A UNITED Kenya - Kenya28Feb

The Mission: 28th Feb 2011, 1pm, 1 nation, 1 people, 1 anthem, united in 1 prayer for 1 Kenya.

Simple huh?

So simple, that people are still looking for a catch. A behind-the-scenes. A the-making-of. A whats-in-it-for-me.

So simple, that people... not just people... but young and upwardly mobile Kenyans, refuse to participate. What good will it do? Okay so we all sing, then what? Will Kibaki and Raila become friends? Will fuel prices go down? And then there's the classic, "Like, OH EM GEE, I can't just stand up in my office and start singing the anthem. Like, GAWSH! What will people think???"

I've heard the phrase, you can't win with everyone, but Kenyan YUPPIES have turned the phrase into a lifestyle. Perfected it and owned it! Who can compete with us? Who can match our love of convenience?

What do Kenyans do when one day they come out of their houses and find the roads outside their houses flooded after heavy rains? They buy gumboots!! We need to learn to create solutions for our country - Muriithi Wanjau, Mavuno.

I was greatly inconvenienced last year, when I took a morning off work to go to Uhuru Park, draw placards and march to Parliament to protest the MPs pay hike. That was not so simple. When I spoke about it on Facebook and blogged about it, a big chunk of my friends gave me the Kenyan YUPPIE default response "GAWSH! You didn't tell us, next time please let us know we goooo pamoja."

I did.

I did it again a week later. Instead of doing my usual lunch time round of Farmville, I took a matatu into town (and if you know me, a matatu is as bad as it gets) to form what was to be a human chain around parliament to protest again. I used the words "what was to be" because what we ended up forming fell very short of a chain. Of my THEN 828 FB friends, only 4 showed. While standing there yelling outside parliament, some other YUPPIES on their way to lunch walked by us and aired their views while at it. "Good job guys, ebu tell them!" "Why are you making noise, just vote for the new constitution all our problems will end" "Wazi! Wazi!"

When I got back to the office that day, I realized that I needed to work out a way to get us YUPPIES to participate without the INCONVENIENCE of having to leave our high flying jobs and Key Performance Indices to pull an Egypt, or a Tunisia on what I feel is a ridiculous system of governance in this country. So I googled and came up with an online petition that I hoped would reach the masses of online 'protesters' and which I would in turn send to anyone willing to listen.

Last I checked, I had collected all of about 400 signatures. FYI The MPs 'had a change of heart' about hiking their pay so that ended that.

But wait, a little bird once told me that there are about 5 million internet users in this country, and about a million of those are on Facebook regularly! (By the way I don't do statistics so, my little bird could be off by a couple of millions). So why didn't people respond? Okay, so maybe my marketing is a little off. But there is another online petition right now, that is being given MASSIVE airtime by Caroline Mutoko and KISS100. How's that for marketing. Last I checked they were at about 10,000 siggies.

So recently some Kenyans on twitter, came up with the KENYA28FEB concept. I think its GREAT! I think, what better way than to get everyone focused on KENYA; not on useless politics and politicians, impunity, land grabbing, all the things that are not working in this country. How about we focus on KENYA for a change.

It was... it is such a simple thing to do.

Then why come we have some YUPPIES going on about what effect it will have or why this or how that or whatever. I put it to you, WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TODAY TO BRING CHANGE? Or are you wallowing in the CONVENIENCE of hiding behind a name and a photo on the internet, bickering about how bad things are but not moving a finger nail to do something about it.

I say this, I gave it a shot. I did what I thought I could do. Now the SIMPLE folk at Kenya28Feb are doing THEIR part. The sooner you get off your behind and do something, or be a part of something that's already BEING done, the better for you. The better for us. The better for Kenya.

Simplicity is divine. BE the change.

28th Feb 2011, 1pm, 1 nation, 1 people, 1 anthem, united in 1 prayer for 1 Kenya.