A strong safety net is the key to entrepreneurism

The Jubilee government is big on entrepreneurship. We have a women’s fund for women entrepreneurs. On the President’s website, many of his speeches make reference to unleashing entrepreneurship that comes bottled up in every youth across the country.

This is all encouraging to would-be entrepreneurs, except, wasn’t Kenya always a country of entrepreneurs?

Our streets are teeming with all manner of Chinese products, sold by men, women and children. On the matatu each morning, at least three people selling sweets jump in to tempt you to buy their wares. Our streets flood with hawkers every evening selling food, clothes and toys.

Two thirds of Kenyans are self-employed or are entrepreneurs. If ever-increasing levels of entrepreneurs are an indicator of a thriving economy, then we are an international powerhouse.

In the market place of ideas, our businessmen outperform all those lazy Americans who for years have pretended that capitalism was bottled at the foot of the Statue of Liberty.

We are a nation of go-getters where more than half the population has gone to work for itself. We are our own bosses, enjoy the dynamism and flexibility of being in business for ourselves. This dynamism and entrepreneurial zeal existed even before the Jubilee government came and promised to promote it through its many funds.

FINANCIAL RUIN

Greece, whose economy has been razed down by the European Central Bank, is the also a thriving hub of entrepreneurs. Austerity has coaxed animal spirits into the market. In Spain, where unemployment is in the double digits, self-employment has similarly boomed. Benin has 10 times the rate of entrepreneurs that the US has.

The least entrepreneurial countries are Norway and Luxembourg. It seems like the more advanced an economy, the less entrepreneurial they become.

If individual entrepreneurship or small bands of entrepreneurs is the key to economic growth and development, why are we poorer than the US?

Entrepreneurism is the law in Kenya. We have to bend backwards and acquire all manner of entrepreneurial skills than richer countries. This hasn’t led us out of poverty.

This idea that loans from Uwezo and Youth fund will spur entrepreneurship that will end up raising living standards in the country is false. The idea that we need entrepreneurs for economic development is not true. We need big government projects to develop, not atomised funds aimed at five youth who have banded together to sell chicken.

None of these funds will make a dent on the unemployment problem or raise living standards.

The Youth fund has so far only created employment for its board members. In Kenya, being an entrepreneur is horrible. The lights go out and your salon stops working. There is a police crackdown so you cannot sell your sweets in PSVs. All the while, Kanjo and the police are busy turning the screws to shake you down.

All the loans dished out meant to empower people make us end up with identikit businesses. They all had simu ya jamii then moved on to quail eggs and now are selling you land in Isinya. M-pesa has bottomed out, it isn’t a business that can be run by itself. Entrepreneurism is usually a race to the bottom for business as everyone piles on the latest fad. In Roysambu, they all sell clothes and brightly-coloured shoes. Every stall in Nairobi flogs clothes or second-hand computers. In Nairobi West they all sell booze.

Any business that can be started with Sh50,000 can be easily replicated to the point that profits are driven out. People with limited abilities have few options available to them. Half the youth do not finish their 12 years of schooling, and many are incapable of running a business. 

A strong safety net is the key to entrepreneurism. The fear of financial ruin keeps many from venturing out. If you live in a strong welfare state, losing your job doesn’t mean your children will starve. There is no safety net in the country. No pension for your old age, no medical cover when you are sick and no paid maternity leave if you get pregnant.

This idea that the informal sector and government-sponsored microcredit is going to be the panacea for our unemployment is false. We need more schools and better completion rates, better healthcare and bigger ideas to improve unemployment among the youth. Uwezo haiwezi. Uwezo will not hack it. 

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BANKING THE BANKERS

Where does the CBK governor keep his money?

A while back, I pointed out that one great predictor of a bank’s health was where its headquarters were.

A grand head office in the most expensive piece of real estate in the country is a boast of sound fundamentals.

