Dear All,
Today was an interesting day, as the counselors from the Friends Church Peace Teams (FCPT) visited the internally displaced people's (IDP) camp at Turbo.
About a week ago, Jodi Richmond of Friends Theological College did a training at the Lubao Center for about thirty plus Friends who had some counseling skills. The plan was for them to then go to the Turbo IDP camp and counsel some of the 4,000 people still at the camp. About thirty of these counselors (six were experienced AVP facilitators plus three youth from the IDP camp that we trained as AVP facilitators just last week) showed up at the Turbo post office and were taken to the IDP camp. The counselors were divided into four groups--children, youth, women, and men.
While the concept was that each counselor would have five people in his/her group, the reality was that most groups had about fifteen. The number of children was overwhelming. They were divided up into three or four age groups and still there were 100 or more in each group. The counseling sessions were done out in an open field. People just stood or sat down on appropriate ridges or rocks - a few school benches were brought out. All told, I think that including the children there were at least one thousand people participating. The youth and adults talked in their groups for at least two hours!!!
As part of the program the FCPT brought some food for distribution. Gladys and I (with others) had gone there the previous week to make the last distribution of the relief supplies we had for the Lumakanda people. We were told that we could no longer give relief directly to the Lumakanda people. What we brought each time was a very small amount for 4000 people. Instead we are now to give it to the Red Cross who will distribute it to a select group--elderly people it was determined. So today the FCPT relief supplies had to be given to the Red Cross, and so it was done. During the counseling time, one group of men required me to come speak to them. Their concern was that if the food was given to the Red Cross it would be sold off and not given out in the camps. At another time two men had told shared the same concern with me. They wanted us to distribute the food right then and there ourselves because they said that those bringing the food would not be stealing it.
Will the Turbo IDP's receive the goods the FCPT gave them? We left the list with George Njoroge, the camp's IDP chairman. I'll ask him and others when I see them next.
On March 22 The Daily Nation had a four page advertisement placed by the Red Cross telling of their work during the crisis including and long lists of everyone who had contributed.
Okay, let us see how the Americans did.
-- American Red Cross--3,250,000/
-- Netherlands Red Cross--147,000,000/ (45 times more than the Americans)
-- Canadian Red Cross--6,876,228/- (more than twice as much).
Under "Governments" they listed
-- USAID--12,543,600/
-- British Government (DFID)--135,000,000/ (11 times more than USAID).
Is American generosity for places in distress really only a myth? Americans, by this measure, were sure far from generous in the relief in Kenya!
But then the Red Cross reports in this advertisement: "This has enabled humanitarian aid to reach each person in IDP camps countrywide." Yet all the previous distributions by the Friends Church Peace Team were made to IDP's who had not been served by the Red Cross. Person after person reported that the Red Cross trucks passed them by and never helped them out. The IDP's who are not Kikuyu claim that the Red Cross (at least in Western Province) only served the Kikuyu and neglected anyone from other ethnic groups.
As part of this effort, Kaimosi Hospital rented an ambulance and sent their head nurse, Irene Gulavi, with some medicines. I wasn't sure if this was necessary because the Government had a clinic at the camp. How wrong I was! She had a long line of people waiting for her services and she was still working away when the rest of us left after 3:00 p.m. This clearly indicated that the Government clinic was not working properly. When I asked folks whom I knew, I was told that the Government clinic had no medicine and so they just wrote a prescription for people to go buy the medicine. But since the refugees didn't have any money to buy the medicine, they didn't. So, in the end, I was sure glad that Irene came.
I talked with a number of the FCPT counselors following their sessions with the IDPs and I heard the following:
1. The youth were still very bitter and could easily be goaded into attacking and killing others.
2. The young women in the camp were being solicited by some of the policemen in the station, and with few other sources of income, some of them were falling into prostitution.
