Kisumu's reputation for protest is holding it back

What you need to know:

  • The Digital Program targeted standard eight dropouts selected from each sub county who, in most cases, have no chance of getting employment. 
  • Many of the investors in the hospitality industry whom devolution has brought to Kisumu have concentrated their investments within the Central Business District.
  • The explosion of Internet of Things means greater monitoring. Things that need constant monitoring are increasing by the day. 

In spite of heated political debates on Kenya’s media that suggest that nothing is being done right, some good work is going on at the county level. 

Devolution is working. We just need to support the efforts of county governments. 

I am one of those who worry too much about our country’s future. However, whenever I travel around the counties, I am persuaded that we appear to be on the right track.  

My recent travels to the counties of Kisumu and Uasin Gishu gave me a lot of hope.

Kisumu is a bustling metropolis with huge potential, particularly if it sheds its moniker of "violent protest capital" and makes all investors feel comfortable and welcome. It’s certainly cleaner than its bigger sister, Nairobi. 

After walking up nine floors to the governor’s office, I could not help but savour the scintillating beauty of Lake Victoria.  For up there, I could see the surreal image of a lake that was idly warming up to the early morning sunshine. 

At a distance, I could see Kisumu’s run-down miniature marina, which represents a glaring chance to exploit the lake’s tourism potential. 

The sloping hills across the waters lie virgin because many of the hospitality investors whom devolution has attracted are concentrated within the central business district.  Some 10 new hotels have come up.

This glory could dissipate if the line between politics and economics continue to be blurred.

STANDARD EIGHT LEAVERS

I was in Kisumu to address youthful graduands of the #TransformKisumu Digital Literacy Program. Some 2,000 people came to witness the first batch of 500 graduate from this transformative program at the Jomo Kenyatta port grounds. 

One of the speakers, a young member of the county assembly, appealed for peace. I got to learn that even though there was calm in the city, some businesses were still convalescing from previous "Monday" protests that saw their properties damaged and pillaged.

As I spoke, I gathered the courage to appeal to Governor Jack Ranguma to protect investors in Kisumu. First, because no one wants a beautiful city like Kisumu to be associated with random hooliganism that undermines investment. 

Secondly, because the only way to fight unemployment is job creation and driving job creators out of the city would be counterproductive.

When the governor to stood speak, he began by apologising to investors who were affected and promised to meet with them to assure them of their safety. The ebullient governor was right and his passion to move Kisumu County ahead through investment was evident. He and his team have adopted a policy of leaving no one behind by providing opportunity at every level.

The Digital Program targeted Standard Eight dropouts selected from each sub-county who, in most cases, have no chance of finding employment. With digital knowledge, they can find back-office jobs monitoring digital cameras globally using the abundant bandwidth in Kisumu. These are some of the jobs created by new technologies such as the Internet of Things (IoT). 

The County Executive for ICT, Mr Michael Onyango, is alive to new technologies that could bring jobs into rural Kenya. 

DEMAND FOR MONITORING

The explosion of Internet of Things means more demand for monitoring. Facilities that need constant monitoring are increasing by the day. 

They include closed circuit television (CCTV) to monitor areas such as retail stores and highways, use of wearables to monitor patients and elderly people, smart farming and automated industrial production, to name but a few. 

Some sectors in Kenya need such monitoring services, but we need to create the product and market it internationally, not just locally.

At advanced levels of monitoring, a rising number of graduates from all universities in the country could train in network monitoring, network security and cyber security, to make them employable in emerging fields. 

In the coming days, virtually every gadget will be connected to every other gadget and as such, some critical monitoring devices will be monitored for long periods of time to guarantee a constant flow of reliable data.

Hospitals of the future will start equipping patients with wearables, which will necessitate integration into ICT.  They will also update their networks to enhance monitoring of their solutions.  

All these will require a re-skilled workforce, and those counties that successfully prepare their citizens for future jobs will succeed.

Uasin Gishu’s cosmopolitan city, Eldoret, is developing its own narrative.  The county was among the first to tackle youth unemployment. On this they were to learn the hard way, because some of the deliverables aren’t working as they envisaged. 

The dream of building a village polytechnic in all Eldoret sub counties is proving challenging, and youth are not registering to learn much-needed skills that would guarantee jobs. 

GOOD PLUMBERS

The problem isn’t only in Uasin Gishu, but countrywide. Yet you can hardly find a well-trained tradesman.

You could sense the frustration of Deputy Governor Daniel Chemno, who told me that academics are not meant for everyone.  In Eldoret you cannot find a good plumber or mason, but no one is training to take up these jobs.  I tell him the situation is the same in Nairobi. 

As in Kisumu, I was here to address some 150 youth from each sub county. They were recent graduates, learning life skills and how they can become job creators to ease Kenya's unemployment crisis.

I chose to emphasise the need to identify opportunity, and to be constantly innovative by adopting new processes and products every time similar products saturate the market.

To do so, we need to discard our tendency to start copycat businesses, which often fail within a short time. 

In every endeavour, there is a window that must be exploited. The youth are a window that needs exploiting because they can bear greater risk now than later in their lives.

ONE-YEAR SERVICE

At a later function in the evening with the local business community, I chose to speak on the supply chain development of local produce and the need to leverage big data at the local level.  Essentially, to develop the supply chain, new innovations must be part of the solution. 

We cannot continue to extract a few products from maize and hope to expand the market. Further, ugali, one of the products of maize, is less portable and must be consumed instantly, making it a difficult choice for the menu of an increasingly mobile population. 

Clearly, there are opportunities for employment that are not being exploited because every youth wants higher qualifications at all costs, even when there are no jobs. In developed countries like Germany, technical training at tertiary level almost always ensures that citizens have jobs.  The training includes even those who later acquire higher-level qualifications. 

Knowing this, we need to encourage a compulsory one-year service by all youths after high school. During this one-year public service, youths would be taken through all manner of technical training, giving them new skills that they can choose to use. Alternatively, they can pursue education to whatever level. 

The country would benefit, and at least the young people would put food on the table from skills that are in short supply today.

Devolution is changing the county rural mindset and helping us to see many things we could not see previously. 

We must learn from the experiences like youth not taking up youth training programs at tertiary level or changing consumer patterns, and provide comprehensive solutions.

The writer is an associate professor at University of Nairobi’s School of Business. Twitter: @bantigito