IRRITATING HABITS THAT MUST STOP!

1. Swallowing of phlegm- This especially happens to people without handkerchiefs. They will keep doing like a pig does- a very bad sound. ‘Sucking’ and swallowing that phlegm is a very bad habit especially to mature people. Unfortunately, you’ll find people doing this in public places. A handkerchief is only 20 shillings!!! 2. Walking slowly in streets- I believe everyone has ever experienced this at one time. A time that you are in a hurry and the people in front of you are walking so slowly such that you feel like you can bang their heads. I mean, we need to understand that the street/road is for public use and not personal. 3. Going through someone’s phone without their consent. This is very irritating and it comes along with receiving other people’s phone calls. This should never happen unless you are a couple and you have agreed so. 4. Peeping through other peoples phones when they are texting. We should all understand that text messages are discreet and personal. 5. Tagging people in unnecessary posts on social media. There are people who tag others in almost all the posts and photographs they upload on social sites. One should only tag people in a photo or post if it really concerns them in one way or the other. 6. Getting in a friend’s house-or any other place without knocking. I’m not trying to suggest anything here bit it’s really important to knock before you get in. this is simply because you do not know what they are doing inside there and therefore, a knock will give them ‘time’ to get up. 7. Lying- this is indeed one of the most irritating behaviors. You have at one time or another planned with a friend or someone else to do something at a particular time and when that time comes, they will decline and try saying they are caught up in a ‘business’ matter and thus failing your set mandate. This mostly happen during a phone conversation where they will tell you they just left the house. Kindly feel free to comment with other irritating habits that you think we should highlight.

RADIO JOURNALISM!

Call it passion, but this is how, always having the confidence in-front of the mic and loving what I do!!

YOU HAVE TO CRY ;-(

It’s just a few weeks ago (or should I say days?) that we heard of a case where a fetus was found wrapped in a polythene bag and dumped in Moi University- an abortion! Without questioning, this was an act by one of the university’s student- a female of course. Criticism and condemnation of this act was spread over on the social media- especially on twitter. To start with, you may realize that maybe whoever did it comes from a very humble background and maybe she has been influenced by some people. In all aspects, when one joins a college, they are usually very humble, cool, simple- name all the positive attributes but this is only valid for some time. I remember one of my lecturers saying the when people are joining college they come with long dresses reaching almost to the ankle and such but they suddenly happen after sometime. We must admit that teens especially in tertially institutions are having sex just like food and in this some find themselves with unexpected pregnancies. Since one is still a student and not ready to raise a kid, they opt to ‘flash’ but the question is who is responsible? Both the girlfriend and the boyfriend are responsible.

A wrong is a wrong no matter its degree. This was just one instance that leaked to the public, what about all the others incidences that we do not hear about? Trust me they are a thousand in one and you meet these same ‘beautiful’ ladies in the streets in high heels swinging their waists. They will also brag of how they got rid of that ‘disturbance’ not knowing the fate awaiting them. When one gets an unwanted pregnancy, the best thing is to admit that in happened and accept is as a reality instead of involving in blame game. Often, the fathers will always escape the game by saying the pregnancy wasn’t theirs- this indeed pushes the lady into doing dangerous acts of abortion. But what I need to tell them is; all that goes around comes around. You can go ahead and abort, but remember one day you might cry for lacking another child and even damaging your womb, you will cry forever seeing other ladies with beautiful kids, I mean you better get the kid and take it for adoption.

AN OPEN LETTER TO SAFARICOM!

Safaricom Limited is the leading provider of converged communication solutions in Kenya- This is the bio you will find in their Twitter account (@SafaricomLtd). Well, this is true; it’s the leading company in Kenya’s telecommunication industry. This started a decade ago when it introduced ‘per second billing’ over its competitor then KenCell (now Airtel) which was offering ‘per minute billing' call services. Over a long period of time, the company has rapidly grown and developed having acquired the largest percentage of subscribers in the country. This has been enhanced by offering quality mobile communication services to Kenyans. Another key contributor to its success is its innovations it has always come up with including The Safaricom Foundation and MPesa. For a long time, I’ve used services of all the mobile networks in Kenya and I finally decided to stick with Safaricom, why? It has quality services comparing to the others. This is a fact. As much as it might not be perfect, it is a quality network- give credit where it deserves. This is the apparent reason why it has many subscribers but what is the subscribers’ attitude towards Safaricom? I’m a fan of social media and for a long time I’ve seen customers complaining and terming Safaricom as ‘the bitter option’, ‘thieves’ or ‘wezi’ in Swahili. This is simply because it charges slightly costly for its services over the other competitors- to maintain their services. For a long time, many people have said that people stick with Safaricom because of MPesa but this is not true- they (including me) stick with it because it is the only mobile network which offers quality services- no any other network with matched services. This is what makes people stay with it despite knowing it is ‘the bitter option’.