3. Almost no one wanted to go back to their home communities because they knew the people who destroyed their houses; they could see their possessions in the houses of their neighbors. Whenever they visited their former home, for one reason or another, they were asked why they were coming back. When I asked some where they wanted to go, they responded that they wanted the Government to buy land for them in places like Nakuru--which, in my opinion, was perhaps even worse than the Lugari area!
4. One person asked the FCPT counselor why there were no Nandi (the local Kalenjin group that did much of the trouble in the area) in our team. Another asked why the Luhya (the group that most Friends belong to and most of the counselors were from, and the majority population in Lugari District) did not help them out when they were attacked. Interesting questions!
5. Many of the IDP's were very angry with certain Nandi politicians whom they claimed incited people to force them out of their land, homes, and businesses.
I think that the day was a real eye-opener for the thirty or so Friends' counselors. Everyone is supposed to make a report of what they did and learned and on May 2 there will be a committee meeting to discuss this and to discern the way forward. Then the following week there will be another two-day retreat for all the counselors.
I have been asked to be the Chair of the FCPT counseling group!!! I asked them to get someone else, but they ended up selecting me anyway. I didn't think I could really refuse since this is the work I am supposed to be doing.
For me the most poignant time of the day was when we were in the field and I noticed a small toy compound obviously made by the kids. It was built solely of dirt, rocks, and twigs! Quite neatly and nicely done--much more like the home they fled than the IDP camp.
Peace,
Dave
David Zarembka, Coordinator
African Great Lakes Initiative of the Friends Peace Teams
Wednesday, April 23, 2008
Apr 17 - Rept 42 - David Zarembka - AGLI UPDATE - Multi-ethnic trainings have begun
Dear All,
After writing so many words on the political, social, and economic conditions here in Kenya, I thought I would to update you on what AGLI is doing about all this.
Through our partner, Friends for Peace and Community Development and their Friends Peace Centre-Lubao, AVP in western Kenya plans on doing at least 200 AVP workshops (mostly with youth) in the next six months. We plan on doing ten to twenty workshops in a community so that the program can make a useful impact. We will focus on Western, Nyanza, and northern Rift Valley provinces. This is a huge undertaking as it means an average of 33 AVP workshops per month--the most we had done in the past was during the AVP program with the gacaca judges in Rwanda when we did about 6 per month. Not counting this week, we have done 15.
This goal presents numerous challenges.
First, we need to have a sufficient number of facilitators. We have increased the AVP staff at the Friends Peace Center--Lubao from one, Getry Agizah, the AVP coordinator, to five, by adding Peter Serete, Bernard Onjala, Eunice Okwemba, and Caleb Amunya. These are the lead facilitators who can go off with two other facilitators and conduct a quality workshop. We are already in the process of developing additional lead facilitators, but we also need more regular facilitators. In some cases we have "re-found" facilitators that we had trained in the past.
We are beginning to correct one of our problems. Almost all Quakers in Kenya are of the Luhya ethnic group and of the above facilitators only Bernard Onjala is not a Luhya (he is a Luo). AVP had already trained a group of Luo facilitators in Nyanza Province from the organization that Onjala is affiliated with--ARO, which is sponsored by Norwegians. The AVP group there has just turned in enrollment forms for 360 youth, that means 18 three-day basic AVP workshops, in Bondo, and in Kisumu, the city on Lake Victoria most hard-hit by the violence. Next week they will begin conducting four workshops per week.
We have no Kikuyu facilitators in western Kenya. This week we are also conducting another Training for Facilitators (T4F). We have invited three Kikuyu youth from our first training at the Turbo IDP camp, together with three of the youth from the village AVP here in Lumakanda (two Luhya and one Luo), to participate. All of these youth took the advanced AVP workshop last week and we received reports indicating that all of them were very "active" (the word used here to indicate that they will be good facilitators). Of course not everyone works out, but this will be a start. We have already started using multi-ethnic teams as much as possible, but this is an area where we need to drastic improvement. The T4F will include five students from Friends Theological College who will be graduating in June and whom we hope to use to meet the increased demand for AVP workshops among Kenyan Quakers .
