Page 29 - Msingi Afrika Magazine Issue 13

Wholeness

own view, communities have no who need it, when they need it. I’m 60-70 years ago, every community
alternative, they have to embrace talking of a center where there will had a traditional medical attendant.
an integrated self-help initiative, be people 24hrs, I’m talking of a There was a center people would
whereby each community has a center that can be established on go to for free, they were voluntary.
center where those people who public land, the infrastructure can Every community had a blacksmith
need medical attention, agricultural be temporary things like containers, who made the machetes (the pan-
advice, psychosocial counseling etc. which can be leased or bought on gas) people needed. Every commu-
can go to. hire purchase. Such containers will nity had seers who guided people
have units: medical wing, agricultur- on what the future has for them.
The scenario of people taking sick al wing, psychosocial wing etc. so So, what I am proposing here is not
people from one hospital to anoth- that experts in those areas are there new for Afrika, it may be new and
er, such that they die in the car, is 24hrs to address whatever problems forgotten elsewhere, but in Afrika
not sustainable. It is very dangerous are brought to them. If we don’t do there are still communities who have
in that the sick are spreading the that, we will degenerate one after the a remnant of that and there are peo-
disease not only to those who are at- other, particularly in Afrika, where ple who are conversant with it, even
tending them over a whole day, over already the crisis of our poverty has where it is not being practiced. So, I
two days, but also to those hospitals. been complicated by the despera- am appealing to people of goodwill
They are taken from one village, to a tion of the pandemic; the crisis the to come together, get closer to their
nearby hospital, to a distant one and, pandemic has brought forth. communities, mobilize people who
eventually, the patient dies either in are willing to volunteer their energy,
the car or somewhere in the bush. If we expect to get assistance from their skills, their time, to mitigate
outside, it’s not there. People have against the crisis of the pandemic.
The way out is, we develop an their own problems. The Australians
integrated self-help center that has have their problems, the Chinese By the same token we have been in
volunteers who can deal with peo- have their problems, the Americans Afrika for 150,000 years, there is ar-
ple’s problems throughout the entire have their problems and they are not chaeological evidence to that effect,
spectrum of technology: medicine, any better when it comes to coping meaning we are one of the oldest
agriculture, psychosocial etc. so that with the pandemic the death rate, civilizations on earth. We have
those who are desperate, particularly the sickness rate; so the only way survived that far because our way
those who run away from the city to out is to organize a self-help strategy of life is sustainable. Sustainability
the villages, who have nothing to do, where each community has volun- means coexisting with the reality,
who get depressed have somewhere teers who are ready and willing to recognizing that nature has its lim-
to go. Those students who are sent help in whatever way they can. itations and that for us to develop,
home when schools are locked by In such centers individuals will be we must embrace and recognize the
the pandemic lockdown, who are at required to contribute something, limitations of nature. We conform
home day in, day out; the students whatever they are capable of, and to the food that we can grow; we
are frustrated, they are stressed, they the combined contribution of peo- conform to the type of shelter that
become a nuisance to their parents, ple of a given community will give we can afford that is environmen-
they must have a place they can go seed money to enhance the sparking tally friendly. I’m saying, people in
where we have experts in education or initiation of the integrated self- Turkana, people in Marsabit, people
who can handle the needs of those help center. As we do that then we who still articulate the traditional
students in such a way that there is have people of goodwill within the way of life are articulating a sus-
at least a bit of continuity to their country, within Afrika, within the tainable lifestyle from which we can
educational program. For example, world who are ready and willing to learn a bit. For those of us who
if they were doing agriculture or chip in whatever they are capable of, are cosmopolitan around Nairobi,
they were doing medicine, we have to help desperate people to mitigate around Nakuru, around Mombasa,
many retired clinical officers, retired against senseless death for a condi- who have been away from a tradi-
nurses, we have retired teachers, we tion that we can prevent. tional setting, it’s time now to learn
have retired psychosocial experts. from those who still have their tradi-
Even as we do that, we must re- tional tenet, so that we can embrace
These people should be pulled member - and for those of us who what is sustainable, as a matter of
together in a center where all those have lived long enough to know - urgency. Sustainability means getting
services can be rendered to those our communities were self-reliant. your food from where you live, get-

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