FEARS OF A DYNASTY

The Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia headed by Pol Pot, and one of the most brutal regimes in history, pushed everyone to the countryside to do manual work. It didn't matter your station in life, your education or what you preferred. This was an extreme human experiment in Marxism that had a major impact on Cambodia's economy for many years, long after the regime had been overthrown. About 2m people died of pestilence, malnutrition, exhaustion or were executed during that nefarious experiment.

Watching how the Dynasty-Hustler narrative is morphing into a common mwananchi's strife here at home, my brain starts to concoct all sorts of scenarios. We've recently seen stories of Boda Boda guys burning people's vehicles and livestock while chanting "down with the dynasties!". Basically anyone who appears to have a little float, a small business, a farm, a kamjengo is now, in the eyes of the unwashed masses, a dynasty. You're being goaded to choose a side and be ready to die for picking it. If you don't pick, one will be picked for you after a superficial assessment of your fortunes.

I get apprehensive how this would play out if the poor uneducated hustler was unleashed on the equally struggling 'dynasty', who, as has been repeatedly harped, is one salary or one sickness away from destitution and extreme poverty.

 My (irrational?) fears show me that at some point -once the hustlers take charge- we shall be handed wheelbarrows and repatriated to the rural areas for backbreaking work. Will my dynasty friends with their well manicured feet, a skin care regimen and air-conditioned offices survive this hustler life? Even my health and fitness enthusiasts will not be amused pushing wheelbarrows full of stones endlessly, with little rest and a measly meal. All along under the watchful eye of a sadistic, nyahunyo-wielding former-BodaBoda-operator-turned-supervisor.

As Robert Nester Marley famously crooned,

Many more will have to suffer

Many more will have to die

Don't ask me why

 

That said, Boda Boda riders are a threat to this country's stability. Slay that beast ASAP!

 #musings