It is most important that we carefully monitor the quality of the workshops. Conducting this large number of workshops with many new facilitators, we need to do our utmost to insure that the quality of the workshops does not deteriorate.
There is a group of four Australians who have built a small guest house in Shinyalu, about 10 miles from Kakamega, called Takatifu (holy) Gardens. It is affiliated with Central (Kenya) Yearly Meeting. We have made an arrangement with them to use their guest house and are now holding two AVP workshops per week there. These can be residential, meaning the participants can stay overnight and do not have to travel home and return each morning. Therefore we have a new plan. We do the basic AVP workshops out in the community and then bring 4 of the most "active" participants to a residential Advanced Workshop at Takatifu Gardens. In rural areas most people are of the same ethnic group, so basic workshops tend not to have an ethnic mix. Bringing together people from various areas will allow us to have multi-ethnic advanced workshops. A nice part of this arrangement is that AVP supplies the facilitators and materials, while Takatifu Gardens supplies the space, food, and when needed, lodging.
I could go on and on, but you get the gist. Getry Agizah is an amazing organizer. Moreover in a culture where everyone wants to "negotiate" (i.e., overcharge), she is adamantly frugal. We have developed a menu for the workshop meals, are in the process of costing out the menu precisely, have established a limit ($300) on expenses for each workshop, etc. We do not pay for space. If the community wants the AVP workshop, they must provide the space.
While we have received a good response for funding these workshops, additional donations are still needed. If we receive even more funds, beyond those needed for workshops currently planned, then we will be able to offer additional workshops. Donations can be made by writing a check to FPT/AGLI with a memo of "Kenya Reconciliation" and mailing it to Friends Peace Teams/AGLI, 1001 Park Avenue, St Louis, MO 63104 USA or using a credit card on our webpage, www.aglionline.org. Thanks for the consideration.
Peace,
Dave
David Zarembka, Coordinator
African Great Lakes Initiative of the Friends Peace Teams
After writing so many words on the political, social, and economic conditions here in Kenya, I thought I would to update you on what AGLI is doing about all this.
Through our partner, Friends for Peace and Community Development and their Friends Peace Centre-Lubao, AVP in western Kenya plans on doing at least 200 AVP workshops (mostly with youth) in the next six months. We plan on doing ten to twenty workshops in a community so that the program can make a useful impact. We will focus on Western, Nyanza, and northern Rift Valley provinces. This is a huge undertaking as it means an average of 33 AVP workshops per month--the most we had done in the past was during the AVP program with the gacaca judges in Rwanda when we did about 6 per month. Not counting this week, we have done 15.
This goal presents numerous challenges.
First, we need to have a sufficient number of facilitators. We have increased the AVP staff at the Friends Peace Center--Lubao from one, Getry Agizah, the AVP coordinator, to five, by adding Peter Serete, Bernard Onjala, Eunice Okwemba, and Caleb Amunya. These are the lead facilitators who can go off with two other facilitators and conduct a quality workshop. We are already in the process of developing additional lead facilitators, but we also need more regular facilitators. In some cases we have "re-found" facilitators that we had trained in the past.
We are beginning to correct one of our problems. Almost all Quakers in Kenya are of the Luhya ethnic group and of the above facilitators only Bernard Onjala is not a Luhya (he is a Luo). AVP had already trained a group of Luo facilitators in Nyanza Province from the organization that Onjala is affiliated with--ARO, which is sponsored by Norwegians. The AVP group there has just turned in enrollment forms for 360 youth, that means 18 three-day basic AVP workshops, in Bondo, and in Kisumu, the city on Lake Victoria most hard-hit by the violence. Next week they will begin conducting four workshops per week.
