Higher park charges will hurt boat operators businesses

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A recent article by Edmund Kwena in the Daily Nation about Shimoni boat operators was well timed.
The writer painted a clear picture of the issues facing the boat operators and the tension that is brewing in this part of the world.
As reported, the boat operators are protesting against the proposed raise in marine park fees that will drastically affect their earnings from tourists.
According to the spokesperson for the Kisite Private Boat Operators Association, Mr Kassim Mohamed, the current rate of $10 being (Sh690) charged by the Kenya Wildlife Service (KWS), is already hurting their business.
Therefore, the proposed 100 per cent raise from next July will be catastrophic, to say the least. Almost all products and services in Kenya and the world over are becoming more expensive due to rising costs of production and other economic factors.
For this reason, many people may wonder why boat operators are protesting against higher park fees that are not even charged to them in the first place. The fee is actually paid by the visiting foreigners directly to the KWS.
However, if one has a little understanding of the tourists, he will agree that they are the kind of individuals likely to be greatly discouraged to tour if park fees are raised.
Wasini Island Restaurant, Shimoni Slave Caves, the Kisite Marine Park, and the Mpunguti National Reserve in the area are visited mainly by second-tier visitors, who opt out of Maasai Mara and other relatively expensive Kenya tourists’ destinations.
Therefore, these south coast attractions have naturally fallen into the category of discounted or less costly destinations for visitors with less money such as foreign students.
KWS ought to think along these lines when planning to improve these parks and services. Great planning must consider all the stakeholders.
Not all tourists can go to Tsavo or take a flights to Maasai Mara. Some can only afford a few dollars for the Kisite swim and the Wasini Coral Gardens.
But the whole issue is not how much tourists can afford to pay at the park. Rather, the boat operators are concerned that the frequent fee increments are destroying their business.
When their prime fishing areas were “fenced off” to become marine parks in the 1970s, Wasini residents decided to become boat operators rather than fishermen.
It became a crime to fish in these parks and since they did not want to fish in Tanzanian waters, they diversified to tourist boats with great re-investment.
Tanzanians do not take kindly to Kenyans who fish in their waters.
The said Shimoni boat operators are typical low resources villagers, who can hardly make ends meet.
In the context of increased regulations regarding taxes, required boat safety-gear and mandatory insurance, their business is already becoming unprofitable and difficult to sustain.
KWS can put a smile on these tax-paying hardworking boat operators by proposing a park-fee that will attract more visitors.
In any case, park fees can be decreased or eliminated in order to save boat operators from losing their livelihoods.
Clearly, the proposed park fees will definitely hurt tourism and families in the areas.
There are many park services that need to be improved. Logically, higher fees may take care of this. But Wasini residents will not be able see it this way due to their current conditions.

ABDILLAHI S. ALAWY,

Wasini Island, Shimoni.

Publication Date: 8/17/2007

Coast legislators' sleeping

It seems to me and to many Wa’pwani that there is a group of Coast MPs and or politicians who are always seen to be very happy to blindly play second fiddle to their up-country counterparts. There is no need for naming names here as these politicians and or individuals know themselves and the people know them too. These individuals are known to be following Raila Odinga like his poodles, and others tag along behind Kalonzo Musyoka. Then they are those who are rallying behind Uhuru Kenyatta simply because they feel indebted to Mzee Jomo Kenyatta and or Daniel arap Moi.

In addition there they are those just because they have been given "senior" national level party positions and are opportunists who are rallying behind NARC Kenya, despite all the indications that the party belong to the people of Mt. Kenya.

This group of politicians have the audacity to shamelessly brand Shirikisho Party of Kenya, the only Coast based party, a tribal party. Although Shirikisho is a regional party, it is by no means a tribal one. Bear in mind that there is nothing wrong for being tribal party, but Shirikisho is not one of them and it should be known as such. A regional party and a tribal one are two different monkeys. A tribal party tends to be restricted to certain regions where the tribe resides, but a regional party cannot necessarily be a tribal one. It is on this background that unlike some other provinces, Coast province is not a homogenous one; hence a regional party cannot be a tribal party in tandem.

