Ideas & Debate

It’s time leaders walked the talk in search for national cohesion

kaparo

National Cohesion and Integration Commission chairperson Francis ole Kaparo. PHOTO | EVANS HABIL

There’s been reasonable coverage of the recent conference on higher education, and also of the meeting a few days before at State House, where President Uhuru Kenyatta met with the vice chancellors and the chairmen of the councils of Kenya’s universities.

Also at the State House event were Education secretary Fred Matiang’i and his three PSs, top officials of the Commission for Higher Education, the Kenya Universities and Colleges Central Placement Service, the Universities Funding Board, the Higher Education Loans Board, the Kenya Universities and Colleges Central Placement Service, plus the chairperson of the parliamentary Committee on Education. As one of the council chairpersons I was among those invited.

We were gathered for what Dr Matiang’i nicely described as a Town Hall meeting, the first to have brought this group together, and the main theme was the promotion of ethnic diversity.

As has been reported, National Cohesion and Integration Commission (NCIC) chairman Francis ole Kaparo addressed us, revealing he had bad news.

“Eighty-three per cent have failed to comply with the Constitution and the NCIC Act that specify no more than 33 per cent should be of any ethnic grouping,” he announced with dismay.

Of the 31 universities and constituent colleges assessed only five had complied — but he offered NCIC to train those in charge of employment, helping them to become inclusive.

“Our universities must be forced to be Kenyan, and the government must never fund tribalism,” he declared, proposing that if an institution is 30 per cent compliant it should only receive 30 per cent of its grant allocation, with vice chancellors being held responsible. Not only that but he called on the ministry to outlaw the many ethnic associations in universities. “We must fight the vice,” he stated, “so as to return order to our society”.

“We want to create an inclusive society that is at peace with itself,” said Mr Kaparo, worrying that of the 76,000 employees at our universities 70 per cent of them come from only six tribes.

The numbers should be in proportion, and other tribes need to be better represented. Related to this is the fact that in 50 per cent of universities the vice chancellors come from where they are situated.

Another speaker spoke of the challenge that comes with naming colleges after the towns where they are located.

Mr Kaparo then turned to the need for developing a curriculum on national values for primary and secondary schools.

“We must develop an education system that will create a national society, like Tanzania has done,” he told us, “instead of Kenyans only being Kenyans when they get onto the plane at Jomo Kenyatta (International Airport) and only until they return.”

He said he has had many different jobs, but confessed he had never done anything as difficult as bringing Kenyans together. He also suggested that it was the President’s greatest challenge.

“If we don’t change our ways today,” he warned, “we shall perish tomorrow. Kenyans are incited by their leaders to fight, but if you approach them properly they will listen.” As they have to him, he added, when he has ventured to recent hot spots.

Mr Kaparo concluded by urging us to do this together, so we could make our country proud of us. And now the President, who had been listening attentively, invited us to give our reactions — which were universally supportive.

One among us called for an integration ranking as an element in the upcoming ranking system, so that those doing badly can be publicly shamed.

And later Dr Matiang’i stated that indeed an Integration and Cohesion Index will be introduced into the ranking system, adding that it will be made public.

While ignorance has long been blamed for tribalism none present here could be said to be ignorant, suggested another, and hence it was our responsibility to show the way.

Another contributed that education is about values, and asked how it was possible that for 50 years we have failed in this area. He asked for guidance on what should be done when a certain ethnic group dominates. Should one sack people? (My thought on this is that we should broker exchanges that rebalance the mix.)

Attention was also drawn to our national values system, but having read the policy document recently again I am not at all surprised that no one ever talks about it. (I’ve always felt that this much needed initiative has lacked bite.)

So, excellent punchy comments by the NCIC chairman, and several contributions by the leaders of our academic world, not least on the subject of strengthening values.

When it came to my turn I suggested that too much of what people talk and write about on values is either describing how awful things are or painting a picture of how they would like them to be, without suggesting how to get from one to the other.

Culture of diversity

What we need, I said, is to build healthy communities around our schools and universities, guiding our leaders on how to promote constructive engagement over the win-lose approach of debating and politicking.

Our leaders must become our role models in this regard, and not least our political leaders. I could not resist adding that too many of them behave like Donald Trump.

The University of Nairobi, we heard from its vice chancellor, has developed an undergraduate course to develop a culture of diversity, and Dr Matiang’i later announced that this will be a mandatory programme at all universities – in line with the promotion of values-based education.

The minister called on the conversation we launched then to continue, and finally the president told us we have a critical role to play in pursuing the cohesion agenda and setting the standards, in collaboration with the Cohesion Commission.

He said the proposed course on national unity, integration and patriotism should indeed be made compulsory, and he looked forward to a similar session to launch the programme.

As for me, I left feeling encouraged that despite all the hammering of our universities in the media there is hope for a better future in the halls of academe.

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