of the day as he outlines them. Well done dear brother! Let us proudly continue to examine our cultures and correct the myriad lies unleashed on them by Western imperialism!

Traditional Luo Funerals Were not Costly like Current Ones

In a recent article, Dr. Bitange Ndemo referred to the splashy houses that many members of the Kenyan middle class are putting up in their ancestral homes as “dead capital” because they are difficult to sell or to present as collateral for bank loans. For this he has received both praise and blame. One of the arguments that I have read against Ndemo’s position is that if people do not put up such houses, their children will be irrepairably ashamed in the event that they (the parents) die. Some have even called such buildings “socio-cultural investments”, thus diverting themselves and others from Dr. Ndemo’s focus on economics. Here I want to focus on Luo funerals in earlier times, because the issue of “tradition” keeps on popping up in the debate on the logic of putting up splashy homes in ancestral lands.

 

Many now believe that traditional Luo funerals are terribly expensive. The truth is that the current splashy Luo funerals are very different from the traditional ones.

 

My grandmother, the late Posia Yiembe Odera, who witnessed the aftermath of the so-called “First World War”, told me the following regarding traditional Luo funerals:

1.      If a person died before sunset, he/she was buried the same day. If he/she died after sunset, he/she was buried the next day (there were no elaborate funeral preparations for days or even weeks).

2.      A person was buried naked inside his/her hut. This is why the Luo word for a widow is “chi liel” (“the wife of a grave”) - she lived in the hut where her husband was buried. In-laws only came to the funeral once they were sure the dead had been buried to ensure they did not see him/her naked.

3.      There was no cooking in the bereaved home before the burial: instead, neighbours brought “nyoyo” (“a mixture of boiled maize and beans”) and other foods to feed those who had come from far.

4.      The day after the burial, a single cow was slaughtered and shared among the in-laws (the numerous cows slaughtered in a single funeral these days were unheard of).

5.      All the above changed drastically when Luo men, who had been conscripted for the “First World War”, came back with loads of cash to show off. They went to the homes of in-laws who had been bereaved while they were away in the war, and splashed their cash in the name of “mourning in arrears”. Another elderly lady informed me that it was also at that time that Luo men violently forced their own wives to smoke cigarettes as a status symbol.

 

I will never forget a time when Raila Odinga challenged the extravagance run-away spending in Luo funerals: that was one of those rare occasions when they essentially shouted him down; and as an astute politician, he retreated. It will take courage to challenge all this unrealistic spending for the benefit of the many widows, widowers and children whose resources are heartlessly squandered in the name of mourning the dead. This desperately needed reform will come through those members of the Kenyan middle class who undertake a critical evaluation of their impoverished and impoverishing value system that leads them to spend money on luxury rather than on investments - on status symbols rather than on ventures that truly raise their status.

The Real Secrets of Wealthy Western Europe and Her Satellites: A Reply to “Secrets of Developed Nations”

Over the last few days, I have received, on different WhatsApp groups, a document titled “Secrets of Developed Nations”, the thrust of which is that citizens of the wealthy Western countries have a lofty work ethic and outstanding levels of personal integrity. However, a sober look at history indicates that the account of the economic advantage of Western countries given in that article is clearly misleading.

     In his celebrated book, How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, Walter Rodney singled out three historical facts that have resulted in Africa’s gross economic disadvantage in our day, namely, the slave trade, colonialism, and neo-colonialism. It is important to emphasise at the outset that in Rodney’s usage, “Europe” includes the European-dominated North America.

     Rodney points out that about six hundred years ago, Europe and Africa were at an equal footing economically – they were both agrarian, and both only had cottage factories. Then Europe began to conduct exploratory expeditions to other continents and to trade with them, but the trade was imbalanced in Europe’s favour. In that trade, Europe took away valuable African natural resources in exchange for largely valueless items whose allure for Africans was simply their “foreignness”.

     To make matters worse, Europe embarked on a trade more virulent than the HIV/AIDS pandemic – the slave trade. For several generations, Europe robbed Africa of its most resourceful segment of the population – the youth – leaving behind the elderly and the very young. Europe also made sure that the African youth she took away were those who had already contracted and recovered from small pox. All this negatively affected Africa’s productivity, because the elderly and the very young could not engage in significant economic activity. Furthermore, the loss of Africa’s youth meant that inter-generational transfer of technology from the aging to the youth was interrupted. Consequently, new generations of Africans emerged without receiving the benefit of centuries of experience from their elders, resulting in economic regression. Thus while for several centuries Africa’s youth worked European plantations, African populations back home continued to slide into greater and greater poverty.

