"IT MUST BE A 'GK' BICYCLE!"

AN EXTRACT FROM MY AUTOBIOGRAPHY, "FROM THE COW-DUNG FLOOR"

“GK” stands for “Government of Kenya”.

There is a saying in my luyia language that “Olia wookhola”, translation, “You eat where you work”. What this boils down to, is Kenyans working for the government must do what they must do to enrich themselves as quickly as they can by virtue of the office they hold. Government jobs are therefore never an end in themselves but rather, a means of acquiring extra wealth and investing it elsewhere “safe”.

The nation as a whole has a strongly embedded belief that citizens who work for the government are paid to manage what does not belong to them. There is little vested interest in the actual work. Some owe their positions not to qualification and competence but purely to political patronage. 

Kenyans part with huge amounts of money as bribes to get those job they are qualified for in the first place. It is not uncommon for some women to be pressured into providing sexual favours in exchange for employment. Some find themselves trapped in a work environment where they continue to give these same favours to stay employed regardless of their marital status. Naturally, a job is treated as an “investment” which must give back the money dished out as bribe with interest. Kenyan civil servants to put it generally, have every ‘reason’ to want to embezzle. Thankfully not everyone able to embezzle does so.

A government employee knows he or she can be redeployed or fired not because of incompetence but rather because he or she happens to be the “wrong” political tribe of the time. He also knows that an unqualified individual could be promoted overnight to replace him because his last name is “politically correct”. It follows therefore that many civil servants have the attitude of ‘make hay while the sun shines’, or ‘strike the iron while it is hot’. It is also the driving force behind investing in business as a backup plan.

Kenya’s national psyche regarding presidential elections is a “do or die” event. The reason is elections in Kenya have never been about leadership. They are about who gets to controls patronage resource, be it at Municipal, County or National level. For many communities, elections are literally fights for economic survival.

There are several things I was told are “government” while growing up in Nambale village.

The exercise books we were issued under the Kenya Primary Schools Equipment Scheme program had large GK letters stamped on them. That was government property. Just by looking around me and without being told, I soon learned to not take care of my exercise books. After all, there was a limitless supply from the school stockroom. I even stole some whenever I could. We also wasted a lot of ‘government chalk’

The famous “Safari Course” book that was part of our Syllabus had “GK” stamped on it. Kenyans who went to primary school in my time will remember the humorous story of one “Simon Makonde”. He is a guy who was born at the beginning of the week, grew up, got married, and was dead within seven days. The author ended with, “And that is the sad story of Simon Makonde”. Unfortunately there are many good things dying “within seven days” in our Nation because of the attitude most of us Kenyans have towards our own government and country.

The ‘GK land Rover’ is the one symbol of ‘Government’ that was exposed to me from childhood. I started to learn about the “GK” Land Rover in a comical way. It was early afternoon in Nambale village. I shut the porch door of the Red Loaf (my parents house), a bit too hard as I walked out into the bright afternoon sun. Mzee Shem (my late father) who was listening to the 1pm news on state owned ‘Voice of Kenya’ (VOK), was not impressed. He yelled, “Zabde! Why are you slamming the door so hard? Do you think that door belongs to a GK Land Rover? I paid for it myself!!” 

This Land Rover I am talking about bears little resemblance to the Land Rover SUVs Canadians drive today. These Canadian versions would not survive their first road trip from Mombasa port to Nairobi. That machine had little in way of creature comfort, just a petrol engine with sheet metal built around it. The doors did not have weather seals to muffle the sound. Closing the door, no matter how gently always produced a sharp clanging sound as metal struck metal. The brown canvas at the back was often ripped, exposing parts of the metal frame.

The Dashboard had two round dials. One was the speedometer in miles, and the other measured the temperature and fuel. The foam seats, if still intact, had the same feel like what you get sitting on a sack full of finger millet. 

Various government ministry departments have offices in Nambale village. These departments at that time included Agriculture, Health, Education, Administration Police, Veterinary among others. The top administrators were each assigned a GK Land Rover. There were about six Land Rovers in use. We village kids knew each Land Rover, the drivers and the ‘government man’ that was being driven around in them. These men made local news from frequent scuffles in Nambale’s Katiba Bar (which is still in business today) after ingesting one too many Tusker beers “baada ya kazi” (“after work”). Most fights were over who takes home the Ugandan girl serving them beers that night. It had therefore been settled in my mind that “important people who worked for the government” always drank a lot and chased after young Ugandan girls. That is why it came as a complete surprise when a man called Timothy Mwakisha, who was the Busia District Commissioner at that time, showed up at St. Thomas Anglican Church and preached a sermon on salvation and eternal life! Mzee Shem later said said to me “Timothy is a 'born again' Christian”. 

One day a friend of mine and I saw a Land Rover parked outside the District Officer’s administration block with its hood up. We wanted to see what the engine looks like and walked up to it. The driver was watching us from under a tree where he sat smoking. I looked in his direction and asked him what was wrong with the Land Rover. My curiosity always got the better of me. I never thought twice before asking a question like this. I am surprised he actually answered me. He could have ordered us to leave right away and go home before he pinched our ears! Instead he said the battery was dead and they were waiting for the store manager to organize for a new one. A week went by. Then two. The officer assigned to that Land Rover began sharing rides with other officers from different departments. The redundant driver was reassigned “yard duty” around the government buildings, a job he did when he was in the mood to. 

There is that time I noticed one of the back wheels of this one Land Rover resting on a red square stone. Nambale is known for its characteristic red rocky soil. Construction stones are curved into square blocks from this rock. Not long after, all four wheels vanished. The GK Land Rover now balanced on four locally sourced red building blocks. Then the lights disappeared, as did the two windshield wipers and door handles. I watched the same fate befall two other GK vehicles in Nambale village. 

Not all the cannibalized GK trucks were replaced. There was a day when the local dispensary ambulance pulled up at Nambale Primary school. I thought we had a medical emergency. Then out came the Education Officer! The one working government vehicle in the village was the Nambale Health Centre Land Rover! 

Meanwhile two wheel-less “GK” Land Rovers stood on red square building blocks. Rainwater collected in the back metal bed, creating a breeding ground for mosquitoes.

 The local community did not make a fuss. It was, after all, the “government of Kenya” at work.

There is this day I was walking down to the shops with a friend. We stepped aside to let a speeding cyclist pedal past us. He was in a hurry, and rode over the bumps, seemingly without care. We watched him disappear, the wind puffing up the back of his shirt like a parachute. We then had this conversation between us. “Why is he riding that bicycle so roughly?” Response: “It must be a GK bicycle”. “No, GK does not have bicycles, just Land Rovers”. Long pause. “Then it must be a borrowed bicycle”. We agreed it was borrowed and that is why the rider did not care. At the young age of 11, I was already speaking the language that is the catalyst for tribalism and of corruption from village level right up to the very top seat of government.

So it is just a normal “working day” in Kenya when government run Kenya Creameries Corporation collapses, followed years later by Nyayo Bus Company among many other government parastatals.