SAY WHAT YOU SAY: FIDEL CASTRO WAS AFRICA'S HERO

Regardless of what some Western leaders say, and despite the flashy - but repulsive - street celebrations in Miami, the fallen Cuban leader Fidel Alejandro Castro Ruz was and will forever remain a friend of Africa.

In the 1960s when the developed world was shirking Africa and siding with imperialists, Castro's Cuba was in Algeria giving military and medical support to the people there in their struggle for independence from France.

Cubans were present when South African insurgents entered Angola in 1975. Together with the Soviet Union, Cuba deployed thousands of combat troops, advisers, tanks and fighter planes, and fought on the side of the Mozambique Peoples' Liberation Army (MPLA) until the South Africans withdrew in 1988, opening the way for Namibia's independence and the demise of apartheid.

Without Cuban assistance, says one media source, the apartheid army would have easily cruised into Luanda, crushed MPLA and installed a puppet government friendly to the apartheid regime.

After those countries were liberated, Havana sent in doctors, teachers, and military advisers to help them achieve their goals of development.

Even now Cuban doctors still visit Ghana and Tanzania from time to time to offer medical services.

Over the years, the island nation has also given thousands of scholarships to African students to study in Cuba.

The heavily-bearded revolutionary was a true friend of Africa and formed long-lasting relationships with the continent's most iconic leaders including Tanzania's Julius Nyerere; Angola's Augustinho Neto; Namibia's Sam Nujoma; and Ghana's Kwame Nkrumah, among others.

When Nelson Mandela was released from jail after 27 years in a South African jail, one of the first leaders he met was the towering Marxist-Leninist ideologist.

Perhaps Cuba's most controversial military action in Africa was in 1977. Castro sent 15,000 troops to support the Ethiopian dictator, Mengistu Haile Mariam, in a territorial dispute with Somalia. Mohammed Siad Barre's troops were forced to retreat after incurring heavy casualties. Up to his death, Addis Ababa considered the Cuban leader a great friend and a liberator while Mogadishu saw him as an evil interventionist.

In total, Cuba sacrificed 4,300 troops in battles in Algeria, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Equatorial Guinea, Sierra Leone and Libya.

No wonder the African Union was quick to come out and condole the fallen leader. "Africa," said the deputy chairman of the African Union Commission, "owes a lot to Cuba and its late leader Fidel Castro."

Castro's name remains his biggest legacy in the continent. Many children, including the eldest son of Kenya's Opposition leader Raila Odinga are named after him.

However, appreciating Castro is not condoning acts of human rights abuses inside Cuba during his term in office. Extra-judicial killings and illegal imprisonments of innocent people must be condemned in the strongest terms regardless of where they occur and who commits them.

But to jubilate over the death of a leader who brought freedom and kindness to so many oppressed people in the world is disdainful.

I believe all human beings deserve respect and dignity in death.

Even Castro's estranged sister, Juanita Castro, who had not spoken to his brother for 52 because she objected to his rule, and who now lives among those who are celebrating his death, is disgusted. "Logically that reaction hurts," the 83-year old woman told the New York Times.

This is what Castro said at the beginning of the Cuban revolution in 1953."You can condemn me, but it doesn't matter. History will acquit me." Yes,

indeed it will.

Kwaheri ya Kuonana Fidel! (Fare thee well, Fidel).

And that is my say.

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KENYA'S KOGELO VILLAGERS STILL WAITING FOR THEIR SON OBAMA TO RETURN

And that is my say.

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FAKE NEWS ARE A MENACE TO SOCIETY

During the past two decades the social media has become one of the most powerful sources of information.

It facilitates free and seamless inter- and cross-border communication and enables information to travel fast and wide. It builds and destroys individuals and institutions, and promotes or demotes merchandise in a way never seen before.

Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google and others are now the new media. While in the past, people had to wait hours, sometimes days, to know what was happening around them, things have dramatically changed now. Citizen journalists, armed with no more than a smartphone, are able to break news to millions of people around the world on real time and keep stories alive with pictures and videos.

This form of communication is a boon to users and consumers but it is also a source of pain, anguish, and disappointment for many.

Fake news have permeated the social media so much so that a new cliché` has been born: don't believe anything you read in the internet.

Fiction disguised as news has saturated the social network - distorting facts and spreading propaganda, innuendos and lies, sometimes with serious consequences in politics, government and business.

Producers of fake news engage in mischief and spin information to please, hurt or damage reputations, or simply to drive traffic. Fake newsmakers "sex" their stories to attract likes and spur social discourse, and photo-shop images to legitimize their stories.

It is not surprising therefore that many people in the US believe fake news influenced the just ended US elections. Blogging sites, websites and posts carried bogus information and anecdotes about Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton that were misleading and plain false.

Impostors lied to voters that they could vote online; gave different voting days for Democracts and Republicans; claimed that Clinton was a murderer; and that the Pope had endorsed Trump, among a litany of many bogus posts. Equally preposterous was a post days after elections that Obama had signed an executive order to investigate the election results.

The social media is also known to regularly "kill" prominent people - from prominent individuals like Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe to Fidel Castro of Cuba; to celebrities like Sylvester Stallone, Paul Mcartney and Lady Gaga.

Those hoaxes were spread through the social media and were shared to thousands of people. A finger was pointed largely at Facebook where most of the false news items appeared. Chief executive Mark Zuckerberg, however, denied that Facebook influenced the elections, and branded that idea "crazy." He said it was "extremely unlikely hoaxes changed the outcome of this election."

Currently, a number of the social media organizations including Facebook are scratching their heads over how to deal with the fakers.

Since it's generally difficult to distinguish between genuine news and fake news because of the way the latter is crafted and presented, consumers are left to use their own intuition.

So, good luck as you thumb your way through the various internet platforms.

And that is my say.

UHURU KENYATTA MUST BE PREPARED TO LOSE UNLESS HE CHANGES TACTICS

If free and fair elections were to be held today, Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga would most likely upset the incumbent President Uhuru Kenyatta.

I base my position on the following premise:

First, three years into government the ruling Jubilee has failed to meet the threshold of national aspirations: It has failed to inspire hope, failed to unite a balkanized country, and failed to tackle chronic unemployment and biting poverty. Tens of thousands of Kenyans are starving in various parts of the country due, in part, to poor policies.

Two, despite promises of commitment and declarations of intent to 'sly the dragon,' grand corruption still gnaws ferociously at the very fabric of the nation. After President Kibaki failed to deal with the matter during his eight years in office, Kenyans expected much more from their new youthful and savvy leader. But recently Kenyatta surprised many when he admitted

he was frustrated by the whole issue of corruption, and blamed his officials for letting him down.

None other than the former anti-corruption czar John Githongo has said that Kenyatta's is "the most rapacious administration we have ever had."

Three, Kenyatta could go home in 2017 because an increasingly cynical citizenry is hungry for real, substantive, and sustainable change. They are tired of the status quo, of rampant tribalism and entrenched nepotism.

During campaigns, the Jubilee party leadership promised a double digit growth. That has not happened. The economy is still hovering at around five percent.

It also guaranteed five million jobs over a five year period. Three years down the line, not even half of those jobs have been delivered. A staggering 70 percent of young people remain jobless.

Four, the economy. Kenya's debt has grown exponentially from 1.2 trillion shillings to 3.2 trillion shillings within three years. It is the citizenry that is shouldering the burden. Even the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) are worried.

Five, there has been a noticeable increase in police brutality against innocent people, protesters and members of the media in the last few years. A number of journalists have been threatened and beaten, and media freedoms are seemingly under siege.

