Last week, the mainstream media was full of the most lavish praise for the recently departed former President Mwai Kibaki.
What I found a little peculiar though was the focus on the former president as a “great man” the likes of whom we shall not see again.
Such remarks, however well-intended – and even if true – somewhat miss the point.
Long-term and sustainable progress is not the product of the greatness of any individual, but rather of the ability of such individuals to succeed in the creation of new and effective institutions. And institution building is a factor of effective teamwork and skilful management, not individual greatness.
I have no doubt that the late president was a political giant who did great things. But we do need to look into the mechanisms by which he achieved his goals.
So back to the creation of institutions, let me start with one of the things which President Kibaki has received most credit for – the building of good roads all over the country, with the Thika Superhighway being the crown jewel of the infrastructure built during his tenure.
The foundation for this achievement – the creation of the institutions that made possible this complete overhaul of Kenya’s roads network – was actually laid back in the dying days of President Daniel Moi’s 24-year rule.
As the Kenya Roads Board website explains, “The History of KRB dates back to 1992 when the Kenya Government together with the Road Maintenance Initiative (RMI) World Bank team hosted a Road Sector Stakeholders Seminar, to address the deteriorating condition of the road network in Kenya and the constraints to timely and proper road maintenance. The identified constraints were institutional, managerial, and financial.”
Further, “The Kenya Roads Board (KRB) was established through an Act of Parliament, KRB ACT No. 7, in 1999 and was given presidential assent on 6th January 2000. The Act commenced on 1 st July 2000 and the Board of Directors was appointed.”
Thereafter, under retired President Mwai Kibaki came the creation of additional semi-autonomous institutions dedicated to the improvement of our roads, namely the Kenya Urban Roads Authority, Kenya Rural Roads Authority, and the Kenya National Highways Authority, all legislated for in 2007
So, what President Kibaki did was to breathe life into an existing institution, to make it deliver on its promise. And to also create new institutions which made such new infrastructure possible.
The same of course applies to the Kenya Revenue Authority, another institution conceived during the Moi era, which has this on its website: “The Kenya Revenue Authority was established by an Act of Parliament, Chapter 469 of the laws of Kenya, which became effective on 1st July 1995. KRA is charged with collecting revenue on behalf of the government of Kenya.”
Seems very simple and easy – and yet it is only after Kibaki took over the presidency in 2002 that the KRA was able to deliver fully on its promise.
And of course, this is what makes politics at the highest levels such a difficult and complex thing:
It is easy enough to legislate for new institutions. But to actually make them work effectively and to provide measurable benefits to the ordinary citizens of a country, is no easy task. There are very few low-hanging fruit in the work of nation building.
Kibaki’s genius then was that he was able to make institutions work as intended. He did not merely work to legislate them into existence. Even those that he found already in place, acquired new life under his presidency.
Kibaki was able to get the Kenya Revenue Authority to fulfil its mission of increasing tax revenues to the point where the government could undertake projects which had been simply beyond reach in the previous decades.
Its all very well dreaming of free primary education or a vast and improved roads network. But unless you have the money to pay for these things, or at the very least, enough money to pay back the loans you may have to take to fulfil your promises of development, it will be little more than idle dreaming.
But perhaps the greatest of Kibaki’s achievements was in the promulgation of the 2010 constitution, which for one, entrenched devolution in Kenyan law and brought about the creation of county governments, and for another, created the Supreme Court.
The people who really should have been at the forefront of mourning the passing of Mwai Kibaki are the residents of North-Eastern Kenya.
For all those decades after Independence going all the way up to the year 2010, these people were shamelessly marginalised, and denied all the infrastructure and services that those in other parts of the country took for granted.
Devolution guarantees that never again will Northern Kenya be a marginalised zone, dangling on the whims of an imperial president. Thanks to the constitutional reality of devolution, the provision of education and health services; the upgrading of local infrastructure; the creation of local skilled manpower; all these are now in the firm control of the local county governments, whether directly or indirectly.
And as for the Supreme Court, it has proven in its decisions thus far, that – whether such decisions infuriate the opposition leaders or, alternatively, the serving president – it has the capacity to substantially diffuse the toxicity that in Kenya always surrounds presidential elections.
Add all this up and it comes to a truly substantial record of achievements.
Whether facilitating the full operations of the institutions that were created before his presidency; or creating new institutions through parliamentary legislation or via an overhaul of the constitution; Mwai Kibaki did much to move the nation forward.
“WATCH: The latest videos from the Star”
