Billionaire businessman Joe Wanjui. PHOTO | SALATON NJAU | NMG
I have known Joe Wanjui since a year after I arrived in Kenya in 1977, when I joined the Rotary Club of Nairobi.
Ten years before that Joe (I can’t bring myself to refer to him as Wanjui) was proposed as the first African member of the club, and in 1974 he became its first African president.
Typical. For Joe’s a man who’s at home anywhere, as he was at the recent launch of his latest book, The Native Son: Experiences of a Kenyan Entrepreneur, in the Vice Chancellor’s Parlour at the University of Nairobi.
Joe recently completed his time as chancellor of the university, and as he had with his previous book, My Native Roots: A Family Story (that captured his childhood and family genealogy), he chose the University of Nairobi Press as his publisher.
This explains the venue of the launch, where grizzled academics mixed with others from the public sector and private sector fellows like me.
Speakers during the evening were so effusive about the author who was being feted that when it was his turn to speak Joe wondered whether all the talk had been about someone else who shared the same name.
Man of the moment
Indeed had the man of the moment not been his usual alive, thoughtful and sparkling self, we could have been forgiven for imagining we were listening to the eulogies at his… well, you know what I mean.
Among those who talked about the man and his book we heard something of Joe’s rich family life from his friend, Fr Dominic Wamugunda and from his eldest daughter and two of his grandchildren; others like Roger Steadman spoke of him as a successful entrepreneur and businessman; and chief guest George Magoha, the University of Nairobi’s Vice Chancellor, talked about the leader who for almost a decade was his chancellor.
“He found us as professors, thinking in truncated mode,” confessed the institution’s CEO, adding proudly “but now we are university managers.” In the same vein the VC noted that under Joe’s influence the CEO position he now fills was sourced competitively, a pioneering and controversial approach for such institutions at the time.
Joe was absolutely for meritocratic appointments, independent of ethnic background; he brought entrepreneurs into the Council – whose meetings started taking place early in the morning and on time, while being shorter too; and he encouraged other businesslike practices such as more computerised and prudent financial management.
In concluding, Prof Magoha described Joe as a true friend, “telling you what you don’t want to hear… and then taking you to lunch afterwards”.
As for me, I have thoroughly enjoyed my interactions with Joe, that started in Rotary all those years ago. In his book he reveals that he continues to support our Rotary Club and its noble ideal, as he has actively supported so many other worthy causes. Let me mention just three, in all of which I have also played a role.
In The Native Son Joe writes about becoming a member of the Kenya Institute of Management’s first governing council in 1969. By the time I was elected to chair that council in 2000 he was its national chairman, or patron, in which capacity he was always available to me as a source of sound advice.
It was during that time that he and I organised several chief executives’ forums, a concept Joe describes in his book as akin to a “mini Davos”. What a great experience it was, and what a great time to renew the formula. Joe, how about it?
Joe also writes about how he and a few others launched the Kenya-US Association (Kusa) in 1989, in order to take full advantage of the connections between Kenya and the US, not least through those Kenyans who had studied in America.
Joe was Kusa’s founder chairman, and he asked me to join his executive committee, that also comprised former Kenyan Ambassador to America John Mbogua and Dr Julius Kiano.
Soon after the founding of Kusa, Smith Hempstone arrived in Kenya for his turbulent term as US Ambassador, during the days of the struggle for multi-party politics, when as Joe puts it in his autobiography the US-linked body became “a pariah”.
How interesting that in recent times relations between the two countries have again been somewhat tested, and how timely following the recent visit of President Uhuru Kenyatta to Washington for the Kusa ideals to be reinvigorated.
Finally let me mention Kepsa, where in its infancy Joe became the private sector umbrella body’s most active elder and a strong supporter. I was one of Kepsa’s founding directors, and I remember that at one of our retreats I had arranged for a presentation to be made on the emerging Brand Kenya project by the then chair of the Marketing Society of Kenya, Paul Kukubo.
Joe was present at the event and promptly offered to organise a presentation to President Kibaki, that led to the initiative being propelled to its rightful national position. Thanks, Joe, for we need our Brand Kenya programme as much today as we did 10 years ago.
For well over three decades I have sat with Joe at many meetings and shared many platforms with him, enjoying the benefit of both his wisdom and his wit. To be with him you know you will be with someone who is pragmatic, straightforward and solution-oriented; and, just as important for me, someone with whom you always also expect to share a good laugh.
The author of The Native Son is still very far from us proclaiming his eulogies. He is further building his foundation to promote the education of women scientists, and he continues as a director of major institutions in this country.
I salute the man who grew up feeling disrespected by the colonials as a mere “native” but who emerged a proud native son of Kenya.