We have no Kikuyu facilitators in western Kenya. This week we are also conducting another Training for Facilitators (T4F). We have invited three Kikuyu youth from our first training at the Turbo IDP camp, together with three of the youth from the village AVP here in Lumakanda (two Luhya and one Luo), to participate. All of these youth took the advanced AVP workshop last week and we received reports indicating that all of them were very "active" (the word used here to indicate that they will be good facilitators). Of course not everyone works out, but this will be a start. We have already started using multi-ethnic teams as much as possible, but this is an area where we need to drastic improvement. The T4F will include five students from Friends Theological College who will be graduating in June and whom we hope to use to meet the increased demand for AVP workshops among Kenyan Quakers .
It is most important that we carefully monitor the quality of the workshops. Conducting this large number of workshops with many new facilitators, we need to do our utmost to insure that the quality of the workshops does not deteriorate.
There is a group of four Australians who have built a small guest house in Shinyalu, about 10 miles from Kakamega, called Takatifu (holy) Gardens. It is affiliated with Central (Kenya) Yearly Meeting. We have made an arrangement with them to use their guest house and are now holding two AVP workshops per week there. These can be residential, meaning the participants can stay overnight and do not have to travel home and return each morning. Therefore we have a new plan. We do the basic AVP workshops out in the community and then bring 4 of the most "active" participants to a residential Advanced Workshop at Takatifu Gardens. In rural areas most people are of the same ethnic group, so basic workshops tend not to have an ethnic mix. Bringing together people from various areas will allow us to have multi-ethnic advanced workshops. A nice part of this arrangement is that AVP supplies the facilitators and materials, while Takatifu Gardens supplies the space, food, and when needed, lodging.
I could go on and on, but you get the gist. Getry Agizah is an amazing organizer. Moreover in a culture where everyone wants to "negotiate" (i.e., overcharge), she is adamantly frugal. We have developed a menu for the workshop meals, are in the process of costing out the menu precisely, have established a limit ($300) on expenses for each workshop, etc. We do not pay for space. If the community wants the AVP workshop, they must provide the space.
While we have received a good response for funding these workshops, additional donations are still needed. If we receive even more funds, beyond those needed for workshops currently planned, then we will be able to offer additional workshops. Donations can be made by writing a check to FPT/AGLI with a memo of "Kenya Reconciliation" and mailing it to Friends Peace Teams/AGLI, 1001 Park Avenue, St Louis, MO 63104 USA or using a credit card on our webpage, www.aglionline.org. Thanks for the consideration.
Peace,
Dave
David Zarembka, Coordinator
African Great Lakes Initiative of the Friends Peace Teams
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Apr 8 - David Zarembka - Update on AVP activities
This is David Z's summary of approximately 150 workshops AVP is currently doing in Western Kenya. It's a huge and laudable undertaking. Read on! (Mary)
AVP – Kenya
David Zaremka
Here are activities that we have done and are doing here in Kenya
1. Takatifu Gardens: "Takatifu" means "holy." This is a group of four Australians who are semi-Quakers. They somehow got connected with Central Yearly Meeting (that is here in Kenya, not the one in the US). About two years ago, they started building a small place in a town, Shinyalu, about 10 miles from Kakamega. It is very nicely constructed. Before the violence their place (which can sleep 24 with six to a room) was used for volunteers from overseas and from Kenya itself. Their program was a lending library of mostly Christian books to the children in the schools in the area.
During the violence there were almost no volunteers to host, so they got the idea of doing AVP workshops in their space. We quickly agreed. They have already done eight basic workshops, mostly for people in their community. Our arrangement is that they cover all the participants' costs (food is the biggest item) and AVP covers the facilitator costs.
We have used the workshops there to give additional experience to some of our beginning facilitators. Already three have moved from beginners to experienced. Next week we will have two residential advanced workshops. We have changed the concept here. Formerly we would do some basic workshops in an area and then do an advanced workshop with the best participants from the basic workshops. We now plan on doing some of the advanced workshops at Takatifu and bring four or five people from various basic workshops we have done in different communities so that people from different parts of western Kenya will be brought together. I think this is a nice development.
