Yes, The Media Know More Than You, Mr Kabogo

Apparently, William Kabogo, the rich Juja MP, who is not new to Prof George Saitoti’s ministry, doesn’t know that the media ALWAYS have more information than most of their sources-especially those who keep them waiting for long before responding to their inquests, or let their phones ring continuously without them picking or even those who just keep mum when the ever hungry Fourth estatetians are marauding around them.

For stubborn ones like Mr Kabogo who develop slippery skins, the media have several ways of nipping them. First they will befriend those around the individual-the very close associates like family members, business partners, their drivers, secretaries or even cooks-then without sweats plough information from them about the hard-headed, cagey individual. They will, of course, promise to replace their identities with the ever secretive phrase: the source of this information could not be named because bla bla bla! Therefore, considering this those of the same understanding as Kabogo who seemed to suggest that the media should have same info as them or even less should wake or be awoken from their sleep, ignorance for this case. There is no way such could happen, not in this era when the worlds have opened up for the media to operate freely.

Any story pursued by the media, for your information, when complete would consist of three pillars-the affected, the winner and the loser. All these are necessary for a good story. For example, for this latest story which Mr Kabogo has been mentioned several times, the affected, Mercy Chepkosgei Keino (RIP), is the originator of the story. The winner, here should be the police, are the beneficiaries of what happened. The loser for this case is Mr Kabogo and other suspects, are those pushed into the dark side of the story. They are often negatively drawn in any occurrence. Going by this plain way journalists conduct their business, you realise they will have more information than any single individual especially one contributing to a particular story at hand.

So next time when Mr Kabogo says: “Sometimes I don’t understand you people (media)…you seem to have more information than we have …”quoted by the Daily Nation, he should be reminded of this moral lesson down here.

Moral Lesson: The media knows more than you.

These Mps Should not Pay Taxes with Their Current Salaries

They should not and most people have decided not to listen to their legitimate arguments for not planning to do so.

First, Kenyans should have stuck to their guns the last time these Mps immorally raised their monthly packages. It was wrong for the august house members to do so and more so Kenyans did not do themselves any good by failing to press harder for the abandonment of the honestly high salaries.

Now that the MPs were allowed to go on as they had planned, they should be allowed too to savour their kill after all it’s for a short moment-only 60 months-and they are back in the village or mtaani having each consumed approximately a cool sh51 million. That’s not much the last time Kenyans compared with billions drowned into blessed scandals as Anglo-Leasing aka Fleecing or Goldenberg aka send a dream sms hepa with a dream ‘gold’ na Kamlesh.

Let the greedy guys and girls enjoy their kill after all they hunted heartily for it when they were campaigning. After downloading everything in their accounts when they were seeking the seats what did you expect them to do when they got into the house where they had all the space, ability and attitude to determine their salaries-thank God and the formulators of the current constitution, the coming Mps will not have a chance to do this immoral thing.

Back to the topic of today, it goes against natural order to let someone have something and after a while you wakeup and want to deny such a person his/her given right. Kenyans allowed their representatives in parliament to increase their salaries, and having gotten that, the hungry, gluttonous Mps accepted the ‘offer’, adjusted their lives, improved their living standards to fit into their huge salary brackets. It’s only natural to do that or who can dispute it. None should and therefore let these members have their monies for the remainder of the term.

It’s a good argument to say that when the MPs were increasing their pay, Kenyans were helpless for they didn’t have a way of challenging it. That might not hold lots of water. When these guys increased their salaries, Kenyans were divided. Many opposed it but some supported. Furthermore there was no real effort to stop the Mps. There were no such radical ideas as postponing taxes, there were no hardcore moves as stopping working in protest. Nobody ever encouraged Kenyans to do a Tahrir Square thing. None. Most only made a lot of noise at first but they droned after few days. They gave up and asked God to have mercy on the Mps.

Having said that the next group of the people’s representatives, be it in the Senate, the Lower House etc, should never be allowed to earn without paying taxes. They should never be allowed to commit such a sin again.

Moral Lesson: Don’t ever allow someone to get more then later ask them to unwillingly drop the extra. They would have naturally adjusted to the lifestyle as per their current income and would be hard for them to shrink back.