LIFE BY LOUIS: Of celibate goats and other AGM intrigues

We are approaching the festive season. This is a season of good tidings, and as they say, the tidings come in small packages.

Among the most significant and exciting events that happen during this period is the Annual General Meeting of Matimbei Ranches and Land Buying Company Limited.

Nearly every homestead in Matimbei village is a shareholder in this company by purchase, inheritance or via proxy.

When the AGM is declared via the local vernacular stations, the good news spread in this cold town like a bushfire in the harmattan season and are received with a lot of excitement.

One peculiar thing about the shareholding in this big company is that we still hold dearly to the old fashioned share certificates.

For the sake of those born in the same season as the standard gauge railway, share certificates are crucial documents that signify your net worth in the company and as such they are kept in heavily fortified briefcases that are stored in the inner bedroom under lock and key and safely tucked under the mattress.

AGM IN NAIROBI

Although our ten acre land investment is located in the Rift Valley and the vast ranch that holds our fifteen goats is in Athi River, the shareholders still insist on holding the AGM in Nairobi.

None of us in the current generation of shareholders have ever visited the land or ranch, and their physical location appears to be a heavily guarded secret.

Apart from the prospect of harvesting generous dividends (a thing that has not happened in my lifetime as a shareholder), the fact that the AGM is held in the City of many lights elicits a lot of excitement. Travelling to Nairobi for most of the shareholders is an annual pilgrimage not to be missed.  

For us to make it in time for the 8am meeting at an old hall located in the railways premises in the City, we must depart Matimbei at around 4am. This means tying a cockerel to your feet to wake you up at 3am. There is only one express matatu that departs the village at 4am for the City, and missing that ride means you may never make it in time for the meeting.

DEPARTURE DRAMA

Departure is never without its own share of drama. Last year we had to wait for Baba Haron outside his gate for twenty minutes so that he could finish milking his cows.

Meanwhile, Cucu wa Grace down the road was still sorting arrow roots in her granary to deliver to her daughter in the City. Although the driver was livid about the sloppiness of his passengers, it is unheard of for anyone to be left behind by the matatu so we all duly waited.

The driver was later mortified when the matatu broke down twice, but from the flurry of activities between him and his assistant driver, I could tell that they had ran out of fuel which they covertly sorted out.

WALKED HALFWAY TO THE VENUE

We arrived in the City under the sun on time, though we still had to walk across halfway town to the venue of the meeting.

I had my work cut out for me to guide the mostly new comers to the City to the venue. Even those who have been in the City before could only remember Kariokor and Wakulima Market, and everyone seemed mesmerised by the many high rise buildings and thousands of vehicles moving up and down.

Our arrival in the meeting hall was full of pomp, and each of us was given a two hundred page financial report printed in very tiny font.

We also got an umbrella, a cap, a bottle of drinking water and some brochures of farm inputs by clever salesmen who were doing ambush marketing during the event.

Inside the hall there were big loud speakers blaring some local gospel tunes, and a budding musician was trying to introduce his newly launched CD with music that none of us had ever heard of.

Last year’s meeting was going to be fireworks based on the information that was being presented in the balance sheet.

The previous year’s financial report had indicated that among our assets we had fifteen goats in the vast ranch.

For the more than twenty years that I have been a shareholder, this number of goats has not changed by a single digit.

After carefully googling the reproductive cycles and habits of goats, I came to the conclusion that the figure was not accurate and was most likely cooked.

I expected the goats to have tripled by then if they are just optimally sexually active. If they were not reproducing, I expected them to have died of old age.

OBVIOUS GAP

I was not about to let the directors to get away with that obvious gap.  

During the eagerly awaited question and answer session, my hand promptly shot up.

This is the most engaging session in the entire meeting and it is a bare knuckles affair.

 “Mr Chairman,” I started respectfully as failure to adhere to such protocols would result to you being thrown out under a point of order.

“First of all on behalf of these grateful shareholders, I want to thank you for your selfless efforts at steering this great company that was started by our forefathers to great heights of prosperity,” I offered as I cleared my throat importantly. A hearty clap followed, giving me the impetus to continue.

“When you go to page 156 of this report, it shows that we have fifteen goats in our vast Athi River ranch. This number has not changed for the last twenty years. Does it mean that the goats are celibate? Or all of them are abstaining from mating?”

A hearty laughter erupted from my corner, but the officials were getting fidgety and were consulting with each other.

“Or do I assume that the goats gave birth by the banks of River Athi and the kids were swept away by the tide?”

I was relentless in my assault as I shook my hands above my head and vigorously perused the financial report.

One of the Chairman’s cheerleaders who reportedly does not own a single share but comes for every meeting rose up to his defence.

FEMALE GOATS

“Thank you for your observant question Baba Brian. Those goats are all female and they do not have boyfriends. That is why their population is not rising. We plan to have them visit a nearby ranch next time they show the intention to go on heat so that they can date the bucks from that ranch and probably sire young ones”.

Well played sir, I said inwardly. But I was not done with him yet.

“Bwana Chairman, how old are those fifteen female goats? Are they the same goats that were there when I joined this company twenty years ago? Maybe they are no longer interested in dating!”

I saw the Chairman loosen his tie, things were getting really thick for him.

“Baba Brian, can we take this offline?”

When you hear an issue being taken offline, just know that it has met a natural death.

One look at the healthy looking directors with fat stomachs and sagging dewlaps reveals the open secret where the choice goats from our ranch have been disappearing to, but if anyone takes that angle of thinking, they keep it to themselves.

Baba Haron had prepared a litany of questions regarding the maize seed variety that we were planting in the maize farm.

He wanted to understand why we had consistently harvested ten bags annually despite the average yield for an acre being three bags.

He expected no less than thirty bags on a bad season from the ten acres.

Just as he raised his hand to fire the question, the chairman indicated that the question and answer session was over.

He had gotten more than his share of bashing, but we promised to revive the question in the next meeting.

We left the meeting at dusk as we persevered the auditors taking us through the entire financial report and bombarding us with strange terms like accruals, receivables and capital gains. Although we have never imported or exported anything, all our prospective profits were swallowed up by an item called forex losses.

For the twentieth year running, the Directors were apologetic that they were not in a good financial position to declare a dividend. The meeting ended abruptly after that sad declaration.

We left the venue with sad faces, but the bounty of gifts seemed to placate us.

We all passed via some hardware shops in downtown Nairobi to buy farm inputs that we had been sent by other farmers.

We arrived safely back in Matimbei past midnight where nearly all the men forgot their umbrellas in the matatu.

But the driver knew all his passengers by name, and the umbrellas were later delivered to the respective homesteads the following morning.

I am really looking forward to this year’s annual general meeting of this great company. I have three irreducible minimums that the directors must respond to.

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