     With the advent of the Western industrial revolution, Europe no longer needed African slaves to work her plantations. Instead, she needed much more raw materials from Africa to feed her factories. That is when it suddenly “dawned on” Europe that slave trade was inhuman, culminating in the official abolition of slave trade and slavery. Yet that was certainly not the end of the story; for Europe realised that to maximise her acquisition of Africa’s raw materials, she needed to have political control over Africa, giving rise to the advent of colonialism. Thus Africa, which had been grossly weakened by centuries of slave trade, was relatively  easy to subjugate politically in the advent of colonialism. Indeed, “colonialism” is simply a euphemism for “robbery with violence at a politico-cultural level”. Europe forced Africans into the European monetary economy by imposing taxes on Africans, knowing very well that the only way Africans could get money to pay the taxes was by working for the colonialists, first in their forcefully acquired farms, and later also in government offices.

     Once the structures of Western domination were firmly in place in the forcefully created African countries (numerous ethnic groups forcibly lumped together into single states that were later to be misleadingly referred to as “nations”), Europe was ready to “grant independence” to these political units, knowing full well that she would continue to control their economies and politics. Indeed, the “national flags”, “national anthems”, written constitutions, and other symbols of power in post-colonial African states were all copied from Europe. Thus “independence” was simply the transition from colonialism to neo-colonialism – a situation in which Europe no longer controls Africa through open brute force embodied in the colonial administration, but rather by puppeteering post-colonial states to do her bidding. In this way, Europe continues to ensure that trade between her and African states is imbalanced in her favour.

     In sum, the real secrets of wealthy Western states, misleadingly referred to as “developed nations”, is oppression and manipulation for the purpose of exploitation. This is why, contrary to the poisonous message of the article “Secrets of Developed Nations”, Africans must not succumb to the temptation to hate themselves because of their economic disadvantage. Instead, they must realise that they are where they are because of a vicious foreign invader who has oppressed and exploited them for more than four hundred years. They must therefore decolonise their minds and embark on serious planning for the welfare of future generations.

     That the majority of African youth today are unaware of Rodney's timeless analysis is evidence of the precarious condition of future generations that are being denied the opportunity to know their true history. In this regard, the words of Steve Biko continue to ring in my mind: “The most powerful weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.”

 

Reginald M.J. Oduor, Ph.D.

Beyond Liberal Democracy: The Quest for Indigenous African Models of Democracy for the Twenty-First Century

 

DATES: Monday 22nd and Tuesday 23^rd May, 2017

 

TIME:

Monday 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m.

Tuesday 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m.

 

VENUE: Mini Lecture Room 5, fourth floor, University Towers, Main Campus, University of Nairobi, Kenya

 

ORGANISERS: The Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies of the University of Nairobi, Kenya and the Council for Research in Values and Philosophy (RVP), Washington, DC, U.S.A.

 

Background

Democratisation in post-colonial African states has met with a multiplicity of challenges, chiefly the subversion of the liberal democratic independence constitutions through self-serving constitutional amendements by civilian governments as well as through the setting aside of constitutions by military regimes. What is more, there is growing evidence that the second generation liberal democratic constitutions that have emerged on the continent from the last two decades of the twentieth century are also being subverted through similar processes. Thus a number of scholars now speak about “the failure of democracy in Africa”. However, others contend that what has failed in Africa is liberal democracy rather than democracy as such. They hold that liberal democracy, with its emphasis on the pre-eminence of the freedoms of the individual above communal responsibilities, is alien to the continent and therefore doomed to fail as often as it is tried.

 

Consequently, the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies of the University of Nairobi in collaboration with the Council for Research in Values and Philosophy (RVP) is organising a two-day international conference to evaluate democratisation in Africa.

 

Focus

The papers will address the following three questions and any other related ones:

1.      Is democracy universally applicable, or does it require adaptation to cultural realities?

2.      To what extent has the adoption of Western liberal models of democracy hindered democratisation in post-colonial African states?

