Please, Stand Up for Our Marathon Kings and Queens

When marathon enthusiasts and fans from other countries complain of Kenyans’ dominance in this field, they not only need to be forgiven but also should be asked to go slow on their rather unnecessary outbursts.

Last week the media were abuzz with information that Kenyans and other non-Dutch citizens were going to get the least of peanuts available for them if they outrun their hosts, the Dutch, during the 2011 Utrecht Marathon to be held later this month. They said it and up-to-date the organisers have not changed their discriminatory rewards of 10,000 Euros for a Dutch winner and 100 Euros for a Kenyan or any other foreigner who wins.

If that’s not discriminatory, then someone should redefine this word. When someone literally rules over something and refuses to cede that superiority, it tends to get tiring and people may start losing interest in it. That’s very true. However, should superiority be overlooked over competition? I guess it does not add sense to pull out the finest in order to promote the lame or the weak. Imagine telling Brazil or Spain not to send their national football teams to the World Cup so that a team from Guatemala, Guinea Bissau or Thailand wins the World Cup. It doesn’t make sense, at all. Don’t even talk of banning Roger Federer or Rafael Nadal from the Grand Slams because they are the absolute faces of the Slams and if someone hinted at their banning from Wimbledon, for example, that person should be prepared to be called an imbecile of the imbeciles or told to pay millions in dollars in fines.

However, now that individuals, Kenyan athletes have found the tricks to their success in long distances, it’s suddenly becoming a “boring and uncompetitive”.Why now, when Kenyans, the real faces of marathon takes the sport to a higher level, someone suddenly thinks of a way to control their exploits. Such ways meant to restrict them to their homes and let their athletics-talents rot away while mediocre runners fill the field and earn from poor running, are unacceptable in a globalised world as ours. Furthermore, in a capitalistic world like the one we are living in, competition is key. It’s essential for the success of every interested individual.

Now that the rest of world seems to be interested in demoralising our runners from exercising their talent, it’s time Kenyans rose to appreciate their own and shame the lazy discriminators whose main intention is to promote themselves and their ego-centric thoughts. Locals should appreciate more these people and make them celebrities so they can feel the same feeling of importance they get when they run in London, Rotterdam, Boston, New York, Tokyo or elsewhere. Nairobi Marathon (normally sponsored by Standard Chartered Bank) should be made more prestigious by increasing the rewards for the winners, also organising marathons in other cities and towns like Kisumu (Lakeside Marathon), others in Mombasa, Nakuru, Embu etc.

Doing this will discourage Kenyan athletes from getting enslaved to thoughts of only running in foreign countries where they are often not appreciated or discriminated against.

Kenyans and to a good extend Ethiopians runners have shown agility, perseverance and commitment in running over 42 kilometres and winning the races and gaining every other praise but none for committing their good bodies to 42kms of grievous harm on their bodies and undefined fatigue. The very last thing to do to such hard working entertainers is discriminate against or seem to undeservedly glorify others over them.

The most we can do for this people is guard them against blatant misuse by foreigners who sometime careless about their welfare after they get entertained. We can guard them through appreciation, praising their efforts and organising for local marathons befitting their stature so they can show off to locals including their family members and neighbours.

Kenya Still Very, Very Ripe for Violence

With the rather not so strange happenings over the last few months in the country, a stranger or simply a mad person will rule out part two of another explosive election-related violence in Kenya.

Kenya’s political atmosphere is nearing its charging summit. The charging rate seems to be going up each day. Some may say the naming of the now famous Ocampo Six is to blame for this but that could not be true because anyone keen would know there has been bad blood brewing since the formation of the Grand Coalition government back in 2008. There’s no doubt about that and if things are not put back to order and emotions controlled for the remaining period before the next general election, then Luis Moreno-Ocampo would be in a better position if he begins polishing his claws in readiness for another pounce.

What has been happening in the country is reminiscent of what went on prior to the 2007 elections and a kid born after that year should be the only one innocent of the barbarism demonstrated by some Kenyans towards each other then. There was incontrovertible hate speech, there was pure incitement, there was possible arming-either physically or psychologically, there was political hatred stoked by politicians, there was everything that made the atmosphere volatile and “warriors smell blood”. Who can deny that something alike is happening now?

When politicians openly ask Kenyans to go head-to-head in the name of fighting for a place somewhere (Uhuru Park), a public place, what will stop them from telling them to go for each other’s necks when anarchy prevails once again like it happened shortly after last elections. What will stop them? If they can call for a press conference and comfortably reveal their plans to take on one another in the city, what, for evil sake, will gag them from asking their vulnerable diehards to say such “No R* No Peace,” or “ordering to shoot to kill (civilians).”

Let’s get it right, good people. Whatever politicians do they do it for their egos. This is not a so hidden secret but unfortunately not so many Kenyans know it.

The Hague has come and some individuals (their names now a chorus in most local newspapers-the backgrounder for journalists) have been identified and it’s upon them to prove their god-given innocence. It’s solely their onus to do it on behalf of themselves not Kenyans who have knowingly been treated to diarrhoeic abracadabra meant to steal their attention from important stuff. In other similar fronts, some individuals could be covertly celebrating their narrow escape from Moreno-Ocampo list, that is if what some ODM members and its affiliates have been saying and how they have been behaving so far, is to go by. They do this without caring about the damn consequences and without bothering to clear their names either from the egregious crimes. Their rather not healthy rhetoric can only be understood as diversionary tactics aimed at painting another with white sin while hiding black sin. It can be equalled also to an effort by the real thief who points hard at an innocent soul and loudly shout thief! thief! thief! in a bid to divert wrath, as he/she runs away from the crowd.

With every bit of it of these happenings, emotions are being stoked and sobriety borne after the signing of the 2008 Peace Accord is slowly being revoked and fast getting replaced with hatred. It’s a worrying scenario and every Kenyan who’s in his/her right mind ought to be scared with these developments.

What took place in December 2007 and January 2008 should have been a painful but informative lesson to us but it seems it was just a small mistake, a temporary explosion meant to be easily forgotten just like a landmine in a bomb-prone country as Iraq or Afghanistan.

To put it straight, we did not learn anything, at all from the after 2007-deadly violence. We didn’t, period.