In time of grand coalition troubles, students offer lessons in leadership

Secondary school student leaders have put Kenya’s top leadership to shame by holding a successful national conference days after a small team of PNU and ODM negotiators failed to hold a crucial meeting on the state of the coalition government.

The 2,000 students held a five-day meeting that appears to have given a lesson to politicians on how to conduct meetings that can build consensus and find solutions to corruption and other ills facing the coalition.

The students who concluded the meeting at Nairobi’s Bomas of Kenya on Friday, spoke against graft and tribalism and sought ways to raise educational standards throughout the country. All provinces were represented at the inaugural meeting organised by the Kenya Secondary School Heads Association.

It stood in stark contrast to the aborted Kilaguni talks last weekend, in which PNU and ODM failed to agree on an agenda, throwing the country into another period of anxiety after the December 2007 presidential election deadlock that led to violence early 2008.

At the well-coordinated student conference there was consensus that the nation’s political leadership needs to put its house in order if crucial sectors such as education and health are to get back on track.

The last student to speak, Carolyne Mutisya of Mulongo girls school, Nyeri, asked MPs, through the chairman of the parliamentary committee on education, David Koech, to stop what she called politics of competition and show leadership.

“Tell your colleagues to learn and share (ideas), but not to compete to outdo and defeat each other,” said the 17-year-old, adding: “We (students) have shown that Kenyans can shun tribalism and tackle national issues”.

The chairman of the National Student Leaders Association, Joseph Muliro, said the conference had set an example which, he noted, should help the coalition partners steer the country out of the current political morass.

“Our participants were from different ethnic backgrounds, and the group was large, yet we have come up with good resolutions which we are determined to follow through to implementation,” he said.

The 2008 crisis

The Nairobi School Form Four student said it is a shame that political leaders have not learnt from the experience of last year’s crisis, “whose effects are still evident through famine and displaced families”. He added: “Many of our students and their families were displaced, and many are still in camps today as our leaders jostle for control of politics.”

Mr Muliro asked the coalition principals, President Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga, to return to the negotiating table and seek consensus “in much the same way as we have done”. Reading out the resolutions, Mr Muliro said the conference had agreed to promote and foster peace and patriotism as an agent of change in schools and the country at large.

A Limuru Girls Form Four student, Sharon Kaari, asked political leaders to concentrate on projects that would directly help people, including resettling thousands of internally displaced people. “I wish they could understand what ordinary Kenyans are going through,” she said. “Many of our colleagues are not in school because they are either hungry or were displaced from their homes by the 2007 elections,” said Ms Kaari, 17. “We students have shunned tribalism, and we urge our leaders to follow our example so that they may unite wananchi.”

Herman Bunde from Rongo district’s St Joseph’s Rapogi wondered why the leaders are not talking about solutions to students’ problems, such as the current shortage of teachers.

Many students, he noted, have no access to the Sh10,000 annual government allocation due to difficulties in state financing, “yet the coalition partners are not providing solutions”. Instead, “we are only seeing corruption scandals coming up at a time many people are going without food.”

Integrity in ministry

He asked the Education ministry to ensure integrity begins at its offices, including ensuring that exams are not leaked to a few students. “We were told that examination papers are not printed in Kenya, yet some students are able to access some questions before the papers are sat,” he said.

The 17-year-old said the country is unlikely to develop if “we keep classifying people as either Luos or Kikuyus instead of using our ethnic diversity to achieve unity”. The students opposed a recent policy decision by the Government to increase the retirement age from 55 to 60 years, arguing that older teachers cannot relate well with students as young as 14, leading to strikes.

This resolution was supported by Mr Koech, who said the decision would lock out 20,000 youngsters from replacing public servants who retire annually. “This decision came at the wrong time when levels of unemployment are very high,” he said.

The students asked schools to come up with the proper criteria for selecting prefects, whom they blamed for the high incidence of school riots last year. Some prefects are high-handed and do not provide a good link with teachers, they noted. “Prefects should be selected through a competitive policy which is open and that takes into account leadership qualities of students,” they said.

They accused some school heads of living outside their institutions, noting that some engage in private businesses. They asked the Education ministry to allow mock examinations in schools, arguing that they are important in gauging students’ abilities.

Representing Central Province, avid Mwaura urged MPs to pay taxes to raise Sh2.3 billion which, he said, would be used to pay fees for needy students. The students called for the scrapping of the quota system of admission so that students may study in any school in the country.

Kenya Secondary School Heads Association chairman Cleophas Tirop supported the call to end the quota system. “Even teachers should work anywhere. If I am told to move from Kapsabet Boys to Mbooni (in Eastern), I should accept the transfer,” he said.