YOUNG MOTHERS FOR REAL!

The honourable CS MAGOHA was out  to give a briefing on the findings from the Senate committee tasked with advising the ministry on the modalities of opening schools under this Covid scare. Only families with candidates know how fidgety they had become not knowing their fate. Anyway, it seemed like the minister couldn’t ignore and just couldn’t wait to fire away at the elephant in the room. The recent reveal of the exponential number of pregnant schoolgirls in the country just had to be tackled. Any responsible adult and father would be obliged to do so.

I was baffled earlier in the day, when I came across the post somewhere in the net and it struck me as odd. I am aware what most people had was just the figures from one county – Machakos, but (courtesy of my essential services badge) I had numbers for all counties pretty early in the day. It’s description in one word – poetic. I mean the numbers were so high, with Nairobi predictably leading from the front with slightly above the better half of eleven thousand, that they actually literally looked like Covid-19 status update numbers from Brazil.

The self-confessed professor of twenty or more years still razor sharp had the wit and audacity to question the authenticity of this information. How did they arrive at these figures? Who or which organization conducted this survey? Who are these children,from which schools? How did they get a hold of them to find out their state? Schools closed on late March, how could anyone get a hold of all those school kids and test them? No matter how you look at it, it’s next to impossible to get such data unless all those kids went to hospital to seek help and we got the news there. Better still, an underage pregnant would never take themselves to hospital at one or two months in it. Not logical at all. Again it’s not even two months without school that is if you don’t count April. It’s the holidays for crying out loud. It a normal thing, only this time a little longer.

What also clearly caught my eye was conservative Garissa, Wajir, Marsabit beating Mombasa hands down.  I mean if you know the Coast the way most of us do, there is no way that is holding any water. There is no way, for example, the Garissa or Wajir bodabodas are more lethal than their counterparts in Mombasa. That is a the-world-is-flat lie. It made me remember the tale of the judge who told a defendant to try and make the dog smaller if he didn’t mean for it to be a hyena whilst he was trying to explain his case.

According to them you can never guess who is to blame for the spike in pregnancies. I can give you all day but you won’t get it. No, not the parents. Again, no, not the man or boy presumably. Let’s cut the chase. They blame it on the man of the moment, the alpha male – Covid-19. That is when it clicked! Has it? This opened a totally new dimension in my thinking and I must give it to some Kenyans for their genius. Whilst all eyes are riveted on the fight against this monster, some people have already turned it into a money – mincing plot. Some nerve! It is practical that pushing a narrative so hard makes people start believing that line and just like that pap an NGO is born to champion and defend just that. Then, as if by order, we would need funds to do this, some to do that and the outcome is the siphoning of millions from government coffers into someone’s belly.

I bet the sources of the information had not put into consideration all the dynamics as pertains to this case scenario. Didnt they even think we would be tempted to discern and conclude that maybe we are fighting the wrong battle? Yet again they had underestimated the intellect of other like – minded geniuses out there who can read between the lines. Come to think of the way I had already blacklisted some of my pals from Eastern for the sins of their kinsmen. Even in our traditional African custom, it is classified as an unfathomable act. You don’t steal from the house of the mourning. Only a naive and slow head will still not have had that light bulb moment after perusing through this. As for me on this one, I beg to pass. I beg to say, nope am not boarding.