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TREE-PLANTING SEASON


       The other day, President Mwai Kibaki launched the national tree planting season. What amazed me was that, the launch was swerved away as you would swerve those bitter Flagyl drugs into your mouth and quickly drain them with water. The Musalia excitement filled the air and engulfed everyone’s mind.
       That raises the question, just what is important to Kenyans? What ticks, or flows in the veins of Kenyans? Politics! The clouds have been generous with rains. The entire country is contemplating on what to do next. The rains have been barricading the roads, denting the economy and causing wanton destruction.
The experience has not opened our eyes to the fact that we need more trees. We would rather cry foul of the inefficiency of Kenya power in supplying power, frequent blackouts, high power bills, traffic jams et al. The root to all these problems is, the barrenness of the land. The ground has lost weight and so there is need to re-establish that by planting trees.
      This season of planting trees should be a day to day season. It should be a season embraced by everyone, it should be a public holiday celebrated every time there is a holiday.  It should be written the national anthem and the Pledge. It should be recited sung and danced to. The season should be a culture like bull-fighting in Western Kenya.
     If only we looked at it that way. Kenya would be green. I wish the government spokesman came up with such an idea, beautifying the country by planting trees, just as he did beautifying the city by planting rocks, weapons of mass destruction if used by the professionals. Such would be a noble idea.
     My first instinct when the president launched the season was, it would be taken over by the office of the government spokesman and the corporate sector will quickly quip in. The public will reluctantly drag their legs into the initiative as the entertainment industry jumped happily and make it a comical affair. Being April when schools have gone for the Easter holidays, kids will be seen running with tins of trees also making a mark in the society.
       Poor me, I was just having a dreadful nightmare. Because when I woke up, the situation was political this political that. 
       We have a HUGE responsibility to reclaim the country’s forestry that is rapidly diminishing. This country could leap from that state of abuse if only we came together and see reason in restoring the forest that has been on a drastic decline. We cannot just do it in a day but can achieve some percentage if we could show some consistency.
     Someone help me on how I can find seeds and seedlings and plant them. We are such greedy that instead of planting trees allover Kenya we plant them for beautification, a fashion that has made the have-nots to lack trees to plant since the seedlings have a price tag!  
MY FOOD FOR THOUGHT
          Back in the days, when we were small boys, there were so many orchards with a variety of fruits guavas being predominant.  We used to cut them for wood but they defied the outrage. They just grew and multiplied scorning our efforts to clear them. I never knew why they survived our torture.
Now that I am an old young man, my eyes have opened to the secret that made this trees give us our daily bread, read fruit, and wood without dying out. And the secret is;
             “We planted them ant nourished them”
          How?
          Simple.
          We went to bush in the orchards while herding, the animals also did their thing there. The seeds of most of these plants are so small; hence while we munched them, we kept them in our stomach. After several hours, they would pass out through the faeces and be planted! And the trees will replace those we cut. Balance of nature at best.
         Maybe we should return to eating these fruits and doing our thing along the roads and in the forests. The faeces offer nutrients to the plants as they grow.

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