A political party is a political organization that seeks to attain political power for its people. It is a vehicle that should poised to usher development for it people and or region. These Coast politicians opposed to Shirikisho must be blind metaphorically and literally for not seeing those perceived to be 'tribal parties' that have successfully been able to bring beef to their people. Excellent examples, Simon Nyachae-led Ford People and the Luhya's own pride Ford Kenya party under the strong leadership of the Local Government minister Musikari Kombo.

If I may ask, where were the Coast MPs when Kombo secured several presidential appointments as a compromise for his party to accept the government proposed list of EALA nominees? Coast legislators were perhaps hiding in other people's parties, suppressed to an extent that they cannot even breathe let alone shout. The funny of it all is that the Coast pick for the EALA slot was not proposed by a Coastal lawmaker but Justice & Constitutional Minister for reason best known to Martha Karua. And to add slat to the injury, none of the Coast legislators knew of Ms. Sakina Sungu Kwekwe before her name was proposed by Karua. Can any Coast MPs dispute this fact?

Label Ford People and Ford Kenya regional and or tribal party or whatever one wants but the fact remain that the two parties have had 'their people' (read tribesmen/women) appointed to important government positions from cabinet to permanent secretaries to ambassadorial and to parastatal heads. Western province, the home base of Ford Kenya has a fully fledged university. Does the Coast have a university yet?

If Shirikisho was tribal party and or Mijikenda party look at the multi-tribal lineup of its national leadership. Apart from ministers Mwakwere and Dzorro, the national Chairman is Mwashengu wa Mwachofi, Secretary General Yussuf Abubakar, Vice Chairman John Safari Mumba --the three individuals are from three different and distinct tribes. And so are Mwakwere and Dzorro.

Finally when it comes to Shirikisho there is this erroneous notion that the Mijikenda people are one tribe. The online Wikipedia dictionary describe the Mijikenda as follows: "The Mijikenda ("the nine cities") are the nine ethnic groups along the coast of Kenya from the border of Somalia in the north to the border of Tanzania in the south. The Mijikenda include the Digo, Chonyi , Kambe, Duruma, Kauma, Ribe, Rabai, Jibana, and Giriama. Each have unique customs and language, although the languages are similar to each other and to Swahili."

Boldly speaking, instead of the Coast politicians catch the moment to join hands and unite for the sake of their people under the Shirikisho banner, they are the first ones disowning the party and praising other people’s parties.


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In a separate but related story, Shirikisho Party of Kenya is rising as a major player in the emerging political coalitions in the country. President Mwai Kibaki’s friendly parties’ leadership who trying to revive NARC are courting the party and at the same time KANU and the little known Labour Party of Kenya (now with Kalonzo Musyoka) all are seen to be cozying up to Shirikisho to join forces with them in what they refer as the potential third force. For the first term a Coast based political is poised to play an important role in the future government of the country.

All this did not happen out of fluke and is not that surprising at all. Before I go on, I would remind the two senior Shirikisho officials, the secretary general and the vice chairman, Yusuf Abubakar and John Safari Mumba respectively, that they will be fooling themselves if they believe that Shirikisho without Mwakwere, Dzorro, Ananiah Mwaboza, Joseph Kingi, Gonzi Rai and Abdalla Ngozi and their core supporters would have been taken seriously by any coalition groupings. If the two and other officials think so, then they are kidding and fooling themselves concurrently.
It must be remembered that the party was founded in 1997 by a veteran Coast trade unionist Mbwana Warrakah. The vision of the party was attributed to fighting for rights of landlessness and unemployment among the indigenous people. The founders of this party had a vision for the Coast people that have remained unfulfilled. Certain political power hungry people hijacked the party from the original founders, removed them unceremoniously and then messed up the party.
It was for this reason that Shirikisho did not receive the mass support the Warrakah-led party founders had envisaged and were potential to amass. Even before the mess up, the party was able to get its first member of parliament in the same year's general election -- Suleman Shakombo captured the Likoni seat from a KANU incumbent. Seeing a leadership vacuum the Likoni MP tried to hijack the party and imposed himself as the chairman simply because he was the only party legislator. Under pressure from then President Moi, the Likoni MP defected to KANU and almost sold the party to Moi.
In 2002, Shakombo changed political camps from KANU and joined NARC. Despite all odds Shirikisho was able to retain its parliamentary status by successfully sending its second member to the national assembly, this time around for the Magarini seat—Harrison Kombe. This is not what one could call a chequered history, and although not in the “little known league”, Shirikisho has never been taken seriously and was not considered a player in either national or region politics until very recently.

