Arjen Westra’s African Weblog

US-Senator Obama visited Kenya. The media were full about his visit. What surprised me most, was that Obama spoke out about a lot of things and that his ideas were taken just as if he was a veteran statesman. But he wasn’t, It felt just as if he was hired to do so. But is a US-senator supposed to criticize the government of the country where his father was born? Obama’s only connection with Kenya is, that his father migrated to the United States long time ago, but he was received like a long lost son. He criticized the government of president Kibaki, he criticized tribalism and he criticized the raid on newspaper The Standard this year. Why did he not promote Kenyan business in the United States, but instead choose to go with the Kenyan political flow? This is exactly that what Kenyans have had enough of these days? Why am I writing this? Because for me it confirms the idea that Kenyans are in desperate need of a hero, a myth that as a relative outsider can put things in a way that people listen to. South Africa had Mandela. Kenya now is dreaming about their own Mandela with Obama. The problem is, that Obama has nothing to do with Kenya, unless he migrates back to his fathers roots and comes to save ‘his’ country. 

 

Just back from exploring East Africa, Tanzania. For the second time in a few weeks I visited Spice Island Zanzibar. Poetry: The starting point of Livingstones Travels. But also politics: although not in the open. A lot of poverty, people are not happy because a lot of tourism money is going into the pockets of freshly elected local politicians. Ok, thats is nothing new. What struck me was the mountains of garbage, left by hotels and lodges just outside Stonetown, the capital on the west coast of this beautiful island. Also: tension under the surface. Wandering through the old town, one can feel an atmosphere of mystery. The media have after elections and everything seems quiet now. But people are not happy with their new chosen president. On the coffee corners in the narrow alleys, they talk secretly about the nearby future, their new president who took an island and added some other Zanzibar places to his possessions since he came into power November last year… ‘Give it one year and the situation will explode…’ a friend told me while we were enjoying a coffee on Jaws Corner at the heart of Stone Town.  Meanwhile tourists pass: laughing and joking with the local guys who would like to make some money out of them…