HUMILITY IS A SIGN OF STRENGTH, KENYA OPPOSITION LEADER MOSES WETANGULA SHOULD KNOW THAT.

A video clip has been making rounds in the social media for months allegedly showing President Uhuru Kenyatta "stuck" in traffic in Nairobi, his back window open, and street boys latching at his car desperately trying to make a pitch for roast nuts.

The location of that video is not given and there is no credit line to indicate who actually shot it and when. It was dark outside. The man seen chewing njugu (ground nuts) appears in likeness and voice to be our President. After buying the munchies and trying severally to dismiss the youths by insisting he had bought enough, he reaches to his pocket, pulls out a note of money and hands it over to the happy kids: "mugawanye" (divide), he tells them. The kids say "asante Mheshimiwa" (thank you Your Excellency) and saunter away to try their luck with other customers.

If the brief video is genuine, then Uhuru must be the first known Kenyan President to buy ground nuts from street kids.

Wasn't that a mundane show of humility? Only President Daniel Arap Moi matched that. The former President had the habit of suddenly stopping his motorcade at some fruit kiosk in the middle of nowhere, chatting nonchalantly with hawkers and buying bananas for himself and his entourage?

Humility, someone said, is not a sign of lowliness or weakness, but a virtue of strength and confidence. In the absence of humility, hubris reigns.

Let us now take the incident last week at which opposition leader Moses Wetangula was "ejected" from a Kenya Airways flight at Nairobi airport. The only demand put on Wetangula by the airline personnel was that he produces his ID to confirm his identity before boarding a flight to Mombasa. That was not an unreasonable demand given that all passengers are required to do the same. IT IS THE LAW.

The co-leader of the Coalition for Reforms and Democracy (CORD) had good reasons for not having his ID card in his possession. He had inadvertently left it in a bag which was in a vehicle travelling by road to the same destination. But that was not a good excuse, enough to exempt him from the law.

What was improper was the manner in which Wetangula tried to circumvent regulations, which to me, smells of hubris. Instead of flaunting his political credentials, he should have recalled his driver to the city even if that meant delaying his travel. There was no need for chest-thumping; no need to inconvenience other passengers on that flight.

Wetangula is just an ordinary citizen. He is no longer the Minister of Government he once was to demand special treatment. In any case, even Ministers are required to comply with the law.

This habit of political leaders behaving badly is most common in our present political establishment. Not too long ago, a Kenyan MP was ejected from an airline because of being rude and cantankerous. There have been several cases where leaders have refused to be body-searched at airports citing their public positions. Because they drive specially numbered vehicles, many of them have no respect for traffic rules; others demand to be fast-tracked at queues claiming they are too busy.

Unless leaders are prepared to be humble and courteous, and are aware of their limits, one cannot expect citizens to behave any differently.

Wetangula now wants to raise the matter in Parliament. By doing so, he is confirming one thing: that he believes he's above the law.

Let him and others know that nobody is above the law in Kenya, nobody.

And that is my say.

DIASPORA AFRICANS ARE FEELING THE PINCH OF THE EBOLA CRISIS IN AMERICA

Ebola, the virus that has killed thousands of people in West Africa, and one on the American soil, has become a reason for discriminating Africans by a section of people in the United States and elsewhere in the West.

For the first time, Africans living in the US feel profiled over Ebola even though they live thousands of miles away from the epicentre of the disease in West Africa.

The virus has exploded into a major crisis in America. It has sent people into a state of panic or "hysteria" as President Obama has said, and driven them into what is now known here as the "abundance of caution." Extreme prevention measures have been put in place to curb its spread. This is after a Liberian national Thomas Duncan arrived in Dallas, tested positive for Ebola and died. Two American nurses who had close contacts with Duncan are presently hospitalised.`

The importation of the virus from Africa has fueled an abundance of xenophobia among a large population of Americans whose perception of Africans has now turned into one of suspicion and indignation.

It is common knowledge that many Americans are deficient on matters of geography. Because the United States of America is one country, they cannot imagine Africa is different, that it is a splinter of over 50 independent nations.

