Written by West Fm
2011-12-06 16:09:00
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The heavy rains that have been experienced in Kenya since late October 2011 have demonstrated the vulnerability that Kenya and Western province and North Rift are to Mother Nature.
It is a tragedy that the world bank funded Western Kenya Community Driven Development and Flood Mitigation Project that was launched in 2007 with much fan fare by president Kibaki to address once and for all the perennial threats of floods to western province and north rift got bogged down in the corruption web in 2009 and has remained in limbo since then.
West fm notes that the elected leadership of western province and north rift has shown least interest and determination since 2009 to have the then 10 billion shillings world bank funded Western Kenya Community Driven Development and Flood Mitigation Project put back on track to address the floods menace now traumatizing residents of the region from River Sabwami in kwanza through Bungoma, Kakamega and Busia counties.
The floods affect the most vulnerable of people of the region and in one swoop they destroy kill and damage crops, people, homes, livestock, granaries and all the earthly belongings of the residents. And as the residents suffer, loose all their property the elected leadership, the mps, the ministers, the councilors issue empty platitudes of empathy, sorry over the weekends and jump into their four wheel guzzlers to the city or to their local comfortable homes away from the ravages of floods.
West fm appeals to the Kenya Red Cross, the churches, the Muslim faithful and all other well wishers to come forward and give assistance to those now displaced by the raging floods unleashed by the torrential rains. And the government the local authorities and the constituency development funds committees must move speedily to give humanitarian help to all affected by the floods and put in place measures to prevent the outbreak of water borne diseases.
West fm states that at the end of the day this floods must awaken western province and north rift to purposefully and once and for all address the challenges of mother nature throws at the region and convert them into opportunities to harness the waters so as to use it to generate electricity and also convert it into clean safe drinking water and for irrigation during the spells of the year when there are no rains.
The challenge is that western province and north rift must own and take charge of its destiny and seize the opportunities presented by the 10 billion shillings world bank funded Western Kenya community driven development and flood mitigation project and the 9 billion shillings government Nzoia dam proposed for construction at the Lugari-Kimilli constituencies intersection as those projects if well implemented have the potential of unleashing a massive socio-economic transformation of the region into one where mother nature is used to nourish its people rather than be a curse that brings suffering and destruction.
West fm challenges the electorate of western province and north rift in assessing and determining who to elect into leadership in 2012 to ask the question - are those seeking elective office capable of taming Mother Nature like the current floods and harnessing the same for the economic takeoff of the region?
The mayhem the floods are causing to western province and north rift are a sad reminder that 48 years after independence the successive elective leadership of the region have miserably failed to put in place appropriate measures to protect its people from being helpless victims of the wrath of Mother Nature. And nobody from outside Western Province and North Rift will ever change the destiny of the region. Change that propels a society forward is invariably disruptive, cataclysmic and the people of the region must be prepared and ready to embrace change however disruptive, unfamiliar if they have to move to new heights beyond subsistence agriculture.
Western province and North Rift must jettison cowardly and parasitic leaders who crave to keep its people in the chains of a status quo that celebrates poverty, hopelessness, unemployment, fear of progress and risk taking and install a new crop of courageous, selfless, transformative, visionary leaders prepared to take charge of radical socio-economic change that will lift the people of the region into a modern economy that delivers employment, wealth creation, prosperity, hope and happiness.
The perpetual torment of floods in the region is not an act of god but a testimony of failed leadership.
WEST FM EDITORILA©2011
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