Having discovered its strengths, Safaricom has noticed its dominance in Kenya and in this regard, it has gone ahead to ‘take advantage’ of the loyal customer in one way or the other. First was the scraping of anything to do with ‘unlimited’ including unlimited Internet, unlimited SMS and so on- so that the consumer can use the renewable bundles. Well, as much as there might be other reasons for this including ‘this is business’, then to my understanding, this is a way of taking advantage of the consumer. The most recent was the introduction of the new daily internet bundles with free SMSs. Previously, the bundles were 5MB-5/-, 10MB-8/-, 25MB/- and now 5MB-5/- with 5 free SMSs, 10MB-10/- with ten free SMSs, 20MB-20/- with twenty free SMSs. If you noticed, the 20bob bundle has been reduced by 5MB and 10MB bundle price hiked by 2bob and thus ‘forcing’ the customer to get the ‘free’ SMSs once they purchase the bundle as a compensation or ‘blackmail’. This has been criticized by many people and yes I agree, there is no one time all the people will agree with one thing or fail to see a negative. However, Safaricom should not always ‘make decisions’ that will affect and ‘hurt’ the customer. It should put some efforts to at least do a survey to note what the customer really likes so as to offer close to perfect matches of services/offers. I just had to highlight the above example to get known of what I’m talking about. Kindly, Safaricom, try to change in the way you deliver services and offers, just be ‘considerate’ to the customers pockets in a ‘friendly’ manner. In the meantime, the other service providers should try up and down to offer quality services so that there is ‘fair’ competition in the telecommunications industry.

RELIGION? NO, IT'S TERRORISM.

Of late we have heard and seen the state of security in our country. Almost each and every day there is an explosion-or even grenades seen somewhere. A Kenyan would assume that this is the work of the al-shabaabs simply because of the Kenya's military existence in Somalia but I would not agree or disagree. What is on the table is; they are terrorists, people who are not having the good will of the country and just want to distract the peace of the country. So many questions have been raised by many people that these terrorists are Muslims and the government wants to harass them. Unfortunately, I believe that it’s just a coincidence that the terrorists are from the Muslim community and this is not a religion war whatsoever. We have associated terrorism with Muslims yes but the government is trying all it can to curb it. The president indeed gave a two week amnesty declaration for the public to surrender any illegal arms or face dire consequences, let’s wait and see what will happen. I wouldn’t really say that many civilians have illegal arms but the question is; where are all these arms (including but not limited to grenades and explosives) coming from? Someone somewhere is behind it probably? I would say that the fight is ours and we should all be focused to fight terrorism in our country- and it all starts with us by reporting suspicious people and taking the necessary precautions to be safe because pointing fingers will barely help. Sometimes it's our ignorance that costs us that much. Security is very vital in a country as it ensures citizens have no fear doing their businesses and even conducting daily activities. It is also for a country to have good security for it to attract tourists and investors and make them feel safe as they are key contributors to our economical development through revenue generation. Be part of this fight, it simply starts with you.

THIS IS JOURNALISM.

When I was going through my Journalism training, one of my lecturers usually told us that Journalism is not all about being famous, career and probably good money, it’s simply a passion. Well, I now tend to support to go with it. If you told a villager that you are doing Journalism, they’d probably think of appearing on TV and such. Fortunately or unfortunately, it’s a different other things alongside the whole avenue. Say production work, scriptwriting and all that. This is a course that should be taken by curious, enthusiastic and enthusiastic people. I think I forgot talkative, but not per se. but especially radio Journalism really requires social people who will interact with others regardless of any barriers. Journalists should be credible with information, I mean; they should be trust-able by the audience. They should also be reliable, accurate and ‘sharp’. My sharpness here means they should be up to date with information. It would be very bad when someone asks a ‘reliable’ Journalist to explain something that is happening in the country, it would be so shameful for one to say they don’t know. It also comes with persistence because it really has a lot of challenges and probably when it comes to law (media law & ethics). You have probably seen some journalists going behind bars for some legal actions especially defamation. Again, Journalism really requires a person who is ready to live double lives; the real personal life and the media’s life, we all need to have our own social life that is not known to the public. It also requires a person who has a heart-I mean anti-fragile especially when it comes to TV. For example going to shoot a video at Kismayu where you can clearly see people killing each other. Sometime back I asked my lecturer what a photographer should do on arriving an accident scene; help the victims or take the photographs and the lecturer told me you should go ahead and take the photos. Generally, it’s a very tricky career and one need to be ready to live for it.