2. Buchifi Community Center: Brad Ogilvie, who works at William Penn House in Washington, DC., has connected with us. He has an organization called the Mosaic Initiative. It's goal is "Through our three initiatives, we bring together people from all walks of life, and touch on near and far corners of the world. We work with these individuals and groups to identify common goals aimed at preventing the spread of HIV and promoting unity in our communities. The creative partners and coalitions are committed to working closely with treatment and care organizations to insure that the newly and previously diagnosed people with HIV receive compassionate and appropriate services, while also working diligently to overcome the economic and social conditions that feed the perpetuation of HIV and other preventable diseases."
One of these initiatives is to support Buchifi Community Center here in Kenya. Their contact person is named Eluid Ojenge. What I find interesting is that unlike most AIDS prevention programs, which focus only on prevention, the Mosaic Initiative sees that AIDS will be best prevented by solving many problems in a community, including poverty and, in the current situation in Kenya, peace. As such Brad, who was receiving my updates from Kenya, asked if we could do AVP workshops with youth in the Buchifi community. The Mosaic Initiative has sent us funds to do some workshops and we will be starting with the first two next week.
3. AVP-Turkana: WE have been trying to introduce AVP to the Turkana and Pokot in northern Kenya. These are pastoral peoples whose youth frequently steal each other’s cows and engage in running battles. Due to various circumstances we were unable to implement the program. Finally at the end of March we were able to do the first two AVP basic workshops which went well. We will now be bringing three Pokot and three Turkana to one of the advanced workshops next week at Takatifu Gardens and then for a training of facilitators at the Lubao Center.
4. Lugari District: Here we have done one AVP basic workshop with youth from the Lumakanda community, and as I write we are doing the first AVP basic in the Turbo Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camp nearby. We plan to do another basic in the community and another in the IDP camp, and then do at least two advanced workshops bringing the two groups together. We will also do AVP workshops in other areas of Lugari District.
5. ARO: This is a center near Bondo in Nyanza Province (Luo rather than Luhya). Getry, Eunice and I visited it yesterday. This center is supported by the Norwegians, and its purpose is poverty eradication and peace-building. They have done a lot on the poverty eradication with many interesting projects. They have outreach branches in the communty around them. Our AVP staff member, Bernard Onjala, is affiliated with this organization. Recently twelve of the AVP participants went to an IDP camp in Kisumu, mostly of Luo who were attacked in Naivasha and Nakuru, to counsel them. They have a picture, with all of them and an about five-year-old boy who watched the attackers cut of the heads of both his parents! Their AVP program is to do the workshops with youth in five of their branches. This ought to start in about two weeks.
6. Chwele Yearly Meeting: Chwele Yearly Meeting is right below the conflict on Mt Elgon. The conflict is coming down the mountain and already has impacted their area. We have approved a proposal to do ten AVP basic workshops with youth in ten different Friends churches in the yearly meeting.
7. Uzima Foundation: Janet Ifedha, who is the Uzima Foundation coordinator in Western Province and an experienced AVP facilitator, has given us a proposal to do 20 workshop with the bicycle taxi drivers in three communities near Kakamega. These will begin as soon as they are arranged. Uzima had developed their own youth facilitators.
8. Lubao Peace Centre: The week after next we will hold a Training for Facilitators at the Lubao Centre. We will be bringing in the best participants from the various places we have done AVP, including Friends Theological College. Since we are doing so many workshops, we need to have more facilitators. Here is the advantage of having our own center. Normally a residential workshop would cost us around $1000 or more, but I expect that this one at Lubao will cost about $500, so this is saving us at least $500.
We badly need the office building that the workcampers started last summer. Barbara Myers and Dawn/Mark Amos have collected $6,000 to continue with the construction. The last rows of the bricks are being put on and then the roof. This will probably take all these funds, so we will still be needing others for doors, windows, plastering, etc.
