We have failed the poor of this country; we’ll burn in hell

A flying bus has just ended the lives of at least 36 people on its way from what was supposed to be a routine cross-country shift.

The mangled wreckage downstream is awfully painful to look at, the bodywork must have been made from an alloy of sawdust and paper-mâché.

Under compassionate circumstances, the Nithi bus tragedy would have united us in grief, normal programming standing at attention, and our bloodstreams boiling with pent-up rage.

However, based on our legendary poverty at multitasking, we’ll have to stick to assisting politicians job-hunt for August 9, or else they’ll starve, and from the way our national debt is set up, we can’t afford another state funeral right now.

Kenya is a beautiful country. Our friends abroad say God must have created us on a Monday morning.

We have climatic conditions to die for, our people are genuinely warm and have a self-drive that is the envy of Tesla engineers.

On paper, we’re the country everyone is afraid to be paired with anywhere, any day.

But that lynchpin status has been lying idle since we kicked out British colonialists like polio.

We’ve increasingly lowered our expectations of the government, which has since mastered the delicate art of feeding us with services only when it is in the mood.

This capitulation didn’t come easy, but readjusting our spine back up will definitely need more than vibes and Inshallah.

Children of a lesser god

There are government officers who should be in prison right now singing like a canary while recycling cabbage fibre up and down their alimentary canal.

But those children of a lesser god have been left to seek their answers from heaven, as government heads roll only in their dreams.

When singled out to face the swinging axe, the National Transport and Safety Authority will predictably come out to claim professional harassment, passing the buck to the bus company, who’ll in turn accuse passengers of staying quiet when the driver was rushing home to his family.

The driver’s family already blamed the faulty brakes.

The brakes can’t defend themselves, so the government will interpret the silence to mean guilt, and the matter will certainly end there.

Thirty-six people are a sea of humanity. Those who eat numbers at the Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) say the average household size in Kenya is four persons.

It means that the boda boda rider onto whose bike you hopped to beat the airport traffic today has three mouths waiting for him back home when he parts ways with the retiring sun this evening.

Multiply thirty-six by four and you get 144 mouths directly at the door of the nest waiting for the mother eagle, or father sparrow, to return with the worm in its mouth.

I’ve checked. Kasarani Grounds in Chaani Ward Mombasa, Kiplalmat Primary in Waldai Ward Kericho, Mukangu Primary in East Kabras Kakamega, and even Gituamba Sec School in Ruai, right here under my nose in Nairobi; each has fewer registered voters than 144.

To kill a registered polling station, right now, would cause the electoral agency so much grief the chairperson would have to call his hair loss expert in between balancing anti-heartburn tabs.

But someone responsible for keeping our road users out of harm’s way has already presided over the loss of 2,696 lives between New Year and Monday last week, and they’re still throwing the bucket down the well to draw more from where last month’s salary came from without their conscience pricking them over the blood down there.

You’re lying to your children that all is good. Already, those setting off on road trips are being visited by bus preachers helping with nursing panic in exchange for turning to Christ upon safe arrival.

We have failed the poor of this country. We will burn in hell.

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