Working towards a better life for #NairobiCounty residents and investors, @kideroevans, the leading ODM gubernatorial nominee, identifies with majority of residents as the most likely to be elected governor for various reasons.
As a resident of Nairobi I @KumekuchaPhil have no hesitation in sharing out my personal preference for ideal governor for Nairobi. Here we go:
ONE a middle-aged person aged between 30 to 50 years, with a proven respect for family values and one who meets all the preconditions set by the constitution especially the integrity and leadership chapter of the Constitution.
TWO the candidate ought to be preferabbly a person of mixed/multiple degree or equivalent qualification say a BCom graduate with additional legal or accountancy or IT training. Additional postgraduate qualifications, eg. MBA are definitely an added bonus.
THREE the candidate ought to be a well travelled person - at least to 5 international cities for professional purposes - especially to destinations that are much more developed than Nairobi County.
FOUR the candidate should have been CEO of a commercial enterprise for a period of no less than 5 years, during which time he/she must exhibit evidence of generating profits/revenue/growth, whilst successfully managing staff of at least 50 people.
FIVE In addition, the ideal candidate must have proven skill in leadership, communication and negotiation, presentation, management and operations.
SIX the candidate should not have a political or civil society activists or armed forces or religious background, unless that background was followed up by a 5 year stint working in commerce and industry, heading a corporation with similar traits as those shown above.
These requirements are by no means limited, but obviously they eliminate a host of aspiring candidates including a well known #KOT favourite.
Moving forward, here now is today's fact-laden governance lesson from Mr. Evans Kidero :
a) Business people in Nairobi ranked insecurity at 69.6% as undermining business.70% investors in Kenya indicate crime, theft and disorder as major concerns compared to 25% in Tanzania and 25% in Uganda. Attacks on business and individuals affect business viability, economic stability and social prosperity hence an impediment to development.
b) Insecurity discourages local as well as foreign investors from initiating, sustaining or enhancing business enterprises. In Nairobi the cost of insecurity on business is phenomenal considering the loss of revenue involved and the extra investment on security measures put in place.
c) 33% of Nairobi firms identified insecurity as a major problem which accounts to losses of about 4% equivalent in annual sales, and up to 3% operating costs go towards security enhancement, private security services and other security upgrades. This implies the cost of doing business in Nairobi is high. Hence Nairobians have a paralyzing fear and siege mentality created out of insecurity. This is my prescription towards minimizing this problem;
Solution 1: Create a Monitoring Unit within the City Council of Nairobi, Ministry of Local Government and Provincial Administration to check the alarming rate of slum expansion.
Solution 2: Generally, increase police visibility in the Nairobi County. Police visibility is an acknowledged strategy to deter criminal behavior.
Solution 3: Create employment programmes and/or labor intensive technologies to absorb the youth and address unemployment.
Solution 4: Enhance the capacity of the City Inspectorate to play the role of a Metropolitan Police with powers to enforce law and order.
Solution 5: Ensure collaboration between the City Council of Nairobi, Ministry of Local Government and Nairobi Metropolitan Ministry to upscale street and neighborhood lighting.
Solution 6: Make it a requirement for developers to include security lighting in their premises.
#NairobiCounty #NairobiCounty #NairobiCounty
The political promises currently being made to our youth about jobs , for example, at political rallies are, on the surface, indications of good socio-economic awareness. It is good to see that our politicians know what is ailing our country socially and economically. The creation of jobs for the youth is a critical component of what is required for the realization of Kenya’s vision 2030. The youth, understood to encompass young people in general, constitute more than 50% of the population of Kenya. Indeed some studies and reports put this figure as high as 74%. Considering the fact that this is the most productive age bracket, it makes a lot of political sense to worry about what is happening to our youth.
ReplyDeleteHowever, in the many political promises being made to the youth regarding jobs, candidates hardly outline how the promises will be achieved. Kenyans still remember vividly the promise of 150,000 jobs a year made in 2002 by the NARC coalition – a promise that never came to pass. The electorate was taken for a ride by the political class that had no intentions of creating the jobs they promised in their campaign. In the current constitutional dispensation we need to hold politicians accountable on what they promise in their manifestos and public utterances.
That is why I feel excited about being in the Evans Kidero Nairobi gubernatorial campaign. I believe this candidate has hit the employment nail on the head. In my private discussions with him, he puts his finger on four things that Nairobi County must do to help create the jobs required to bring Nairobi to a middle-income economy as envisioned in our national master plan, the vision 2030. The first point is to attract direct foreign investments (DFI) to the Nairobi County. The reality on the ground is that we are currently not attracting enough of DFI to help create the jobs required. This leads to the second point: since investors tend to avoid a city that has a high crime rate, to get the necessary DFI we must sort out the insecurity in Nairobi. In this regard, his concept is to reduce the number of police officers who control traffic, and instead employ traffic marshals and work closely with the national government to turn the city inspectorate department into a metropolitan police force.
The third point is based on the fact that the cost of power is too high in Nairobi: 1 Kilowatt Hour costs 25 US cents while in Johannesburg and Cairo it is 7 US cents and 4 US cents respectively. This high cost of power deters investors who would otherwise want to set up manufacturing concerns in Nairobi. To sort this out, we would do well to turn the Dandora dumpsite into an electricity-generating plant and reduce the cost of power in Nairobi substantially. Several reports have been tabled in City Hall discussions suggesting the same but there seems to have been no administrative will to implement this noble idea.
To make the vision 2030 a reality, we need to industrialize our country, the easiest point of entry being the juakali sector where we have our cars repaired, jikos and sufurias fabricated, and even pangas and jembes made. If we standardize the products from the juakali industry, make sure that all pangas are