The news that over 70 people lost their
lives to illicit brew is truly saddening and what is more painful is the fact
that the deaths could have been avoided. While apportioning the blame, Kenyans’
greed cannot go unnoticed. Adding pure industrial methanol to the drinks to
make them more potent is a first class greed. Not long ago we had brewers who
added ARV drugs to the drinks to make the more intoxicating. Clearly, Kenyans greed is not ending any time
soon or in the near future. Nonetheless, what I can’t get around my head is why
someone would drink himself to death yet we have plenty of maziwa mala not to mention
the assortment of soft drinks available.
Meanwhile, ‘Experts’ have emerged to
shed light on the state of alcoholism in Kenya. While going through the
newspapers, I stumbled upon an article on Daily Nation that purportedly
explained why Kenya is a drinking nation. In the piece, the expert, Mr.
Shadrack Kirunga, a counselor came up with all sorts of reasons why Kenyans are
drinking like fish. While to a large extent most of the expert explanations therein
were farfetched, one of the reasons was way too outrageous.
According
to him, Kenya’s drink problem is largely driven by low self-esteem, especially among
men. He claims “Kenyan men feel that the women in their lives have become too
strong, too independent, too smart and too educated – this is difficult for
some men to handle, and so they end up feeling inadequate. To deal with this,
they turn to alcohol.” I find this
reasoning to be illogical and therefore invalid. If a man finds himself in such
a position he will simply walk away and look for another woman who will be
submissive. Why on earth would one drink himself to death because his wife
wields more power? So much for experts!
