ARE KENYANS SO GULLIBLE, THEY CAN BE DUPED BY KAMLESH PATTNI FOR 20 YEARS?

By Jerry Okungu
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
November 26, 2008

As I sat alone at Amsterdam Airport one morning this week, my mind raced back to Kenya. Strangely enough, I started thinking about what one man called Kamlesh Pattni; an alleged man of God had been doing to Kenyans for the last two decades.
The reason Pattni came to my mind was the story I had left unraveling back in Nairobi. Apparently the man had swindled both his campaign staff in the 2007 elections as well as the faithful of his church. The man of God had once more swindled Kenyan peasants of their meager earnings with promises for bigger things to come.

Under normal circumstances, I would have condemned the infamous Golden Berg kingpin to eternity; however, this time round, those Kenyans that smelled cash on hearing that Pattni had started a church and a political party deserved it. I congratulate Pattni for teaching these idiots a lesson they will remember in a long time!

Just listen to this; Kamlesh Pattni forms a company called Golden Berg International way back in the early 1990s. Of all the people, he enrolls Daniel arap Moi, then Kenya’s president, the late Kanyotu; then Kenya’s spy chief, George Saitoti; then Kenya’s Vice President, a Mr. Arap Bii of Kenya Commercial Bank, a Mr. Mbindyo, then PS Treasury, a Mr. Koinange also Treasury PS, a Mr. Kotut; then governor of the Central Bank and a string of high profile politicians and technocrats. In the process, he literally loots over Ks 20 billion in compensation for fictitious mineral exports from Kenya when everybody knows Kenya has no minerals to export!

For the past 20 years, Kamlesh Pattni along with his partners in crime has been in and out of courts fighting charges of economic crimes against the state. As I write this article, Pattni is still not out of the woods yet but George Saitoti and Governor Kotut have so far been cleared by the courts of any wrong doing. Kanyotu is dead but others have still to get lucky like Saitoti and Kotut.

In the middle of all this; Pattni was recently involved in the Grand Regency transaction with the Central Bank that left huge casualties in its wake. As he exchanged the Grand Regency Hotel for his freedom, the deal cost then Minister for Finance his job. Amos Kimunya is still fighting to clear his name.

This is the man that swopped his Hindu faith for Christianity in the middle of his trials and became Paul. Subsequently, he founded a church of which he is the high priest then bought a political party called KENDA in 2007 to run for President.
I say this; it really needed a brave and a nitwit of a Kenyan to have gone near Pattni as a KENDA Party member or as a follower of his church. But many Kenyans did just that because Pattni promised them plenty of cash. However, strangely enough, Pattni convinced them to spend their own money to campaign, work for the party and become poll agents of KENDA for greater rewards; probably in heaven!

Now that the campaign is over; they are hungry, angry, yawning and rioting on the streets of Nairobi with no Pattni in sight! Should any sane person blame Pattni?
Four months ago I met these types of Kenyans at some peace meeting. They confessed they had worked with Pattni during the campaign and were amazed at how mean the man was! They tried talking me into forming some weird organization. However, when I remembered that they had actually worked with Pattni I quietly slipped away as far as I could.

The dilemma Pattni adherents are going through does not deserve pity. It is the kind of situation thousands of Kenyans find themselves in over and over again without learning a single lesson. Kenyans’ greed for easy wealth is amazing. It never dissipates with each disaster. It is either Nigerians are luring them to non-existent universities and financial transactions running into millions of dollars or local pyramid schemes are fleecing them of their meager incomes.

How many Kenyans have withdrawn all their savings and handed the loot to a con pastor who promises them blessings and more blessings in the weeks to come? How many Kenyans have met conmen who have promised to double their cash and have literally emptied their savings into the laps of such conmen?

May be Kenyans had better understand this one doctrine: never expect a rich man to hand you a single dime for free. Rich men are the meanest creatures ever created by God. More importantly; whoever can promise to double your money; ask him to show you his bank account first!

jerryokungu@gmail.com
www.africanewsonline.blogspot.com