Communication is part of human life, and developing good writing skills is a great plus.
Writing this column has been a joyous journey of self-discovery for me. I have found out that, just like in my political leadership work, I’m more attracted to data, than the politically clever turn of phrase.
I believe that if we could all be persuaded to draw more conclusions from data, rather than what our politicians say, we would have a better republic. That is a tale, however, for another day.
I have also found out that to be adequate, a writer requires discipline, and have a good presentational style.
In graduate school and after, I published a couple of academic papers in refereed journals. Who am I? was, however, my first real attempt at non-academic writing. It was what it sounds like – a search for meaning and understanding as I transitioned from teenager to young adult at St FX, my uni.
One of Canada’s leading liberal arts colleges, it is set in rural Nova Scotia at Antigonish, a wonderful small town, devoid of big city distractions. So in between political science and econometrics, I would ponder the meaning of life. The resultant manuscript was, sadly, lost between return home, and graduate school in Australia.
After that, I wrote business plans and consulting reports. I was good at it. My clients usually raised the monies they were looking for. One client recently looked me up after 30 years! In corporate life, I was taught, and then I taught, the Ten Secrets of Powerful Business Writing to business consultants. We taught the secrets all over East Africa with my colleagues Kanyi, Wambui and Njuru. Those were fun times.
Sensing the fun may be all too much, or too many beans spilled, management promoted and relocated me to Sandton. From there, I would write programs to bring change at scale, as we went about our mission of creating jobs, increasing incomes and improving peoples’ lives. That work involved giving governments a few good ideas. Policy dialogue we called it. After a few years of that, I decided to be the change I was preaching and run for political office.
The nature of the writing now changed to speeches. Tough act, writing and reading speeches. Unlike now when we appear bread-based, government then was half bread! So opportunities for making speeches came in halves. Occasionally, personal pieces were fun to write. Such was the Border Crossings of East Africa, describing family holiday adventures as we drove from Nairobi, to Fort Portal, Kigali, Mwanza and back.
The latent hunger to write was awakened when my son published his first book. Out of the Box, is a children’s story book. Ngure, the author, wrote it when 8 and published when 9 years. So intrigued was 3rd President, Mwai Kibaki, that he came to launch the book at Kilimani Junior. The author became a press sensation. Sufficiently challenged, and desirous of similar fame, I begun to pull together various bits of writing – an occasional unpublished essay here, a published one there, and so on.
That labour has yielded two manuscripts. Both remain unpublished, much to the chagrin of Catherine Riungu, my friend and editor. The first, Overthrowing the Delamare Economy, is a broad look at what must change for Africa to industrialize. The second, What’s to Be Done, is more recent and Kenya focused, examining policy options for our current tough times. How can we leverage this expensively acquired infrastructure for faster growth?
The task of finishing them has reflected the political seasons. Occasionally there have been bursts of energetic activity. Weeks of research and writing, interposed with longer periods of absence. Aluta continua.
But it was a keen-eyed Nyeri regional bureau chief of this leading daily who recognised something I had not - that I would find regular writing enjoyable. Over tea in my office, he suggested I try a six-hundred-word op-ed. And so I did. At first, I struggled to fit the ideas into the word count. Politicians use many words, often to say very little. I tried harder. I’m a leader, not a politician, I told myself in self-encouragement. As weeks progressed, I got the hang of it. A while later, the weekend editor asked me to make it longer. 1,000 words he said.
At first some readers were skeptical, thinking that my staffers might be helping me out. When does a governor have time to raise own-source revenue, get credit rated, issue a bond, build smart towns, campaign for Azimio, and himself and still write, they asked me? When I made legal arguments in some of the pieces, some wondered if the wife was assisting.
As I persisted, I started looking forward to the time I carved out for the activity. I was enjoying it! The best part? Every so often, kind citizens will smile and tell me that they read the column and find it useful. Some say it with a phone call, by text or in social media. Caught in a thankless trade, political leaders relish any encouragement, however little.
One of the nuances in communicating economics and public finance management is that sometimes, you need figures, charts and graphs tell the tale better. Frequently, I have requested the same. In sympathy, management has offered space the Business Daily, and I am taking it. I hope to see you there.
@NdirituMuriithi, an economist, is partner at Ecocapp Capital. His column is moving to the Business Daily.
