Living by the 'Creed of Greed' and the 'Me First' Attitude

Two things appear to have slowly entrenched  themselves in our society.The creed of greed and the attitude that "I come first."The biggest questions therefore are:Do we work just to make money? and why are Kenyans enmeshed in this attitude of 'me first'?Many scholars and people alike are asking  is the growing so called 'hustler mentality' the way to go?

Kenyans today are living by the creed of greed.This is attributed  to the fact that every new born Kenyan immediately inherits a debt of no less than Sh30,000. It is a debt that was incurred by others on our behalf.You will also observe that Kenyans are filled with the attitude of 'me first'.A good example is where motorist and pedestrian compete on who to use the road.Each is competing to use the road first and non is willing to allow the other to use the road first.This attitude is well spread in out society where politician and those in leadership position are more interested in themselves and their needs.

Going back into Kenya's history,the colonizers bequeathed to the first indigenous government, the railway, we inherited many farms and many institutions but 48 years down the line we can no longer run a railway system; forests that were left have been converted into plots. Its  a country where many a politician, many a respected individual now stand on rooftops and pontificate about what Kenyans should do.

From the bible  its clear that God makes something out of nothing. Kenyans have lost sight of the intrinsic value of work. Kenya's colonial legacy had both positive and negative aspects and we could have built on the positives and discarded what was not good for us.  The rain started beating us when we adopted a mis-education policy.The colonizers came up with an education system that was supposed to create people to work in their company, a system to create serfs. And that's why you find a person coming from a village where there may be several nuclear physicists PhDs and there's no running water, there's no electricity and people are dying of hunger every year.Apart the education system, Kenya's working populace is a product of societal norm and values which have been inculcated at the most basic unit of the society; the family.If you look at other societies, you'll find that people come up with inventions and ways to make life easier for themselves, but this doesn't seem to be the way we as Kenyans have been cultured to think.

Our parents were the first ones to encounter this colonial education system and they bought it hook line and sinker and they passed it to us unquestioningly. This has created a whole generation of people who have no interest in solutions, they primary motive for work is to just get rich.The tragedy then is the middle class, that slice of the population that should be creating solutions for Africa, who are  caught up in making wealth for themselves to insulate themselves from the poor.

The third factor  is  scarcity mentality. We have this myth that somewhere there's this national cake and I have to get into position so that I can get some for myself and for my relative. It's a very insidious thinking that has gotten into us.So what have we done to our forest cover? From 30 percent to meager 1.7 percent; because we are all eating it. Nobody is asking who's going to plant trees for the next generation.

Like the proverbial Phoenix Kenya can rise from the ashes on the wings of the youth. who should inculcate the idea  that in the absence of role models we will chart our own course guided by our  self-conscience. We must also do away with the attitude of 'me first' and cultivate the culture of empathy. We must be ready to allow and accept that we live this world with others.