And finally, Kenyatta won by the narrowest of margins in 2013: 50.03 percent against Odinga's 43.28 percent of the vote. Dynamics have not changed much. Odinga remains Kenyatta's most potent political adversary and will most likely give the President a run for his money. The leader of the Orange Democratic Party has the momentum, the determination, and a fanatical support of loyalists across the country at this point of time.

Also, the newly inaugurated Jubilee Party is yet to kick off in a more tangible way. It is only this week that party regional committees were appointed to oversee activities at the grassroots level. This laissez-faire attitude on the part of the Jubilee could be its Achilles Heels.

The only thing the opposition must do without delay is to announce its presidential flag-bearer, even though my view is that the flag-bearer will indeed be Odinga himself.

Having said all that Kenyatta has some positive victories of his own. He can cite improved infrastructure (roads and railway lines), free maternity services, a more secure country, fertilizers and electricity provisions, and the delivery of digital learning devices to schools. He can also argue that Kenya is viewed more positively in the world today than it was during Kibaki's time.

Will these positives be enough to guarantee him another four years in office?

Conventional wisdom tells me nyet.

I must say however that not everything is broken for Kenyatta. There is still time to change the negative perceptions on the ground. To do so, he needs to change tactics and strategies and dispel feelings among some that his Administration is elitist and insular.

As someone says, politics is a battle of perceptions.

And that is my say.

IS ABSOLUTE DEMOCRACY A DANGER TO SOCIETY?

Democracy, said the former US President Ronald Reagan, is worth dying for, because it's a deeply honorable form of government ever devised by man.

Indeed, democracy is "sweet." Anyone who has studied Comparative Government as I have done will agree.

Democracy guarantees freedoms, the rule of law, and respect for human rights. More importantly, democracy ensures that supreme power, when obtained, is vested in the people, and as the Merriam Webster dictionary explains, that that power is exercised directly or indirectly through a system of representation usually through free elections.

But sometimes too much application of democracy, and in the US case, absolute democracy. (read freedoms) can be dangerous.

With only a few days to go before what many say is the most consequential presidential election in recent history, democracy in America appears to be under assault.

It is normal for candidates in elections everywhere to trade accusations and counter-accusations. But what we have been hearing from some quarters - especially Donald Trump's campaign quarter - is unsettling even for a stable, democratic country like America.

We are hearing of possibilities of "a revolutionary war" - of violence and bedlam - if Hilary Rodham Clinton wins the elections on November 8. We are hearing that people will march on the Capitols. "They're going to do whatever needs to be done to get her out of office, because she does not belong there," according to a Washington Post story quoting one Trump supporter last week.

We are hearing the Republican Party candidate threatening to appoint a special prosecutor and hinting at jailing Clinton if he wins the election; and we are also hearing one Republican Senator remarking that "gun owners may have to put a 'bull's-eye' on Clinton.

Then you have the "lock her up" chants at Trump rallies. They have almost become a signature tune for the Republicans. The thing is that the candidate himself is not denouncing the incendiary rhetoric coming from his supporters. He has not once come out to condemn such dangerous utterances.

Trump too believes the elections are already rigged and is asking his supporters (read "vigilantes") to physically be present at polling stations to "monitor" (read "intimidate") the polls and ensure votes are not stolen.

Interestingly this week, it was a Trump not a Clinton supporter who was arrested trying to vote twice.

Many of the remarks we hear from excited party supporters border on hate speech and endanger human life. They are inciting and undermine the rule of law and everything associated with democracy.

In countries where democracy is more of a lip service than a functional reality (read Africa) such elements would be hunted down, prosecuted or shot dead. I am sure African dictators are having a big laugh at what is happening in the world's biggest democracy.

Of course the United States cannot hunt and jail people for expressing their opinions because of its long democratic tradition.

But if democracy means giving people unlimited freedoms to say what they want then we must question the whole concept of democracy and interrogate Reagan's conclusions.

So, is

democracy really worth dying for? I leave that to you.

And that is my say.

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