BY LEONARD WANYAMA
Sometime in the early heady days of implementing county governments, Machakos County held a spectacular investment conference that wowed the country. The Governor, Dr Alfred Mutua, presented an ambitious strategic plan that morphed into a Maendeleo Chap Chap (Rapid Development) political campaign.
However, his aspirations are today increasingly tainted by the imagery of stalled or failed projects that has been dubbed Maendeleo Chafu Chafu (Dirty Development) on social media.
The hallmark of that function was the hosting of over 1000 foreign Asian and European investors to whom Dr Mutua promised: business facilitation in the form of one stop shops for registration and avoidance of bureaucratic hustles; free land; and ease of processes through use of private public partnerships (PPPs) or Build Operate Transfer (BoT) models.
Between the opening of a vehicle manufacturing plant and images of stalled police cars or tractors only the people of Machakos can truly judge if indeed the initiatives of Dr Mutua have been beneficial for them. Nonetheless, Machakos’ overly international focus could be the main undoing of its administration.
Like most Private Sector Development (PSD) orientation within the country, Machakos initiatives prioritised improving conditions of present business over developing situations in which new and different forms of commerce could thrive. Obviously, governance is all about tradeoffs; however, considering the problematic challenges of inequality facing citizenry the latter should have attained greater weight in considerations.
Nonetheless, the juggling of priorities seems to have been specifically driven by a significant infatuation with Foreign Direct investment (FDI) over local innovation. This makes business environment reforms, business development services, and value chain development the main concern as opposed to Local Economic Development (LED).
Although, in toning down such a critique, some would say the first aspects of LED have taken place; commitment to green growth, development of market systems, environmental issues, health systems, water, hygiene, sanitation, education, better organization of land affairs and governance questions, require significant activism from the private sector above and beyond civility of backroom lobbying.
LED analyses a region’s economy to identifying opportunities that enhance prospects of its community businesses. The PSD strategies employed should not only seek to uplift people out of poverty but also to enhance development that bridges the gap in terms of access, delivery, and cost of social services.
While regional development initiative are central to design and implementation of projects, greater success would emerge if the private sector discontinues its traditional seclusion from traditional civil society organizations.
This is because it will result in holistic indigenous planning that develops proposals intent on: ensuring access to new or expanded markets; taking advantage of economies of scale, for instance, large labour force harnessing comparative county strengths; tapping into demographic dividends of women and youth; shared resources adequately such as is captured in the Lake Region Economic Blueprint (LREB).
Broadly speaking LED will then manifest in; Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR); informal economy; urban and rural development; migration; value chains; skills upgrading; green jobs; enterprise culture; cooperatives; microfinance; and tourism, initiatives that incorporate gender or minority community concerns in governance mechanisms.
How can the private sector seek to implement LED? Business interests can consider the innovation of fusing the American phenomenon of Political Action Committees (PACs) with donor Development Action Committees (DAC).
PACs are normally referred to in Kenya as lobby groups and are primarily formed to pool financial campaign contributions for or against candidatures, political initiatives, or legislation. Currently, the Mount Kenya Foundation can be given as such an initiative with regard to its anti-alcohol campaign. DAC on the other hand are advisory discussion forums on development and poverty reduction.
Considering the coming pre and post elections cycle the fusion of the two should merge into creation of Development Action Committees (DACOMM) comprising of both civil society and private sector. In order to establish and maintain political neutrality, these entities should serve in an advisory capacity on how to bridge inequality prior to the elections.
Once the election is over these entities should morph into financial and influence juggernauts that seek to ensure a social imperative in development initiatives or legislation for the attainment of sustainable development goals from the grassroots level.
Presently this is already happening in a haphazard manner under the banner of county, constituency or ward business associations. Yet their tribal if not clan composition needs to be diminished through guidance by countrywide forums such as the Kenya Private Sector Alliance (KEPSA), the Kenya Association of Manufacturers (KAM) or the Kenya National Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KNCCI).
Essentially, the question here would mean developing a private sector movement that is not intent on creating cliques intent on seeking tenders. Rather, the aim should be to develop new progressive interest groupings with the objective of lobbying for a more inclusive society.
The author is a lecturer of International Relations at the Technical University of Kenya.