To many Americans, Africa is a homogeneous continent inhabited by black people who are not only backward but also poor, miserable, corrupt, and different. They cannot tell the difference between West Africa and East Africa nor differentiate between a Zulu and a Luo.

This lack of knowledge helped by an ill-informed media has exposed Africans in the Diaspora to cynicism and hate perpetrated by racist elements desirous of isolating the continent.

Of late, there have been several disturbing instances pointing to racist tendencies against Africans.

Last week in Dallas, a Kenyan nurse was sent home from work because she had contact with her daughter who was visiting from Kenya. In Oklahoma, more than twenty Kenyan children on an exchange visit to America are now in a state of limbo accused of bringing Ebola to the United States; and in several places reports have emerged of African students being bullied on account of their origins, with one case of a teary high school student from Niger of particular interest. Similar discriminatory behaviour has been reported in Europe.

Usually, I never shy away from flaunting my Africanness while overseas. But with the explosion of Ebola-phobia in the United States having reached extreme proportions, some of us are compelled to mute our origin to avoid public humiliation.

I don't see Ebola going anywhere any time soon which means the phobia and the resultant taunting of Africans will continue for a long time.

But that is not all.

Pressure is mounting on President Obama's administration to ban all travels to and from Africa (not just West Africa). If this happens, the economic implication will be huge not only for Africans but for the entire international community. It means, westerners will not be able to leave from or travel to the continent; and Africans will virtually be isolated.

I hope President Obama will resist such pressure.

And that is my say.

AFRICANS SHOULD NOT BE BLAMED FOR EBOLA IRRUPTION IN THE US

Not since September 11, 2001 when Al Quida terrorists attacked targets in the United States have Americans been so alarmed about their safety. Here in Dallas especially, people are on edge, and for good reasons.

The arrival of the deadly Ebola virus in the United States via a Liberian visitor has sent tremors of shock, consternation and anger among Americans especially in this city of 1.3 million people, where the victim - middle-aged Thomas Eric Duncan - is struggling for his life at the Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital.

Since the announcement last week that Duncan had tested positive for the killer virus, American television and radio news channels have been carrying the story intermittently, twenty-four-seven, via breaking news segments, analyses, speculations and expert opinion from US government agencies, more specifically, the US Centre for Disease Control (CDC), the premier epidemic disease watchdog organisation.

Americans are shocked because most people here believed Ebola was an African problem. Never did they imagine it could cross oceans and reach North America.

In West Africa, the epicentre of the disease, thousands of Africans in half a dozen countries have died from the epidemic that is threatening to enshroud more countries and kill many more people.

A few weeks ago, two American medics working in West Africa had to be evacuated to the US after contracting the disease and were lucky enough to survive, thanks to an experimental drug that is still on trial in American laboratories.

There is consternation because several people in Dallas came into close contact with Duncan including children in four schools. Then there are those who travelled with him on the flights from Monrovia to Brussels and Brussels to Dallas; airline personnel; hospital workers; and residents at the Dallas housing complex where Duncan stayed.

From on-air analyses, it is easy to discern an amount of anger among some Americans, not only directed at Duncan, but his hosts in the US and Africans in general. There is a feeling among some, expressed subtly and not so subtly, that Africans are to blame for the irruption of the disease in the US.

I can now understand why my pew mates in Church, an elderly couple, refused to extend their hands for the peace sign last Sunday.

With the arrival of Ebola in the western world, this still-to-be-fully-understood disease, is no longer an African problem but a global emergency that requires combined efforts by all humanity. President Obama is already leading the way and is sending troops to help construct hospitals in West Africa for victims of the fast spreading disease.

It's now time for other countries to come forward and show their benevolence and solidarity with Africa at this difficult moment. In the meantime, Africans should not be blamed en-masse for the entry of Ebola - a disease said to be transmitted through consumption of monkey flesh - into the Western world.

If there is one thing this sad episode has taught us, it is that ours is a global village. What happens in Africa affects everyone in this planet and vice versa.

And that is my say.