People queue to vote. Manifestos should not ignore the primacy of wealth
creation through increased national production. file photo | nmg
With nominations out of the way, the
parties and candidates now need to get down to the serious business of
drafting manifestos that realistically address Kenya’s challenges and
opportunities.
Hopefully this time around the aspiring
national and county leaders will seriously and positively engage each
other on issues relevant to taking this nation to greater prosperity.
Whereas we should learn from the successes and weaknesses of the past, the focus should really be forward looking.
The
manifestos will need to focus on ways and means of improving people’s
lives by delivering more and better services; empowering people with
jobs and economic opportunities; raising resource management and
accountability standards; and above all improving national cohesion,
identity and brand.
Opportunities for improvement are
countless, but what counts most is how these are prioritised to achieve
the earliest and highest socio-economic impacts at the least cost to the
economy.
I wish to here emphasise the word “cost”
because most of the times the biggest socio-economic improvements are
achieved not with massive budgets and projects, but with mere reforms of
policies, governance and systems which may cost very little.
The
impactful achievements we are seeing in the education sector are not
budget driven but mostly involve systems reforms- enforcement and
common-sense changes.
We are entering the next five years knowing very well
that there will be less national revenues than the country needs for
development. The manifestos should also explain how to generate more
revenues and how to use the little we have to maximise socio-economic
deliverables in spite of the “national debt’ challenges.
Reforms
in public service expenditure may be a critical, albeit unpopular,
starting point. Projects and programmes that increase national
production, associated jobs and taxable incomes are always a safe bet
for manifestos.
Manifesto drafters should accept that
agriculture is probably the highest vote-capturing subject and sector
in Kenya, because that is where majority of voters are domiciled.
Agriculture also happens to be the sector with the highest potential and capacity to deliver jobs and economic empowerment.
It
is also an area with many past unfulfilled political promises and
scanty budgetary allocations. Agriculture should be the king-pin of any
realistic election manifesto.
Agriculture is
screaming, not for large infrastructure projects, but realistic and
practical common-sense reforms to significantly improve or create
sustainable marketing systems that will encourage farmers to invest
their efforts and capital.
The farmers are not after
the populist free or subsidised fertilisers and seeds, but sustainable
systems that provide modern methods and markets including value
addition.
The agricultural sector is also looking for
protection from unnecessary imports, and fiscal interventions to reduce
costs. The manifestos should specifically focus on significantly
reforming and recreating the sugar, coffee, cotton, pyrethrum,
fisheries, and livestock sub-sectors.
Agriculture is a
devolved function that must receive joint and shared responsibility by
both the national and county governments so as to achieve implementation
efficiency and economies of scale.
Infrastructure
that specifically empowers and facilitates agriculture should be given
priority. African economies that mainstream and prioritise agriculture
in their policies, plans and budgets can never go wrong.
By
realistic manifestos I also mean deliverables that the country can
afford and which are impactful in delivering early jobs and improvements
in quality of lives.
I believe the full opening up of
the LAPSSET corridor can and should feature as a priority project to
empower the marginalised Kenyans to the north, while improving security
management in the region.
This may also coincide with the development of the oil export infrastructure by private investors.
Any
continuing or incoming government should be duty- bound to complete all
the projects that are work in progress so that the full budgetary and
developmental value of these projects is realised.
In summary, good manifestos should focus on socio-economic impacts, while realistically addressing sources of funding.
Manifestos
should not ignore the primacy of wealth creation through increased
national production which is key to funding of electoral promises.
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