Kenya’s dumb traffic culture

In my international law scholarship, I’ve denounced as racist and scandalous the international legal and economic orders. I have argued internationally that racial hierarchies – built on the germ of White Supremacy – have kept the so-called Third World in subordination.

In the same vein, I’ve rejected in toto the notion that there exists in essentialist terms a hierarchy of cultures where the White Western cultures sit atop the heap of all humankind.

I have, however, recognised that in every society – whether in the Global South or Global North – there exists side by side both dumb and intelligent cultures. Today, I want to focus on Kenya’s dumb traffic culture. This nursery of values has given us the Londiani tragedy, among others.

Kenyans aren’t dumb per se, but like all peoples they sometimes – often – do dumb things. Some societies tend to learn from their dumbness faster than others. Whether a society is a fast – or slow –learner from its mistakes resides in the character of its elite.

That’s because no society in recorded human history has ever prospered, or become great, without a visionary elite, no matter how well-endowed.

Invaders and enslavers

Take the Democratic Republic of the Congo, for example. Inch by inch, the DRC is most probably the richest country on earth. Yet it’s the poorest. We can blame White invaders and enslavers from King Leopold II to the Americans, but the buck stops at the feet of the Congolese elite.

Today, no state can make it in the ravenous international system without an elite that deeply comprehends geopolitical machinations, race politics and power matrixes and then exploits the system’s asymmetries to its benefit.

This is what an “intelligent” and “smart” national elite must do. It’s why Kenya is miles behind South Korea although in the 1960s we both stood on the same penurious economic ledge.

Today, South Korea is ranked 12th in the world with a GDP of $2.4 trillion against Kenya’s rank of 67th and a GDP of $118 billion. In 60 years, South Korea’s economy has grown more than 20 times that of Kenya. Let’s pause here so you can grab a tissue to wipe your tears.

And South Korea isn’t the only country that has left Kenya in the dust. Soon – very soon – Ethiopia and Tanzania will overtake Kenya in the region unless it wakes up. We are a sick society and are getting dumber by the day. It’s as if our elite’s brain cells are being cannibalised by a deadly virus and our heads are correspondingly shrinking.

Intelligent society

Our education system, the foundation of any intelligent society, is a shambles full of cheats and mediocrity. Our judiciary is rotten to the core from top to bottom. Our government at every level is populated by a thieving political class. Our children now learn how to cheat and steal before they are old enough for kindergarten.

We have laws – beautiful laws and a good constitution – but they exist only on paper. Otherwise our legal system is a dead letter. No one obeys the law in this country. We have law, but no order.

In my view, we have no country if we have law, but no order. We might as well be refugees in our country. That’s why our young people are fleeing in their millions to Europe and North America, even to the Middle East to eke out a more decent living. Now, CS Alfred Mutua has been bragging that he’s finding menial jobs for Kenyans abroad. How did we become so beggarly as a people? We ought to be ashamed of ourselves as a country.

Our terrible traffic culture and the incoherent infrastructure on which it lies are symptoms of our elite’s intellectual disability and low IQ on this matter. My view is that the Londiani tragedy is a reflection of our lawless and dumb society on traffic issues and road usage. Motorists treat traffic lights in major cities a mere suggestion, not an ironclad rule. Speed limits are never obeyed.

Road carnage

The matatu industry and boda boda – though essential – have become an abomination because of their lawlessness. Hardly a day passes without another grisly report of road carnage. Kenya’s roads have become killing fields. Different regimes, except for the famous Michuki Rules, which have since been jettisoned, have failed to bring sanity to our roads.

There’s no respect for roads and road reserves. Nairobi itself, even in its most pristine neighbourhoods, is quickly becoming a slum city. Illegal kiosks and makeshift markets dot every road and its reserve. These unseemly kiosks, which are totally unhygienic, together with their clientele, boda boda, and Uber drivers have made roads dangerously impassable.

At night muggers and rapists lurk within waiting to pounce. Trucks, like the Londiani killer vehicle, barrel down highways, byways and roads at high speeds. Hawkers and street vendors on roads and road reserves risk life and limb and often pay the highest price. Let’s re-engineer our dumb road culture or suffer untold carnage.

Makau Mutua is SUNY Distinguished Professor and Margaret W. Wong Professor at Buffalo Law School, The State University of New York. @makaumutua.