Put aside petty differences and see the bigger picture of Obama’s visit

What you need to know:

  • Of course, being Kenyans, we forgot that freshly-sown grass will not grow in a week, but I suppose it is the thought that counts as we put our best foot and face forward for our visiting President of the United States.
  • The inconveniences, the traffic disruptions, the heavy security, the cost, and even the temporary surrender of sovereignty will all be worth it weighed against the importance and symbolism of the visit.
  • In that regard, it is unwise for the Opposition, civil society, and other pressure groups to take it that the only reason for the visit is so that they can have the opportunity to “tell on” the government.

We have filled the potholes, cleared the garbage, run the homeless street families out of town, aired the drapes, polished the crockery, beefed up security, and for the umpteenth time attempted to “beautify” the landscape on the main thoroughfares into the capital city.

Of course, being Kenyans, we forgot that freshly-sown grass will not grow in a week, but I suppose it is the thought that counts as we put our best foot and face forward for our visiting President of the United States.

President Barack Obama’s visit will be like no other. It will not just be an ordinary president of another country, even a superpower, calling on us, but one of our own fulfilling a pledge to visit the country of his father before he leaves office.

Even if it is not an official State visit — and President Obama had to employ the devise of hosting his Global Entrepreneurship Summit in Nairobi to provide an excuse for Air Force One to head for our shores — it is still clearly the most important visit by a foreign leader since independence.

The inconveniences, the traffic disruptions, the heavy security, the cost, and even the temporary surrender of sovereignty will all be worth it weighed against the importance and symbolism of the visit.

Now, when expecting an important visitor, it is not just about tidying up your living room, but being genuinely welcoming.

It is bad manners for anyone expecting guests to start loudly lecturing them in advance on what they must say or not say.

It is bad manners to start drawing up lists of the gifts they must bring. It is also bad manners to signal that you will be reporting to the guest that the head of your household is not performing to expectations, or that your siblings are taking more than their share of the ugali.

President Obama should not be burdened with all kinds of nonsense from our petty domestic feuds.

When President Kenyatta addresses the nation today, I believe we will hear from a leader and statesman who will not allow himself to be distracted by the infantile noises coming from all over the place.

From the Op-Ed piece he published in the Sunday Nation at the beginning of this week, we can glean that President Kenyatta sees the big picture in the importance of President Obama’s visit and has a clear vision of how it can be exploited toward Kenya’s own advantage.

I wish the President had long ago shut up those small-minded fellows in his entourage — from senior politicians to two-bit MPs and all manner of certified hecklers — who from early on threatened to spoil the welcome by inciting all manner of sterile debate and marches against homosexuality and other things they imagined President Obama would speak about.

Neither of the self-appointed moral guardians from the political classes and their fellow travellers in the clerical collars have the moral authority to make any demands when they are famous only for stealing from the taxpayers and their flock.
Those fellows trying to gag President Obama, whether it be on gay rights or what he might have to say about corruption, media freedom, human rights, and freedom of expression, are only trying to cover up for their own iniquities.

This is not to say, of course, that President Obama should come only to lecture us and wag the big finger at us and nothing else. That too would be bad manners.

In that regard, it is unwise for the Opposition, civil society, and other pressure groups to take it that the only reason for the visit is so that they can have the opportunity to “tell on” the government.

I think we have to take the view that President Obama is not coming here to visit either President Kenyatta or opposition leader Raila Odinga.

He is not coming here for Jubilee or Cord, and surely does not need to be drawn into petty domestic quarrels that have nothing to do with his agenda or the wider interests of our country.

We must, therefore, put aside partisan politics and little differences and focus on what we can leverage from the visit of Potus and the galaxy of business moguls assembled for the Global Entrepreneurship Summit.

[email protected]. Twitter: @MachariaGaitho