At Adrien's request, because he would have just returned from his highly successful tour of the US, the HROC Healing Companion training has been postponed until the end of May. This will be at the Peace Centre.
9. Others: There are a number of other groups that are developing proposals for AVP with youth in their community. In Gladys's home village of Viyalo, the Rafiki Mwema (Good Friends) Women's Group, which is supported by Right Sharing of World Resources, is planning some AVP workshops for their members and then the youth in the area. The Friends Church in Eldoret will sponsor 20 workshops with youth. Twenty are also planned for Malava and 20 for Kimilili, which is also on Mt Elgon and the place from which many of the displaced people come. Not counting the workshops at Takatifu, Buchifi, and Lubao, the total is about 150 workshops. We also have one proposal expected from Kitale.
Comments: When people want to do a series of AVP workshops, we ask them for a proposal (we give them a form) which includes the venue, who the workshops are for, the responsible person/group, etc. and a budget.
Peace,
Dave
David Zarembka, Coordinator
African Great Lakes Initiative of the Friends Peace Teams
Saturday, April 5, 2008
Apr 4, Rpt #40, David Zarembka, Will present greed lead to future violence?
Sent: Friday, April 04, 2008 7:56 AM
Dear All,
Last week Val Liveoak sent me an email asking about an article she had read which told of the frenzy in Kenya to buy Safaricom shares. Since this really is an indication of what is wrong with Kenya, let me discuss it in detail.
Safaricom is the most profitable company in East Africa. It is a cell phone company that just passed the 10 million mark in customers. Celtel, the other cell phone company, has 2 to 3 million subscribers. Since there are only 34 million people in Kenya, at least one out of three people has a cell phone. You can buy a cell phone for $30 now (and probably much less if you get a stolen one). Calls are billed by the second and only the sender is charged. The charge is high at 21 cents per minute (but there are lots of plan variations). To call the US is 38 cents per minute. So they make a lot of profit. On the other hand they have been a very creative and innovative company. I think that they were the first company in Africa to enable people to send money through their cell phones.
Currently the Kenyan Government owns 60% of the company shares. They are selling 25% of the shares at 5/- each (7.5 cents) and the minimum purchase is 2,000 shares for a total cost of $150. The total for sale of 25% is then 50 billion shillings or almost $800 million. Presently there are 800,000 Kenyans who own shares on the Nairobi stock exchange. The prediction is that this offer will be oversubscribed by 4 times -- 3,000,000 Kenyans. If you have a job, you can go to any bank (big ads in the papers) and borrow 10,000/- or more to buy shares. The banks never say what the costs of these loans are. [NOTE /- is the symbol for Kenyan shilling.]
These 3,000,000 Kenyans (almost 10% of the population) are the middle and upper classes of Kenya. The reason for the frenzy here is GREED. People think that they can get the shares now at 5/- and sell them when they can be traded on the stock exchange in June for 10/-, 15/-, 20/- or even 200/- and make a tremendous profit without doing anything except pay back their loans if they have them.
Here are the problems with this reasoning.
First, this offer is gigantic in terms of the economy of Kenya. The 50 billion shillings times 4 (if oversubscribed) will sit in banks for the next three months while the offer is being processed. This is a huge amount of money that the banks are/will be sitting on, but which is not lendable. Therefore interest rates will rise.
Second, people are selling shares in other companies in order to buy Safaricom shares so the Nairobi stock exchange is depressed. (Frankly, if I were in the stock market business, I would not buy Safaricom shares, but the other companies whose shares are now undervalued. But I lack the GREED that Kenyans have.)
Safaricom has big, full-page advertisements in the paper. These include the risks involved which are not insignificant. First, the cell phone market in Kenya is now almost saturated so Safaricom cannot in the future grow at the rate it has in the past. Second, a third mobile phone company is entering the market sometime soon and will create more competition that may lower the costs to customers (as it should), but will also depress Safaricom's profits in the future. There are about twenty other risks mentioned, including the return of chaos to the country.
