Leadership

Behavior defines culture and what the leadership of a country values affects the way they behave and subsequently the entire nation. Citizens for their part, shape their behavior to match what is acceptable and what’s not acceptable according to behavior of the institutional leadership. 

Kenyan political leadership evolved first as traditional and paternalistic led by the first president -Kenyatta - who due to circumstances, having being jailed and in his seventies was considered to be the father of the nation. Moi administration that followed was more concerned with maintaining the status quo and managing instead of leadership or mobilizing resources. Moi and Kenyatta both emphasized personalized power and the deference to elders, which probably conditioned the patriarchal style after independence. With colonization, Kenyans learnt of the monarchy and aristocracy and imitated these forms of leadership whereby they handpicked persons to leadership, created and surrounded themselves with a class of ostentatious consumers, and treated any opposition as treason.This has shaped the leadership quagmire in Kenya, be it political or otherwise.

Most African cultures emphasized belonging, connectedness and community participation; it was always assumed individuals can expect their relatives, clan, or other group to look after them in exchange for unquestioning loyalty. This features aren’t unique to Africans, all cultures pre-modernization were collectivist, with time and evolutionary forces, societies become more individualize to match with modern institutions which demand and reward individual responsibility. 

Already Kenya is transitioning, and while communitarian features still persist due to poverty, the well off members of society practice individualism while still seeking the adoration and deference from their less off members. 

Why don’t our economic elites and companies invest in public goods where they operate e.g. put time and resources into local schools and colleges, and engage in civic organizations? This engagement would establish ties based on performance and activity setting an example of meritocracy instead of adoration and deference for merely being wealth. 

Kenya desperately needs to identify and assert positive values and traditions – those that make a nation of people where the public has a hope for the future, and in which the people know right from wrong and know there are serious consequences for violations. Society needs figures of authority, firmness, consistency and certainty, a national identity, and a plan. Being purposeful is not incompatible with democracy. 

I have meandered a bit, but generally my argument is that we have a leadership void that can be explained by our culture which was in turn shaped by history. Secondly, the leadership gaps are by design i.e. there are vested interests in keeping the status quo. Thus we need a strong leader to change the structures.