Enter Mwakwere, Dzorro, Mwaboza, Kingi, Ria, Ngozi and their supporters, overnight the party gets a new lease of life by gaining two full cabinet ministers, two assistant ministers and two more MPs. And when you include Kombe, the party has all in all seven legislators.

It must not be forgotten that this same group of legislators pleaded with their then NARC Kenya party not to field a parliamentary candidate in the Magarini by-election. They urged the government allied party to support Shirikisho's candidate where even the Vice President moody Awori trekked to the rural constituency to campaign for Kombe’s re-election. The party is now comparable to other regional parties such as Ford Kenya and Ford People.

End this emerging pay to play culture

The Mathioya MP, Joseph Kamotho in his recent Op-Ed commentary noted, “Campaign fund raising in an open, transparent and accountable manner is a global phenomenon in the Western democracies.” The former KANU minister went on to add that, the proposed President Mwai Kibaki re-lection fund raising should not be viewed negatively.

It is troubling that President Mwai Kibaki’s Presidential campaign team is organizing “a Sh 1 million per plate lunch” in an effort to raise Sh1 billion campaign funds quickly. Of course the President’s allegedly private Presidential Elections Board is within its rights to conduct the fundraising and for charging such an exorbitant amount of money. But what the fundraiser is doing is paint a glossy picture that Kibaki’s second term will be a reserve for the rich and famous (who can pay their way in) and not for the common man. It is natural to assume that anybody who is going to pay such steep amount of money you can bet your life that he or she must expect to get something in return — ‘pay to play’ so to speak. The campaign team reportedly plans to invite 1,000 exclusive individuals where each and every one of them will cough Sh 1 million and not expect anything in return from the government.

Even in the Western democracies, campaign contributors’ are the ones who are favoured when it comes to ‘administrations’ (and or government) contracts. None of the 1,000 invitees will be expected to turn down an offer of future lucrative government contracts. My question comes, is the Presidential Elections Board introducing a new political culture of pay to play? I would urge President Kibaki or his close associates to act fast and see to it that “millionaires’’ campaign fundraising is put to halt.

This is reminiscent of retired President Daniel Moi strategy of yester-year where individuals were “forced” and or expected to pay from Sh 5 million to Sh 100, 000, where they raised Sh 100 million. This was because Moi was very unpopular and as such his handlers needed money to buy voters who would otherwise would have voted for the opposition. We have not reached the level of the Western democracies where they need large sums of campaign funds to not necessarily bribe voters but for TV, print media ads, brochures, air travels et al. Even those western democracies they do not select certain individuals for high profile campaign fundraising and if they do so, they don’t charge such exorbitant large sum of dough. For instance, even the US Presidents when they go around the country raising campaign funds either for their own Presidential campaign or for their respective parties’ campaign kitty, attendees pay US$2,500 (Sh17, 000) per plate on lunches and perhaps additional US$ 500 to have one take a picture with the President. They don’t pay US$ 15,000 as is the case in Kenya. You know the funny thing, US is the one of the richest nations and Kenya one of the poorest one, and yet in Kenya ‘political campaign contributors’ are expected (if not pressurized) to come up with more money than their US counterparts.

Kamotho and the assistant Minister for Energy Mwangi Kiunjuri in support of this ‘millionaires’ lunch’ fund raising both cited the record breaking Barrack Obama Presidential campaign where his team raised over US$ 30 million as an example of ‘friends’ are assisting their friend financially to win an election. For the benefit of Kamotho, Kiunjuri and everyone else, the fact of the matter is that Obama fundraising collected close to $ 37 million in personal contributions not from 30 or 300 ‘friends’ but from more than two-hundred and fifty thousand friends, supporters and mostly well wishers in four months and not in a couple of hours. If we want to imitate the Western democracies, then instead of the millionaires’ luncheon, the Kibaki campaign team should organize breakfast and lunches around the country.
They can charge a nominal amount of say between Sh 10 to 15,000 per plate in order to have as many people contribute to the campaign kitty. The campaign breakfasts, lunches and even dinners should not be restricted to the Kibaki campaign. The opposition could do the same on their part. This way, Kibaki supporters or one hand and Opposition supporters on the other hand can be able to come up close and personal to see, meet and mingle with their President and or favoured candidates.
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Ngilu’s woes self created

