My sunshine has come And there's no more rain in this cloud Spring has come and winter's gone Not afraid because the seasons have changed I'm gonna count my blessing then just follow the sun -Angie Stone.
Yeeeeei! Then i remember i like rain but not the cold since i am allergic to the dust and my eyes cannot stand the glare of the sun for too long. Here is a toast to the sun...i am solar powered after all!!
wacha even me I see I have a career writing poems..
The days grow darker as the nights grow chill. The wind blows shrill as darkest nights grow chill. The wolves howl, the moon rises, as nights grow chill. Darkness dances as snowy winter falls. The swirling snow caught by the breeze slowly Falls, making snowy mounds over dark halls.
Sun, what sun? The weather outside matches my mood exactly: dreary.
But, I hope the sun in your life is metaphorical and you're simply glowing, not from the physical weather, but from the sunny happenings in your life :)
I got nyanganywad one of the departmental cars middle of the week just as the rain kwishad. Thank you Lord for the sunshine! Thanks Gish for making me appreciate.
A small axe to the Safaricom IPO By L. MUTHONI WANYEKI I am not the daughter of a Big Man. Neither am I married to a Big Man — or even to the son of a Big Man.
I had the good fortune to have essentially middle-class parents who worked hard to give my siblings and me a good basic education. And I had the good fortune to have a mother whose citizenship made it possible for me to attend university, courtesy of the student loans system of her country.
The student loans covered fees and accommodation. But my parents couldn’t afford to send us much money — getting $100 on birthdays and at Christmas was like getting a windfall. So I worked to supplement the student loans, from the time I left Kenya at the age of 16.
Of course, I now recognise that, despite not being associated with a big man’s family, in comparison with the majority of people in Kenya, I am not only fortunate, I am actually extremely privileged.
But, despite that recognition, having worked since the age of 16, I also know the value of my money. I have worked for what I have. This is why, for instance, I get apoplectic with rage about corruption.
Under Kenya’s ridiculously constructed tax brackets, I fall into the same top tax bracket as Kenya’s Big Men. And I get nothing for it, having to pay privately for everything—including security where I live and medical insurance. But, my privileges taken into account, I certainly wouldn’t mind paying the amounts of tax that I do pay if I felt the money went to help those with fewer privileges, not to pay the obscene salaries of those who cannot be bothered to assure the House of a quorum sufficient to pass even 10 Bills a year — or to build the “bigness” of the Big Men.
The other night, some friends and I calculated the share of Safaricom’s reported Ksh17 billion ($253.7 million) profit that would have gone to Mobitelea — the company that, according to the Public Investments Committee, is irregularly in possession of no less than five per cent of the mobile phone company’s shares, meaning that there are apparently no records of Mobitelea having paid for that shareholding.
MEANING THAT MY TAX MONEY, which went into building and sustaining Telkom and Safaricom, was essentially given away. Meaning that, coming back to our calculation, the alleged owners of Mobitelea — the son of a Big Man and the son-in-law of another Big Man under the former regime and a Big Man in this regime — earned themselves no less than Ksh850,000,000 ($12.6 million) last year alone. From doing nothing at all, except live off the profits of having stolen from us. Ksh850 million off my back (and your’s as well). Again, I am incapacitated with rage.
And yet, the Treasury insists that Safaricom’s initial public offer will proceed, regardless of the outcomes of the PIC debate within the House or any court cases that might ensue.
What?!
FRANKLY, DESPITE OUR NEWFOUND fascination with IPOs, I don’t think a single one of us should put a single shilling forward. Those of us who do work hard and honestly deserve better. If shares in Safaricom could essentially be given away to Big Men, their sons and sons-in laws, then they can be given away to us. Why should we pay for them? They’re our property in the first place, which the government was meant to hold in trust for us. If it breached that trust for three of us, then it should share the love with all of us.
It might not seem like it, but there are, in fact, victims of corruption. Those victims are you and me — every single Kenyan who dutifully pays his or her taxes. I’m furious. I’m ready for a tax boycott — the residential associations led the way and it’s time to scale up their efforts. We need to say to hell with that IPO until the issues raised by the PIC have been satisfactorily dealt with. We need to be the “small axes” that Robert Nestor Marley talked about and cut down all those “big trees.”
L. Muthoni Wanyeki is a political scientist based in Nairobi
Yeeeeei! Then i remember i like rain but not the cold since i am allergic to the dust and my eyes cannot stand the glare of the sun for too long. Here is a toast to the sun...i am solar powered after all!!
ReplyDeleteIs this in reference to the change in weather or changes in life? But anyway here its blazing hot!
ReplyDeleteGood! Way to go! Enjoy the sun...
ReplyDeleteyou ar emy sunshine...my only...yeah! it's great to have it back...lakini enyewe ni solar umefuerahia ama ni as kirima said?
ReplyDeletewacha even me I see I have a career writing poems..
ReplyDeleteThe days grow darker as the nights grow chill.
The wind blows shrill as darkest nights grow chill.
The wolves howl, the moon rises, as nights grow chill.
Darkness dances as snowy winter falls.
The swirling snow caught by the breeze slowly
Falls, making snowy mounds over dark halls.
** Ebu i go jobo ....***
Enjoy the sun while it lasts dear!!
