Age, I concur, is not a qualification. But the repeated appointment of old people to positions of leadership in Kenya has to stop.
That being so, age and gender, ought to be strict considerations whenever appointments are made purely because Kenya is a country whose majority population is made up of youth, specifically women.
These appointments of old people are a deliberate choice showing that a majority of Kenya’s population don’t matter and neither does their contribution.
About 60 per cent of Africans, and especially youth, think that their governments are doing a very bad or a fairly bad job at addressing the needs of the youth as confirmed by findings from the 2017 Youth Wellbeing Index.
Additionally, Kenyan youth share these sentiments with their continued representation by old people even when the young people have demonstrated that they’re able and capable of doing the work themselves.
This is followed by the tired reasoning that Kenyan youth who complain about their lack of representation or inclusion should fight for positions and stop being entitled. Yet we all know this isn’t the case. Positions in Kenya are rarely handed out on merit but rather on tribal and nepotistic grounds.
Similarly, the gender conversation on women representation finds itself in the same position with women regularly being asked to fight for their representation yet we all know the rules of the battle are drastically different for women.
These narrow-minded arguments reduce the real and tangible barriers that both young people and women — as separate demographics — face when it comes to getting their rightful share of representation and inclusion.
First, Kenyan youth who don’t have the pleasure of privilege that comes with wealth or having a powerful last name are the most disposable group of people.
They are the people whose futures are constantly traded off through plundered institutions like what happened with the National Youth Service, Youth Fund and Uwezo Fund. On the other hand, Kenyan women who don’t belong to the elite group are another demographic handled with reductionist attitude.
The decision, therefore, to appoint old people, including older women, is reckless when there’s a bigger pool to draw fresh leaders from. We cannot keep hoarding positions and reserving them for those whose time has passed at the expense of a generation whose time is now.
There are many able young people in Kenya whose driving force is to make Kenya a livable country, can the old people get out of their way so they can mould the country they want to live in?