The masaibu of Health Minister Charity Ngilu run with the law has nothing to do with President Mwai Kibaki. Ngilu or anyone else should desist in dragging the President’s name in her troubles of her own making. Many people are wondering why the President’s name is mentioned in this self debacle. The fact of the matter is that, the Kitui Central MP broke the law by helping a police suspect escape from police custody, period. Unless that is not what happened, that police are just harassing Ngilu, the Health Minister broke the law. It doesn’t matter even if those suspects who were assisted their escape were innocent. It is against the law to aid and abate a suspect to escape. This is something Ngilu knows, I know that and everyone else knows that. The way I see it is that, the Kitui Central MP was seeking political sympathy from the unsuspecting public after realizing what she thought was a courageous act had gone too far. Ngilu and others should heed the Police Commissioner’s free advice when he told Ngilu and her fellow politicians: “I want to advise those seeking votes to campaign in their constituencies and not police stations.

There are no votes there.” Maj-Gen Ali could not have been clearer in his free counsel to the politicians. Ngilu was treated just like any other individual but he theatrics by wanted to create a scene hence the hiring of high profile lawyers, Paul Muite, James Orengo and Tom Ojienda. Why did Ngilu need a battery of high profile lawyers if she knows she was not wrong? When did you see a simple police suspect hiring three lawyers, even before he or she has been charged? Why did Ngilu want to know from whom did the police take their powerful orders from ‘above’ other than from the Head of State? I don’t think President Kibaki is the type of Head of State who would have the time to get involved in such mundane police matters.

I am no fan of the OP, Provincial Administration and National Security Minister John Michuki, but Ngilu was going too far in mentioning names in this matter, the President, the minister et al. Everyone in country knows that Ali is a very independent police chief and no politician, a minister or otherwise would give him orders and (for Ali to agree) to humiliate any politician and above all a serving government minister. If every minister was allowed to behave as they are laws into themselves then that ‘just society’ that Ngilu is claiming to be fighting for will not be attainable.
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Kalonzo’s defection not a storm in a cup of tea

When Kalonzo Musyoka abandoned the Liberal Democratic Party for Labour Party Kenya it was more shocking than the recent tremors that hit parts of Nairobi and the surrounding areas. People have forgotten about the tremble and are now trying to come to terms to what is going on within the Orange Democratic Movement – Kenya, the only party and or coalition that had a shot of unseating Kibaki from the Presidency.

Supporters and foes alike must give it to Musyoka that his boardroom coup in the ODM Kenya was a well orchestrated and choreographed political move. No one expected it, perhaps even Musyoka’s own close political associates. If the associates knew (about it before hand) then they must be credited for maintaining the silence until it actually happened and they pretend they are not aware of it. Let us not forget that in Kenya when a politician makes a political move by say jumping one ship to another, his or her former comrades have a tendency of trying to belittle the act and pretend to ignore it as if it is inconsequential and insignificant. That is even if when it is momentous and significant.

A recent perfect example is when the Transport Minister Chirau Mwakwere led a group of Coast lawmakers and other politicians to defect from NARC Kenya to the Coast based Shirikisho Party. The move was very significant because of the fact that, the Coast people for the first time in their history, have now a party they can associate with and would fight for their rights. But the Matuga MP and his group’s move were disparaged by the likes of Information and Communications Minister Mutahi Kagwe and others in the what is now turning to be a Mount Kenya people’s party who do not know any better. Today Shirikisho under the leadership of Mwakwere and Morris Dzorro is an important player of the bigger picture in the President Mwai Kibaki’s re-election strategy.

If the Mwingi North MP political defection from LDP, of which he was one of the founder members, to the little known LPK was a storm in a cup of tea, then there would never have been a need for a series of meetings by those who believe that the move in insignificant. The true officials of ODM Kenya are unknown and has put the party into question where the court has given it 30 days to put its house in order or face deregistration. Kalonzo’s move was definitely not a storm in a cup of tea but a storm in high seas where it has the potential to wreck an ocean going vessel like the ODM Kenya. The government has nothing to do with the problems facing ODM Kenya and they should leave the government out of their woes.