Building a skyscraper involves decade-long funding agreements, so Mickey Mouse banks will not likely put up real estate in Upper Hill.

You will notice that my back of the envelope rule is yet to be violated. No bank based in upper Hill has drowned.

Finance is a competition between men, and men obsessed with substitutes for masculinity, which is why the buildings are so large. If you can’t read a balance sheet, ask where the banks suits are. In fact, we found out that political manifestos are more truthful than company balance sheets.

However I am curious. Where does the Central Bank of Kenya governor keep his money?

The governor asked us to trust the banks before clamping down on Chase Bank. He accused us of scaring a bank to death on social media. As a show of faith, he should tell us where he keeps his money to calm us down.

I know he dislikes baubles and is a simple man who donates most of his takings to the church. Where though does he keep his loot before it is wired to Saint Peter via the Vatican?

Many Kenyans would feel safer knowing that their money is in the governor’s bank. If I have my few pennies in the same bank as the CBK boss, I expect the bailout will come when the MD decides to loan himself a few billions to buy a new Ferrari to impress the new 22-year-old secretary. 

Play your greatest hits, not the entire album

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LONG SPEECHES

JUBILEE HAS ALWAYS gone for a more visual style. The government stands accused of valuing presentation over substance.

In many cases, this is true, however, there is one area where the President and his men could do with embracing the dark arts of PR.

The State of the Nation address is too long. At more than an hour 15 minutes long, it is an hour too long. This is one case where embracing American tradition has only ended in tedium. The American speeches are unnecessary exercises in windbaggery, meant to antagonise the party that isn’t in power.

The President’s recent speech itself was an exercise in endurance, not enlightenment.

The definition of a bore is someone who leaves nothing out of the story. I know the President is meant to detail all his government is doing, and has done, but this is one case where less is more. You do not have to get up to the podium and recite the Statistical Abstract.

Play your greatest hits, not the entire album. If you play the entire album, it makes us think the hits weren’t that good. Detail has never been a substitute for achievement. The goal should be to make it memorable. The audience isn’t a think tank, it is the common man. The statistics can be put on your website.

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FEEDBACK: Teach religious education in church, not school

Odongo, your articles are always interesting 

I was a teacher in the days when schools had pastoral classes, and as you rightly said, the classes were divisive, instead of giving the pupils religious education! Religions teach their followers social, moral and ethical values. Instead, today’s religious leaders (including mine) teach that their faith is better than any other and that salvation is only through their faith! Some religious leaders also advocate violence as a virtue.

The school curriculum should include compulsory comparative religious education that gives all pupils an opportunity to learn about the principles, ideology and tradition of the major faiths. I am a Hindu, and non-Hindus are often puzzled by the red dot on my forehead, why we consider the cow a holy animal and why we believe in so many gods. All these questions can be addressed in a comparative religious class. Children are quite receptive, unlike hardened and fanatic adults. I say schools, not churches or temples, are the right places for children to study religion!

Usha Shah

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You were spot on. The teaching of religion should be left to churches, mosques and temples, not schools. We should get rid of Religious Education in schools and introduce social studies, ethics and law instead. Pupils can visit prisons, but will never visit heaven or hell.

Timothy

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I agree that religious matters should remain in the church and not be part of the formal education system of children.

I believe the only way to end the divisions witnessed during my high school days is to ensure that everyone understands what the core beliefs of the other students are. I still see hatred in the eyes of some christians when they talk about other religions. It surprises me that an adult would foster such hatred for an institution that has no direct bearing on his life!

How can we have children being brought up in such an environment? Where marriage outside of one’s faith is discouraged because “the church does not allow it”? Should we push this hatred to schools? Does it mean that a child who is of a certain religion cannot live in an area where a different religion runs the education institutions?

It is important that the government realise that Kenyan’s have different views on religion, and ensure that each Kenyan understands other’s beliefs or else we will be creating a sectarian society.   

Gatonye Ng’ang’a