Is book on graft the start of a political movement?

THE CONSPICUOUS ABSENCE of Michela Wrong’s book, It’s Our Turn to Eat, in the bookshops has led to an innovative project that aims to make the book available to a large number of Kenyans either by giving it away for free or making it available at subsidised rates.

The project, which is a partnership between donors and civil society organisations, is a response to the fact that most Kenyan bookshops are too afraid to stock the book lest they be slapped with a libel suit. To ensure a wide Kenyan readership, some 5,000 copies of the book are now being made available through various distribution channels, including local FM stations, PEN Kenya and the National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK).

In a way, the self-imposed ban by bookshops has helped not just the book and its author, but has led to a movement that has joined forces to ensure that the silence on the book is broken and that discussion about its contents is more open. According to a press release issued last week, the project intends to “illustrate the consequences and cost of corruption as well as the adverse effects of poor leadership on Kenya”.

The distribution strategy is expected to generate discussion in the media and the general public that “will create pressure on the political leadership to undertake the necessary comprehensive reforms to end the culture of impunity and address the stumbling blocks in the implementation of Agenda Item 4 of the National Accord.”

The press release further states that the churches are going to organise discussion groups to debate specific episodes contained in the book in parallel with relevant passages from the Bible. PEN Kenya will also stage public readings across the country and subsidised copies will be sold through various vendors.

The distribution of It’s Our Turn to Eat through the media, writers’ associations and church organisations is a stroke of marketing genius that must be commended. The multi-pronged approach also ensures that no one organisation is targeted for censure and that all parties share responsibility.

This is how political movements are formed and gain strength. How a book on Kenya ended up as a movement to bring about reform is probably the subject of a PhD thesis, so I will not dwell on it here.

BUT WHAT FASCINATES ME ABOUT this scenario is how a book about corruption in Kenya, written by a non-Kenyan, has taken on a larger-than-life significance. No doubt the contents of the book are explosive and need to be known to the Kenyan public.

But the fact that donors, church organisations and media outlets have taken such a keen interest in the book might be saying something else about our society. Do they really believe that this book can serve as a catalyst for reform? Or is it merely an issue of timing?

Kenya is in a very dark place right now. With the economy in the doldrums and a political elite impervious to criticism and unwilling to engage in self-reflection, has the book inadvertently become a vehicle for change, particularly in relation to the Grand Coalition’s apparent lack of commitment to the reform agenda?

It is curious that a book about Kenya written by a British journalist should now become the torchbearer for so many Kenyans. Given the dearth of support given to Kenyan writers, is it possible that had she not been a foreigner, the project might never have been conceived or implemented?

Which Kenyan author — besides the inimitable Ngugi was Thiong’o — has the kind of clout needed to rally so many organisations around it? Moreover, Kenyan writers attempting to do a book on corruption in Kenya face the very real possibility of being hounded out of the country or simply killed.

What’s worse, local bookshops won’t bother stocking the book — if it is lucky enough to find a publisher in the first place. Few local bookshops promote local writers. On a visit to a leading bookshop in Nairobi last week, I found just one book by a Kenyan author on the shelves.

Not even the “Kenya” section had books written by Kenyan authors, including Ngugi. (Imagine walking into a bookshop in New Delhi and finding no books by Indian authors! What would this fact say about Indian society?) Is it any wonder then that donors and NGOs are taking on the role of sponsor, distributor and vendor of books about Kenya or by Kenyans?

Ms Warah is an editor with the UN. The views expressed here are her own and do not necessarily reflect those of the United Nations.