The Education Marshall Plan For the Maasai Speech by Phillip S. Wuantai

Convenor, Association of Maa Academics Phillip S. Wuantai gave this address to the Youth from Keekonyokie South Ward on November 21st, 2009. Standing on the podium of ACK Church in Oloirien, he outlined the Association’s preparedness to contribute to a Master-programme for education among the young people of Kajiado North.

Mr. Councilor Keekonyokie South Ward, The Chief of this location, Leaders & Members of the Civil Society, Representatives of the Clergy, Teachers, My fellow young brothers and sisters from Keekonyokie South Ward, Ladies and Gentlemen:

I am profoundly grateful, touched by the great distinction and honor and great compliment accorded me this afternoon by God and yourselves to be one among many able speakers in this historic FIRST EVER DEMONSTRATION FOR DESIRE FOR EDUCATION in the history of the Maa community in Kajiado North. I am overwhelmed, as a matter of fact, and I am rather fearful of my inability to maintain such a high rating as you’ve been generous enough to accord to me. In these historic and lovely surroundings of Oloirien, this perfect day, and this very wonderful assembly of Young people from Keekonyokie South Ward, it is a tremendously impressive thing to an individual in my position to stand before all of you and declare that we as members of the Maa community can’t wait anymore to seek and pursue education like hungry men and women.

But to speak more seriously, I need not tell you that this community’s situation is very serious. That must be apparent to all intelligent people. I think one difficulty is that the problem is one of such enormous complexity that the very mass of facts presented before your eyes every day as to and including the zero number of public appointments in government and the private sector from this community makes it exceedingly obvious for the man in the street to reach a clear appraisement of the situation. Furthermore, the people of this community are distant from the necessary educational institutions and infrastructure being the only constituency (read Kajiado North) with the most proximity to Nairobi, and yet all it can boast of in terms of public institutions of higher learning is a dilapidated village polytechnic at Isinya, fullstop. It is not hard therefore for you to comprehend the plight and consequences the absence of such institutions in your community and the attendant consequences of the long-suffering of the people of Kajiado North and the effect of those consequences on their land, livelihoods, health has, in connection with the struggle to promote education in this community.

In considering the requirements for the resurrection of the Maa community in Kajiado North , the physical loss of land, the visible destruction of livelihoods, the glaring absence of roads, water, hospitals and job opportunities for our young people was correctly estimated, but it has become obvious during recent months that this visible destruction was probably less serious than the dislocation of the entire fabric of the Maasai economy. For the past forty six years, since Kenya gained her independence conditions have been highly abnormal. The feverish loss of land through unwarranted excision by government, the abetted sale, and the more feverish lack of effort by leadership to enable young people pursue higher education engulfed all aspects of the community’s survival.

Our fathers, therefore, has withdrawn many fields from livestock keeping and crop cultivation and instead turned them into commodities for sale at throw away prices. They sold our riches to buy poverty? Amu eishaitie aamirr Iltuli barrikon loo nkong’at e Kaputiei to sinkolio. For there is no point pretending anymore that the King is not naked.

Aside from the demoralizing effect this has on the community at large and the possibilities of disturbances arising as a result of the desperation of the people concerned, the consequences to the economy of Kenya should be apparent to all. It is logical that the Kenya government should do whatever it is able to do to assist in the return of normal educational and economic health in the Maa community, without which there can be no political stability and no assurance for peace. Our policy at the Association of Maa Academics is directed not against any politician or doctrine but against ignorance, against hunger, against poverty, against desperation, and against chaos. Its purpose should be the revival of a working economy in the Maa communities of Kenya so as to permit the emergence of political and social conditions in which a free, educated and empowered community and society can emerge and thrive.

Any assistance that leadership may render in the future should provide a cure rather than a mere palliative. Any leader that is willing to assist in the task of promoting education among members of this community will find full cooperation, I am sure, on the part of the Association of Maa Academics and myself. Any leader who maneuvers to block the recovery of our community cannot expect help from us. Furthermore, leadership, political parties, or groups which seek to perpetuate this community’s ignorance and misery in order to profit there from politically or otherwise will encounter the opposition of Association of Maa Academics and that of ole Wuantai.

It would be neither fitting nor efficacious for Association of Maa Academics to undertake to draw up unilaterally a program designed to place this community on its feet academically. This is the business of the community. The initiative, I think, must come from the community and the youth themselves. The role of Association of Maa Academics should be to lobby and advocate and of support of such a program so far as it may be practical for us to do so. The program should be a joint one, agreed to by a number, if not all, members and leadership of this community.

An essential part of any successful action on the part of Association of Maa Academics is an understanding on the part of the young people of this community of the character of the problem and the remedies to be applied. They must rise up themselves and resolve to go get education. The Good Book says; ‘I will fetch my knowledge from far and ascribe righteousness to my Maker.’ Political passion and prejudice should have no part. With foresight, and a willingness on the part of our youth to face up to the vast responsibility and challenge which history has clearly placed upon their shoulders, the difficulties I have outlined can and will be overcome. Aing’ae naa ilo lianyitata metalaku olosho linyi tenementae? Naa kaji inkoko tenilakuku tenimilakunono intae te sinkaisho enkigerore nimikidup? President Barrack Obama said; “Change will not come if we wait for some other person or some other time. We are the ones we have been waiting for. We are the change that we seek.”

And yet the whole future of our community hangs on a proper judgment. It hangs, I think, to a large extent on the realization of the young people, of just what are the various dominant factors. What are we not doing right? What are the implications of not doing so? What are the sufferings? What is needed? What can best be done? What must be done? Rise up therefore my brothers and my sisters and pursue education with the faith of a baby and the resolve of a hungry lion because we can’t anymore! Give them no rest until you bring home your diploma because we can’t wait anymore; Give them no rest until you bring home your higher diploma because we can’t wait anymore; Give them no rest until you bring home your degree because we can’t wait anymore; and Give them no rest until you bring home even your Masters degree because waiting anymore is a sure way of going under. And for the Almighty God, Give Him no rest until He makes the Maa community a praise on the earth and an ornament of glory for ALL to admire and to cherish.

May God bless you, God bless the Maasai, and may God bless Kenya.

Thank you very much.