On School fires in Kenya

Absurdity cannot begin to describe the state of our beloved nation today. From Cord demos making Mondays semi holidays with IEBC demonstrations to now teenagers and whomever is helping them paralyzing the education sector… This country is heading towards chaos with a government unwilling or unable to take action.

The National Intelligence Service has advised the president to close all public secondary schools immediately to mitigate further destruction of schools. Cabinet secretary for Education,the admant Fred Matiang’i opposes the move and I wholeheartedly agree with him.

Just like Al Shabab and like minded organizations work by disrupting the system and making countries un-governable,  elements guilty of burning schools have taken a leaf from the same ideology. They disagree with some decisions from the top and they will work relentlessly to make sure they get their way to reverse them.

Or they could have a problem with the decision maker as calls are already being made to oust Mr. Matiang’i.

I do not believe that changes in school term length is what is the issue here. The kids are obviously irritated but I don’t see them angry enough to riot and burn schools. After all its not as if they will ask to be back earlier in December when the holidays will be 2 months long. Plus the manner in which schools are being burnt seems systematic and coordinated, a bit too much for students to execute.

There are more powerful people orchestrating this mess. And there is much more at stake than meets the eye. Which leads me back to disruption of order and what the government should do.

Countries cannot and do not close due to terrorist activities, they find ways to overcome them.  The same should be applied to Kenya public school. This is domestic terrorism lite and the sitting government has to be able to stop it.

Let’s take the students, cartels, principals, teachers and whomever will be found guilty of organizing the chaos as who they truly are; criminals!  They should be tried, sentenced and jailed for their actions.

Mr. President please do not close our schools. Ignore the National Intelligence Service advise to close schools, instead instruct them to hand all information and names of those involved in burning schools to the relevant authority for prosecution. 

A reluctant stance in times of turmoil is recipe for disaster.

Keep Kenyan public schools open. Keep the country moving forward.