3.      How can indigenous African political thought be utilised in the endeavour to design models of democracy that are suited to the socio-cultural realities of post-colonial African states?

 

Programme

 

Conference Chairs:

 

Dr. Reginald M.J. Oduor, University of Nairobi

and

Dr. Hu Yeping, Council for Research in Values and Philosophy (RVP)

 

 

Conference Programme

 

 

Opening Ceremony

22^nd May, 2017, 9:00-10:00 a.m.

Master of Ceremonies: Dr. Reginald M.J. Oduor

Time	Speaker
8:00-8:50 a.m.	Registration
9:00-9:05 a.m.	Remarks by Dr. Oriare Nyarwath, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, University of Nairobi
9:05-9:10 a.m.	Remarks by Dr. Hu Yeping, Council for Research in Values and Philosophy (RVP)
9:10-9:15 a.m.	Remarks by Prof. S.I. Akaranga, Chair, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, University of Nairobi
9:15-9:20 a.m.	Remarks by Prof. Peter Wasamba, Dean, Faculty of Arts, University of Nairobi
9:20-9:30 a.m.	Remarks by Prof. Enos Njeru, Principal, College of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Nairobi
9:30-9:55 a.m.	Speech by Prof. Peter M.F. Mbithi, Vice-Chancellor, University of Nairobi
9:55-10:00 a.m.	Vote of thanks by Dr. Wamae Muriuki, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, University of Nairobi
10:00-10:30 a.m.	Tea break

Session 1

Critique of Liberal Democracy in Africa (1)

 

Monday 22^nd May, 2017, 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

Chair: Dr. Oriare Nyarwath, University of Nairobi

Time	Presenter	Title of Paper
10.30am-10.50am	Prof. J.N.K. Mugambi, University of Nairobi, Kenya	A Critique of Notions of Democracy as Applied in the Twenty-first Century
10.50am-11.10am	Prof. Jack Anselm Odhiambo, University of Nairobi, Kenya	Who are the “People” in a Democracy?
11.10am-11.30am	Dr. Hu Yeping, Council for Research in Values and Philosophy, U.S.A.	Democracy and the Common Good
11.30am-11.50am	Dr. Dennis Masaka, Great Zimbabwe University, Zimbabwe	Colonialism and the Challenge of Western-style Democracy in Africa
11.50am-12.10pm	Prof. Winnie V. Mitullah, University of Nairobi, Kenya	Liberal Constitutional Democracy Deficit in Africa: Interrogating Opportunities and Challenges
12.10pm-12.30pm		Discussion
12.30pm-1.30pm		Lunch break

 

 

 

Session 2

Critique of Liberal Democracy in Africa (2)

 

Monday 22^nd May, 2017, 1:30-3:30 p.m.

Chair: Dr. Emmanuel Ifeanyi Ani, University of Ghana

 

Time	Presenter	Title of Paper
1.30pm-1.50pm	Prof. Sirkku K. Hellsten, The Nordic Africa Institute, Uppsala, Sweden	African Political Ideology and Practice in the Era of Globalization: From Communitarian Socialism to Authoritarian Neo-liberalism - The Next Steps?
1.50pm-2.10pm	Mr. David Jesse Oduor, Advocate of the High Court of Kenya	The Fallacy of Liberal Democracy in Africa
2.10pm-2.30pm	Mr. David-Ngendo Tshimba, Makerere University, Uganda	The Pitfalls of Liberal Democracy: Lessons from Electioneering in Democratic Republic of the Congo
2.30pm-2.50pm	Dr. Munamato Chemhuru, Great Zimbabwe University, Zimbabwe, and University of Johannesburg, South Africa	The Quest and Limits of Liberal Democracy in Post-Colonial Africa: An appeal to the Communitarian Model
2.50pm-3.10pm	Prof. J.P. Odoch Pido, The Technical University of Kenya	A Design Perspective on Democracy and Democratic Models
3.10pm-3.30pm		Discussion
3.30pm-4.00pm		Tea break

Session 3

Critique of the Quest for Africa-Specific Models of Democracy

 

22^nd May, 2017, 4:00-6:00 p.m.