At the price of 5/- per share the impression is that the stock is cheap. But with 10 billion shares, 5/- may in fact be an overestimate of the value of the company. If you read the financial analysis of the offering in the business section, as I do, you will note that the shares may be vastly over-valued. In other words, what if in June the shares turn out to trade at only 3/- per share? Or 1/-? People will not be able to pay off their loans with the profits from their GREED, but will need to use their regular income to pay back the loan and its expenses. If this doomsday scenario happens much of the middle class will be in hock. If this happens they will think that they have been deceived by the Government, they will demand redress, and these demands could again turn into violence as the entire economy goes into real shock.
Raila Odinga and the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) are opposing the sale at this time. Their reasoning is as follows. A number of years ago the Kenyan Government sold 30% of their shares to Vodafone, a big British telecommunications company. But somehow or other a company called Mobitelea Ventures, which was registered in an offshore haven, ended up owning 5% (now it seems like it is 10%) of the shares of the most profitable company in East Africa. No one knows the identity of the officers or shareholders of Mobitelia. It seems clear that the owners of the Safaricom shares in this company are those politicians and high level civil servants who received bribes to complete the deal. This means that they are worth at 5/- per share, $160 million ( if 5% of the shares) or $320 (if 10% of the shares). This is Kenyan corruption on a grand scale. ODM wants the directors and shareholders of Mobitelea Ventures to be made public before the Safaricom shares are sold. It is easy to see why some people in the Kenyan Government did not want to give up their offices to the opposition which, during the election, promised to investigate this scandal and many others.
Do you remember the looting, burning, police repression, and death in January and February?
Kenya is back to normal, where GREED rules. This Safaricom sale is a clear indication that fundamentally, at the level of what needs to happen to reform this society, the conflict has already been forgotten. This is what happened in 1992 and 1997 when various politicians were assassinated, and what happened with the other simmering conflicts in the country.
As I noted in the last of my nine interpretation of the conflict here, this is a spiritual crisis. If people from top politicians and civil servants down to the many buying the Safaricom shares continue to put their own selfish interests ahead of the interest of the society and the country as a whole, then my friends, I think we will see another round of violence in a few years. Kenya needs to practice "Love your neighbor as yourself", "do unto others as you would have them do unto you," and other spiritual concepts that put others, society as a whole, ahead of GREED.
In response to the question that I posed in my March 30 report, Kenya's gift to America is
Barack Obama.
Peace,
Dave
David Zarembka, Coordinator
African Great Lakes Initiative of the Friends Peace Teams
Dear All,
Last week Val Liveoak sent me an email asking about an article she had read which told of the frenzy in Kenya to buy Safaricom shares. Since this really is an indication of what is wrong with Kenya, let me discuss it in detail.
Safaricom is the most profitable company in East Africa. It is a cell phone company that just passed the 10 million mark in customers. Celtel, the other cell phone company, has 2 to 3 million subscribers. Since there are only 34 million people in Kenya, at least one out of three people has a cell phone. You can buy a cell phone for $30 now (and probably much less if you get a stolen one). Calls are billed by the second and only the sender is charged. The charge is high at 21 cents per minute (but there are lots of plan variations). To call the US is 38 cents per minute. So they make a lot of profit. On the other hand they have been a very creative and innovative company. I think that they were the first company in Africa to enable people to send money through their cell phones.
Currently the Kenyan Government owns 60% of the company shares. They are selling 25% of the shares at 5/- each (7.5 cents) and the minimum purchase is 2,000 shares for a total cost of $150. The total for sale of 25% is then 50 billion shillings or almost $800 million. Presently there are 800,000 Kenyans who own shares on the Nairobi stock exchange. The prediction is that this offer will be oversubscribed by 4 times -- 3,000,000 Kenyans. If you have a job, you can go to any bank (big ads in the papers) and borrow 10,000/- or more to buy shares. The banks never say what the costs of these loans are. [NOTE /- is the symbol for Kenyan shilling.]
