Men and women in Kenya

Is endemic corruption changing the relationship between the sexes in Kenya? Are men generally being equated with politicians, gangsters or conmen in a country that is losing faith in the former and struggling to deal with the latter?
I have heard that women are quicker now to abandon men who let them down, either by failing to hold down a job, drinking their wages, or just generally not measuring up to expectations. Women are happy to hook up and have children but if the men don't deliver, they are also ready to walk, presumably if their financial situation allows it. I wonder if this is a symptom of general disillusionment with the governing classes, traditionally dominated by men, now distilled into the home?
And if women are taking the lead in the home and showing less tolerance for men's foibles, is there room for a similar shift in politics?
That was the thrust of an article in Saturday's Daily Nation, which argued that women must step up and lead. I might take issue with a few of the names listed as role models for women -- Margaret Thatcher is always difficult to sanctify -- but the final paragraphs are interesting.
Columnist Gitau Gikonyo writes: "Today most of our young men have become useless, sorry figures of men, all in a daze, hooked on substances ... The heart of the matter is that men are cry babies. I am yet to come across a circumcised man who can agree to undergo the ritual a second time. Yet he will send a woman to the delivery room many times. The writing is on the wall. Men have failed and women must now step up and take the lead."
Some might argue the comments are flippant and easy, but the idea that something new is needed in Kenyan politics seems to be a popular one.
I'm not sure though that the fact that Jimmy Kibaki, the president's increasingly voluble son, is warming up to enter the political fray by running for his father's seat in Othaya qualifies as a new beginning.
As the battle for 2012 goes on, in the increasingly irrelevant present there was more bad news for the economy -- remittances by Kenyans living abroad dropped 15 percent from January to April, compared to the year before. That dry statistic probably means some people won't be eating much. According to the UN's World Food Programme, the price of maize has risen by up to 130 percent in Nairobi and 85 percent in Mombasa over the past year. Cooking fuel prices have risen by 30 to 50 percent and the cost of water by 90 to 155 percent. This story details just what those enormous rises mean inside places like Kibera, Nairobi's massive slum. The article quotes Oxfam GB's Alun McDonald as saying: "But the urban crisis is not just about poverty - it is also about governance ...Citizens need to have affordable access to basic services such as water and healthcare. Given the political tensions in Kenya at the moment, having hundreds of thousands of increasingly poor and hungry families could well lead to further instability on the streets of Nairobi - and potentially other cities."
We've seen some of that instability in recent weeks with the clashes between police and mechanics at Nairobi's Globe Roundabout, and rioting by hawkers in Mombasa's Central Business District. Yes, the causes are different -- in Mombasa, hawkers were ordered out of the CBD some months ago and they say they can't make a living; the Nairobi spat is about jua kali (informal) mechanics being forced off land that has been purchased by a mosque. The similarities -- angry young men (mostly) with nothing to lose venting their frustrations by attacking the symbols of authority immediately available to them eg police or firetrucks. Other places and other times have shown that that kind of anger can easily be harnessed and channelled into something much more dangerous.
And finally, a sad story from inside the Daily Nation: just 11 lines but in some ways, it tells you more about problems facing Kenya than columns of analysis and opeds:
"A woman was stabbed to death using a spear by cattle rustlers. Ms Lankesya Leshaleke, 40, was herding goats and sheep at Kandutura village in Rumuruti Division when two men emerged from a thicket and confronted her. One of them was armed with an AK-47 rifle while the other had a spear. She died while undergoing treatment at a Nyahururu hospital. All the animals were stolen."
Disputes over land and resources, access to weapons, desperation and poverty. A potent mix.