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The day I got on that overloaded bus from the green countryside heading to Nairobi for greener pastures in a concrete jungle, I lost all my FREEdom. I left the Free Domain for one socially constructed in superficial conveniences. I had arrived as a true Lord of the Land but I was quickly introduced as a tenant to the Lord of Concrete wrongly designated as LandLord. This was a strange world. One in which you paid to live! I was quickly introduced to the Cost of Living. The sad exchange of Free Domain for the right to be freely dominated. In this strange world, If you didn’t pay this cost of life, you faced real prospects of death. I had to pay for water, food and a place to cook it. I had to pay for a place to sleep. Sometimes I had to pay the pharmacist for sleep itself in the loud noise of matatus meters from my bedsitter. In fact, I had to pay for air. Part of that payment was the fare from polluted Eastlands to Arboretum Recreational Forest to breathe some fresh air. What was my daily life in the countryside was now only available in costly doses of recreational visits to a place with trees. To recreate what I was slowly killing. This modern life surely haieleweki. Na bado sipangwingwi! Sadly, some of my neighbors paid the cost of breathing with their very lives from lung cancer gotten from pollutants from Industrial Area.
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To control it, you must impose restrictions on Capital Outflow. You might go as far as restricting trade of the shilling offshore or to non-residents for a short period. That is, foreigners or foreign-owned entities should be restricted from converting short-term assets like cash and shares to foreign currency for a certain period of time. On the expiration of that period, a repatriation tax should be imposed as an incentive to keep the money in Kenya. This will stabilize the Shilling and provide the economy much needed capital. The escaping value will be trapped by law to finance your long-term vision for this nation. If you don’t do this, at least in part, you will be relegated to fighting constant fires and five years will find you engulfed in financial, economical and political flames and shame. You will spend the five years surrounded by debt sellers that we wrongly call development partners and donors donating money made in our very economy. But you cannot fail! You must not fail! These actions may sound drastic but are what is credited for saving Malaysia after the 1997 Asian Financial Crisis. We must be preventive.
Further, you must create a law that limits how much profit can be repatriated. If you plot the Shilling against dividend payout to foreign investor, you will note that the Shilling has predictably and irreversibly lost value every time.
This is just an excerpt of the original post, the rest of the article become a chapter in this book
Robert Mwangi, MBA author of the books President’s Advisor, Money Circles, Five Fingers and Dollar Altar. He also composed and sung ZIBA UFA
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Great article, over to you Mr. President, you cannot fail, the hustler needs you!!
Very nice Piece. Keep on the good work.
Yes the hustler needs liberating but they need to liberate themselves since every benevolent leader inherits a yoke from the predecessor you know to maintain status quo., by the development partners who don't care that the said leader is corrupt. Actually the dirtier they are the better since they would be easier to manipulate. They also want a bargaining tool to lobby for infrastructural projects, heathcare supplies and what have u., they want to compell such leaders to comply or face extreme starvation., in certain instances they use the international criminal court as the last tool to threaten compliance. Our leaders on the outside appear pro hustlers but behind that facade is a game of cards which the hustler is the prize., we are slowly being like sheep who only hears the voice and staff of the master., without which we stay in a state of limbo., people, communities and societies needs to come together to solve their immediate problems. self suffience starts from within and the moment we start to like our very own pot made from industrial area and not a vintage one from the ming dynasty we will be on our way there. the message is not to the leaders but to the hustlers themselves., to start to create something, yes the hustler fund. a good initiative but will it reach the intended target people or those who worked tirelessly to ensure that we got the helms of power.? serious questions bur I reckon we need to craft a message to the hustler., that of self dependence, gratification and living within the realities of our own dormains and applying measures that makes us food secure first and diversity of income sources.