Chair: Dr. Jacinta Mwende Maweu, University of Nairobi, Kenya

 

Time	Presenter	Title of Paper
4.00pm-4.20pm	Prof. Edward Wamala, Makerere University, Uganda	The Rule of Law versus the Rule of Good men (Philosopher Kings): A Classical Solution to a Contemporary Problem
4.20pm-4.40pm	Ms. Robinah S. Nakabo, Makerere University, Uganda	Gender Sensitive Followership and Leadership in Africa: the case of Uganda
4.40pm-5.00pm	Dr. Donna K. Pido, The Technical University of Kenya	Democracy as Falsehood: Seek But Do Not Expect to Find
5.00pm-5.20pm		Discussion

 

Session 4

Indigenous African Models of Democracy (1)

 

23^rd May, 2017, 8:30-10:30 a.m.

Chair: Dr. Wamae Muriuki, University of Nairobi, Kenya

 

Time	Presenter	Title of Paper
8.30am-8.50am	Mr. Kisemei Mutisya (United States International University, Kenya) and Dr. Joseph Situma (University of Nairobi, Kenya)	Tentative Elements of African Indigenous Models of Democracy
8.50am-9.10am	Dr. Khondlo Mtshali, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa	Consensual Democracy and the Expansion of the Mind
9.10am-9.30pm	Dr. Jacinta Mwende Maweu, University of Nairobi, Kenya	From Liberal to Consociational democracy: Which way for Africa?
9.30am-9.50am	Dr. Siphetfo N. Dlamini, University of KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa	Ake's Model of Consociational Democracy: A New Perspective of a Holistic Development in Africa
9.50am-10.10am	Dr. Emefiena Ezeani, Federal University Ndufu-Alike Ikwo, Nigeria	Cooperative Collegial Democracy: An Alternative African Context-relevant Political Model
10.10am-10.30am		Discussion
10.30am-11.00am		Tea break

 

Session 5

Indigenous African Models of Democracy (2)

 

23^rd May, 2017, 11:00 a.m. to 12:40 p.m.

Chair: Prof. Edward Wamala, Makerere University, Uganda

 

Time	Presenter	Title of Paper
11.00am-11.20am	Dr. Francis Chigozie Ofoegbu, Federal University Ndufu Alike Ikwo, Nigeria	Democracy in Africa: the Need for the Practice of Universal Communalism
11.20am-11.40am	Dr. Solomon Ochepa Oduma-Aboh, Kaduna State University, Nigeria	Communalism as an Authentic Basis for an Enduring Democracy in the Twenty-first Century Nigerian Society
11.40am-12.00noo	Dr. Emmanuel Ifeanyi Ani, University of Ghana, Legon, Ghana	The Traditional Roots of Democratic Verbal Discipline
12.00pm-12.20pm	Dr. Moses Oludare Aderibigbe, The Federal University of Technology, Nigeria	Democracy and the Right of the Minority in Africa
12.20pm-12.40pm		Discussion
12.40pm-1.40pm		Lunch break

 

 

Session 6

Indigenous African Models of Democracy (3)

 

23^rd May, 2017, 2:00-4:00 p.m.

Chair: Prof. Winnie V. Mitullah, University of Nairobi, Kenya

 

Time	Presenter	Title of Paper
2.00pm-2.20pm	Dr. Reginald M.J. Oduor, University of Nairobi, Kenya	In Defence of Ethnically-based Federations in Post-Colonial African States, with Special Reference to Kenya
2.20pm-2.40pm	Dr. Tayo Raymond Ezekiel Eegunlusi, Federal University of Technology, Nigeria	Critical Reflections on Africans’ Consideration of a (Monolithic) Democratic Alternative to Liberal Democracy
2.40pm-3.00pm	Prof. Dan Chitoiu, Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iași, Romania	Reconsidering Hierarchy: Justice and Responsibility in an Alternative Social Scenario
3.00-3.20pm	Dr. Thomas Menamparampil, Guwahati, Assam, India	Strengthening Indigenous Values to Facilitate the Emergence of Suitable Forms of Democracy
3.20pm-3.40pm		Discussion
3.40pm-3.50pm	Dr. Hu Yeping, Council for Research in Values and Philosophy	Closing Remarks
3.50pm-4.00pm	Dr. Reginald M.J. Oduor, University of Nairobi	Closing Remarks