If Kenya and its African neighbors received the same kind of mass media attention about its most profound and life-threatening problems as it has about its recent post-election incidents, then perhaps the continent could make some true headway in its battles against extreme poverty, chronic hunger and HIV/AIDS.
But alas, it seems that these critical issues are simply not new or sufficiently newsworthy to make headlines. After all, there are no machete-carrying boys in these grim illnesses, no flames and no fury. Most of the victims in these battles have no fight left in them.
I find it ironic that Kenya, and many other African countries, suffer from “feast or famine” media attention.
As a Kenyan living in New York and the owner of a major safari outfitter operating in East Africa, last week I turned to any and all resources to keep me informed about the unfolding situation. I received daily updates from the Kenya Tourist Police and Kenya Tourist Federation as well as reports from our staff on-the-ground.
What became frustrating and even laughable at times, however, were the striking discrepancies between what I was hearing from my Nairobi-based staff and fellow Kenyan tourism suppliers, compared to what was being portrayed by news outlets. The situation was neither as apocalyptic nor the violence as pervasive as implied in the news. Incidents were taking place almost exclusively in the heavily populated slums of major cities or in remote country areasfar from the average tourist tractand not involving millions of reasonable, middle-class Kenyans, who were as appalled as the rest of the world.
According to the Kenyan Tourist Board, there were 30,000 international tourists in Kenya last week, none of whom were involved in any way. My company had nearly two hundred travellers on safari during this period and none of them saw nor heard any of the clashes that we witnessed on the evening’s news. It was business as usual. But again, this does not make for a good headline.
Missing also were the heartwarming stories of Kenyans helping Kenyans. As our Director of Operations reported the other day, “All is well in the city centre with the grocery shelves well-stocked and people busy buying. The best part, though, were the big piles of non-perishable foods stacked up at the front of the storeall donated by Kenyans to be sent to fellow Kenyans in the worst affected towns. Everyone is trying to help each other.”
If members of the media want to help Africa, then I call upon them to report on the formidable menaces of Africa not just the sensational, occasional problems. As activist and Nobel Peace Prize nominee Bono writes in “The End of Poverty” by Jeffrey D. Sachs, “Fifteen thousand Africans die each and every day of preventable, treatable diseasesAIDS, malaria, TBfor lack of drugs that we take for granted. This is Africa’s crisis.”
What can the average Westerner do? Do not give up on Kenya. Ever since Kenya’s independence forty years ago, whenever the country has experienced any sort of domestic incident even relatively minor ones pundits have predicted the demise of the country. This, of course, has never been the case. Kenya has always prevailed as a model of stability and democracy in the otherwise volatile horn of Africa.
We should also consider helping Africans who fight daily battles with hunger, poverty and deadly diseases. For more than twenty years, Micato’s non-profit foundation, AmericaShare, has been supporting residents of Nairobi’s notorious slums by providing access to such basic services as clean water, food, health care and an education.
Kenya’s present crisis underscores, more than ever, the need to provide an education to the impoverished children in slums and remote areas the precise areas where the current violence is playing out.
The real news story should be how the world can help Kenya and all African nations eradicate extreme poverty and chronic hunger, and ensure universal primary education and basic health care for all. That is the true crisis of Africa.
--Dennis Pinto, CEO, Micato Safaris and Co-Founder, AmericaShare