These 3,000,000 Kenyans (almost 10% of the population) are the middle and upper classes of Kenya. The reason for the frenzy here is GREED. People think that they can get the shares now at 5/- and sell them when they can be traded on the stock exchange in June for 10/-, 15/-, 20/- or even 200/- and make a tremendous profit without doing anything except pay back their loans if they have them.
Here are the problems with this reasoning.
First, this offer is gigantic in terms of the economy of Kenya. The 50 billion shillings times 4 (if oversubscribed) will sit in banks for the next three months while the offer is being processed. This is a huge amount of money that the banks are/will be sitting on, but which is not lendable. Therefore interest rates will rise.
Second, people are selling shares in other companies in order to buy Safaricom shares so the Nairobi stock exchange is depressed. (Frankly, if I were in the stock market business, I would not buy Safaricom shares, but the other companies whose shares are now undervalued. But I lack the GREED that Kenyans have.)
Safaricom has big, full-page advertisements in the paper. These include the risks involved which are not insignificant. First, the cell phone market in Kenya is now almost saturated so Safaricom cannot in the future grow at the rate it has in the past. Second, a third mobile phone company is entering the market sometime soon and will create more competition that may lower the costs to customers (as it should), but will also depress Safaricom's profits in the future. There are about twenty other risks mentioned, including the return of chaos to the country.
At the price of 5/- per share the impression is that the stock is cheap. But with 10 billion shares, 5/- may in fact be an overestimate of the value of the company. If you read the financial analysis of the offering in the business section, as I do, you will note that the shares may be vastly over-valued. In other words, what if in June the shares turn out to trade at only 3/- per share? Or 1/-? People will not be able to pay off their loans with the profits from their GREED, but will need to use their regular income to pay back the loan and its expenses. If this doomsday scenario happens much of the middle class will be in hock. If this happens they will think that they have been deceived by the Government, they will demand redress, and these demands could again turn into violence as the entire economy goes into real shock.
Raila Odinga and the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) are opposing the sale at this time. Their reasoning is as follows. A number of years ago the Kenyan Government sold 30% of their shares to Vodafone, a big British telecommunications company. But somehow or other a company called Mobitelea Ventures, which was registered in an offshore haven, ended up owning 5% (now it seems like it is 10%) of the shares of the most profitable company in East Africa. No one knows the identity of the officers or shareholders of Mobitelia. It seems clear that the owners of the Safaricom shares in this company are those politicians and high level civil servants who received bribes to complete the deal. This means that they are worth at 5/- per share, $160 million ( if 5% of the shares) or $320 (if 10% of the shares). This is Kenyan corruption on a grand scale. ODM wants the directors and shareholders of Mobitelea Ventures to be made public before the Safaricom shares are sold. It is easy to see why some people in the Kenyan Government did not want to give up their offices to the opposition which, during the election, promised to investigate this scandal and many others.
Do you remember the looting, burning, police repression, and death in January and February?
Kenya is back to normal, where GREED rules. This Safaricom sale is a clear indication that fundamentally, at the level of what needs to happen to reform this society, the conflict has already been forgotten. This is what happened in 1992 and 1997 when various politicians were assassinated, and what happened with the other simmering conflicts in the country.
As I noted in the last of my nine interpretation of the conflict here, this is a spiritual crisis. If people from top politicians and civil servants down to the many buying the Safaricom shares continue to put their own selfish interests ahead of the interest of the society and the country as a whole, then my friends, I think we will see another round of violence in a few years. Kenya needs to practice "Love your neighbor as yourself", "do unto others as you would have them do unto you," and other spiritual concepts that put others, society as a whole, ahead of GREED.
In response to the question that I posed in my March 30 report, Kenya's gift to America is
Barack Obama.
Peace,
Dave
David Zarembka, Coordinator
African Great Lakes Initiative of the Friends Peace Teams
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