They came in like the proverbial camel, the now popular street fable suggests that the camel initially only requested to shelter his nose inside the tent, but once they allowed his nose in, it has since gone ahead to take up most of the tent space by bringing his entire body in.
They allowed him an inch, but he has gone ahead to take a mile, the cries imply.
This is what some of our politicians want us to believe of the 'China men' currently operating in Kenya, that the reason the “tent space” is suddenly so small, is because the Chinese duped us and have since gone ahead to take up a majority of our jobs and opportunities.
But nothing could be further from the truth, the Kenyan situation is not sudden but a persistent concern that has been here since a good part of the last decade, and it’s only bound to get worse unless addressed through proper policy mechanisms.
While it’s true that some Chinese men have been seen hawking and a few others doing menial jobs that are supposedly a reserve of the Kenyan poor, it is dishonest for politicians to use this as the reason youths in their regions remain unemployed.
I am all for foreigners with no proper work permits to be asked to give way. But this alone does not even begin to solve the Kenyan unemployment situation.
Our politicians must be honest and asked to tackle the real issues bedevilling our economy, the foremost of which being corruption. Corruption impacts on the cost of doing business, on the quality and quantity of infrastructure which then has a direct impact on our economy.
Corruption has our health system on its knees, our education system is on its death bed, all because of corruption.
Then there’s tribalism, poor national and county government policies, insecurity being witnessed in some regions, unrealistic national wage bill, etc.
Things and people to justifiably blame for our current woes are many, the Chinese roasting 'mahindi' along Ngong road is however not one of them.
#hivisasaoriginal