Can the poor stand up and be counted?

It is so hard to find one rich man in pain with a satisfied mind. The Bongo Flava generation may not know it but these are lyrics from a song by Porter Waggoner.

He says that money can’t buy you youth when you’re old, or a friend when you are lonely or love that has grown cold. According to him, “the wealthiest person is a pauper at times”.

Despite such words of encouragement to the poor, world leaders are determined to reduce poverty by half in the next seven years and plant the seeds of prosperity in every village and town. They believe that if you tackle poverty first, all the other things will be added unto you. Which is a good philosophy no matter how you look at it.

The only challenge comes when it is time to decide who is poor and who is not.

If you have been following the news lately, you might have heard that a group of MPs from Nyanza have blocked the Planning ministry from releasing a report showing the distribution of poverty across the country.

The MPs happen to have seen the report before everybody else and they are not happy with the findings. According to them, it has been doctored to show that poverty is declining in Nyanza.

Until recently, that part of the country was only better off than North Eastern Province, arguably the driest and most needy part of the country. Never mind that Nyanza exports fish worth of Sh4 billion every year and is home to the third largest fresh water lake in the world, which is also the lifeline of the land of the pharaohs.

The MPs have refused to be satisfied with the findings which show that their constituents are doing relatively well financially and their pockets are getting deeper. According to them, this is a ploy to ensure that the region does not receive its fair share of the national cake.

But this is not the first time that reports on poverty levels have caused dissatisfaction.

Before 2002, there appeared to be a general agreement that 56 per cent of Kenyans were living below the poverty line. No. That is not the equator or some other imaginary line on the map. It is an indicator by the World Bank and other people with loads of cash that politely describes people who live on less than Sh70 a day.

Last year, there was an uproar when the then Planning minister, Mr Henry Obwocha, said that the number of the absolute poor had been reduced to 46 per cent. Politicians were supposed to have clapped for him but instead, he only got brickbats and was accused of doctoring the figures.

Even Kabete’s Paul Muite protested, saying his constituency had been ranked as “the least poor” and not the richest.

Although all the politicians agreed that the economy had grown, they also said that a few people were feeling the benefits. It had not trickled down to the masses. So there was no way the number of poor people would have gone down.

It must be that the scientists and demographers employed by the Planning ministry are using the wrong tools to measure poverty or they are blind. There can be no other explanation why their findings are being greeted with disbelief.

So, who is poor and who is not?

According to the World Bank, if you spend less than Sh70 a day, you are absolutely poor. Few know how the bank arrived at this figure but it is gratifying to note that a new breed of thinkers is questioning this wisdom.

Take the example of a grandmother who lives in rural Kenya. If she wants milk, she milks her cow, which in all likelihood is called Nguno.

If she wants to cook ugali, she goes to the granary, gets one “gorogoro” of maize and mills it at the village posho mill. If she wants greens, she picks them in the garden behind her house. If she wants fuel, she uses wood from the nearby forest. The only things she has to buy to make a meal is cooking oil and salt. She spends less than a dollar a day, but is she poor?

Yet an office messenger in the city who earns Sh15,000 a month might face a bigger financial crunch because he has to pay rent, take a bus, buy lunch and spend more money on other incidentals including human hair for his sweetheart. Does the fact that he has a bigger income make him less poor than the village granny?

A recent study carried out at a community wildlife sanctuary in Narok had startling revelations about wealth distribution. It said that herders were poorer than farmers. These in turn, were poorer than those who were engaged in business.

So, if you are a herder and you want say bye bye to poverty, better start shopping for a jembe and some seeds. And if you are a farmer, don’t just sell your produce at the gate of your farm. Seek higher prices elsewhere. Or become a middleman.

If you are in employment, upgrade your skills and move to the next level.

Alternatively, you can borrow a leaf from financial advisor Manyara Karago. He says that if you want to grow richer you should spend less than you earn and save the difference. It is a simple and sound strategy but the real test is in making it work for you, especially at a time when we are all battling with inflation and parents have to pay for the damage that their children caused when they burnt down their schools last term.

But whatever method you use to cross the valley of poverty, remember that being poor has its joys, and as Porter Waggoner said, the wealthiest person is a pauper at times.

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Lakes and forests our finest temples

I have a theory. I believe that the state of a country’s game parks, rivers and other natural habitats can tell you about the values of that country’s people.

If the people have lost their values or their society is decaying, you can tell by just looking at the state of their rivers and forests.

From my observations, countries with lower corruption levels care more about the environment than those that are caught in the miasma of graft.

Garden of Eden
Their forests are larger, their rivers cleaner and their lakes magical experiences that remind you of the Garden of Eden.

I would not have stumbled upon this insight had I not read Edwin Bernbaum’s essay, “The Spiritual and Cultural Significance of National Parks”.

According to him, “these sanctuaries of unspoiled nature represent places of spiritual renewal where we can return to the source of our being”.

Now I can understand why traditional societies declared the forests, mountains and other natural habitats into places of abode for their gods.

In this way, these features remained sacred and were preserved because people are not likely to destroy or deface their places of worship.

But once they stop seeing God when they enter a forest, they will most likely cut down the trees. And once they have lost their values, they will no longer respect their rivers and lakes.

Instead, they turn them into dumping sites.

As such, the battle to preserve the environment can not be won on the political front alone. It also has to be fought as a moral crusade.
It is one thing to fence off nature parks and clean up the rivers but it is another to get those living near them to respect these sacred places in the long term.

Mr Bernbaum, in paying tribute to American conservationist John Muir had this to say: That when Mr Muir was pushing to establish the Yosemite National Park in California, he said the Yosemite Valley was “a temple far finer than any made by human hands”.

Inspire awe

I have been to many places of worship in the world, including the Cathedral of Cologne — where the bones of the three wise men are preserved — and the Pagoda of Miyajima — where the ashes of Buddhas are kept.

But no building can inspire the awe and tranquility I experience when ever I get the opportunity to visit the temples of nature; be they ragged mountains, frothy rivers or wild forests.

As Mr Bernbaum noted, these habitats “provide us with some of the most beautiful, majestic and awe-inspiring places on earth”. Let us conserve them.

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The true test of courage

Many things have happened in this country since voters went to the polls on December 27, last year.

Some of the things have been good, some not so good and some outright terrible. But we have to find a way to put all that behind us.

A colleague pointed out one way to do this through a fable.

He said that a donkey fell into a well and the owner could not get it out. Eventually, he decided to bury it. He called his neighbours to help put the animal out of its misery. But they noticed that after some time, the donkey stopped braying.

When they looked they noticed that the donkey was shaking off the soil being piled on it and the mound reduced the depth of the well. And as the well filled up, the donkey made its way up. Eventually, it jumped out.

Which reminded me of an old saying. That the true test of our courage is not in falling but in rising up again every time we fall.

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Out of Africa

Last week, something heart-warming happened in West Africa.

Nigeria finally agreed to give up its claim to the oil-rich Bakassi peninsula which has been at the heart of a long-standing dispute between that country and Cameroon.

The end of the conflict was evidence that the African continent can find amicable ways to solve some of the problems afflicting it.

Interestingly, many of the people who were living in this area have decided that they are Nigerians and have been leaving the peninsula in droves and crossing the border into Nigeria.

Which means that the sacrifice “our broddas” made has won them the respect of the people.

Now, the country must confront the challenge of ensuring that its citizens benefit from its enormous oil resources to end the intermittent clashes that have turned its Niger Delta into a war zone.