ReplyDeleteSun, what sun? The weather outside matches my mood exactly: dreary.
ReplyDeleteBut, I hope the sun in your life is metaphorical and you're simply glowing, not from the physical weather, but from the sunny happenings in your life :)
Thanks am enjoying the sun both the one outside and inside. More in the next post.
ReplyDeleteenjoy your sun, gish.
ReplyDeletebtw very nice song by angie stone.
wow.magnificent
ReplyDeleteMore power to you ((((((Gish)))))
ReplyDeleteEnjoy to maximum - vitamin D ni muhimu (me thinks)
ReplyDeleteHebu see my twin bro still insisting to come out n play. si he expeired himself? Eish...LOL
ReplyDeleteEeh mami pray that the sun wont hide again and the rain shall not come. Enjoy to the fullest you deserve it. (((Ma Richi)).
ReplyDeleteMan... I just went through hurricane Dean, I definitely know what thats about.
ReplyDeleteI got nyanganywad one of the departmental cars middle of the week just as the rain kwishad. Thank you Lord for the sunshine!
ReplyDeleteThanks Gish for making me appreciate.
Like the song. Good to hear your sunshine came out.
ReplyDeleteI love this. So full of colour and happiness.
ReplyDeleteSeems you have some bright days in your life! that's good.
ReplyDeleteI know all about dark clouds so yeah, enjoy the sun :-)
ReplyDeleteMmmmmhhh.... keep the sun shining. That's a gud way to make our hearts mellower. keep the sun shining. what's been up?
ReplyDeleteA small axe to the Safaricom IPO
ReplyDeleteBy L. MUTHONI WANYEKI
I am not the daughter of a Big Man. Neither am I married to a Big Man — or even to the son of a Big Man.
I had the good fortune to have essentially middle-class parents who worked hard to give my siblings and me a good basic education. And I had the good fortune to have a mother whose citizenship made it possible for me to attend university, courtesy of the student loans system of her country.
The student loans covered fees and accommodation. But my parents couldn’t afford to send us much money — getting $100 on birthdays and at Christmas was like getting a windfall. So I worked to supplement the student loans, from the time I left Kenya at the age of 16.
Of course, I now recognise that, despite not being associated with a big man’s family, in comparison with the majority of people in Kenya, I am not only fortunate, I am actually extremely privileged.
But, despite that recognition, having worked since the age of 16, I also know the value of my money. I have worked for what I have. This is why, for instance, I get apoplectic with rage about corruption.
Under Kenya’s ridiculously constructed tax brackets, I fall into the same top tax bracket as Kenya’s Big Men. And I get nothing for it, having to pay privately for everything—including security where I live and medical insurance. But, my privileges taken into account, I certainly wouldn’t mind paying the amounts of tax that I do pay if I felt the money went to help those with fewer privileges, not to pay the obscene salaries of those who cannot be bothered to assure the House of a quorum sufficient to pass even 10 Bills a year — or to build the “bigness” of the Big Men.
The other night, some friends and I calculated the share of Safaricom’s reported Ksh17 billion ($253.7 million) profit that would have gone to Mobitelea — the company that, according to the Public Investments Committee, is irregularly in possession of no less than five per cent of the mobile phone company’s shares, meaning that there are apparently no records of Mobitelea having paid for that shareholding.
MEANING THAT MY TAX MONEY, which went into building and sustaining Telkom and Safaricom, was essentially given away. Meaning that, coming back to our calculation, the alleged owners of Mobitelea — the son of a Big Man and the son-in-law of another Big Man under the former regime and a Big Man in this regime — earned themselves no less than Ksh850,000,000 ($12.6 million) last year alone. From doing nothing at all, except live off the profits of having stolen from us. Ksh850 million off my back (and your’s as well). Again, I am incapacitated with rage.
And yet, the Treasury insists that Safaricom’s initial public offer will proceed, regardless of the outcomes of the PIC debate within the House or any court cases that might ensue.
What?!
FRANKLY, DESPITE OUR NEWFOUND fascination with IPOs, I don’t think a single one of us should put a single shilling forward. Those of us who do work hard and honestly deserve better. If shares in Safaricom could essentially be given away to Big Men, their sons and sons-in laws, then they can be given away to us. Why should we pay for them? They’re our property in the first place, which the government was meant to hold in trust for us. If it breached that trust for three of us, then it should share the love with all of us.
It might not seem like it, but there are, in fact, victims of corruption. Those victims are you and me — every single Kenyan who dutifully pays his or her taxes. I’m furious. I’m ready for a tax boycott — the residential associations led the way and it’s time to scale up their efforts. We need to say to hell with that IPO until the issues raised by the PIC have been satisfactorily dealt with. We need to be the “small axes” that Robert Nestor Marley talked about and cut down all those “big trees.”
L. Muthoni Wanyeki is a political scientist based in Nairobi
That is a lovely song :-)
ReplyDeleteso this was a song and not a poem .. kweli my makendes are in trouble....
ReplyDeleteangie stone has the most amazing talent.
ReplyDeletethe picture is priceless.
and even though it seems the mayor banned sunshine in new york this week, this got me sunny where it matters...
Gish ..this has just made my day!
ReplyDeletei love angie stone...that song in particular....
ReplyDelete