EDITORIAL
23-12-2020 by Freddie del Curatolo
The Kenyan Song of today, Wednesday 23 December 2020, is actually the counter-song of yesterday.
Like a Native American lament, subdued and monotonous, it is one of many reversals.
To the willing carpenter from Ganze who uses his savings to build his love nest, in Transmara a family that owns land now worth over €2 million is starving and living in miserable conditions.
This is all the fault of the father of the family, Ole Kapen, who six years ago decided to give in to the demands of a large company based on the outskirts of Nairobi and leased the 75 acres of land with its fields and crops for 33 years, receiving a sum considerably lower than the rental value of such a large plot. More importantly, he demanded that the full amount be paid to him in one year.
Who knows what plans Ole Kapen had for himself, his wife and thirteen children. After renting a modest house in Kilgoris, the nearest town, he quickly ate up almost all the 30,000 euros he had earned in bars, women and unlikely deals, according to the Kenyans website. "He travelled in taxis, smoked cigars, came and went from Nairobi dreaming of big business," says his wife, with whom the relationship naturally broke down after repeated violence and the refusal to pay for the education of their children, still of school age.
The tenfold increase in the value of much land is one of the causes of murders, court cases and disputes between relatives in Kenya. And Ole Kapen dramatically recalls one of the many Navajo or Apache chieftains who are no longer as proud as they once were, but are alcoholics and psychologically labile, and who have not only sold off the lands of their ancestors, but also their own dignity. Let us hope that this sad song can be a lesson to many of his compatriots.
It would not be Malindi if there was no sun
Who also appears when he doesn't want to
Smiling behind low and dark clouds
Which raises rains dreaming a new heat
MAL D'AFRIQUE
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