I am sure many have read the article by Dr. Ian clarke that appeared in today's edition of the sunday Vision newspaper. He simply stated something that we all have noticed, but typically we mutter under our breath and look on.
The invasion of the kenyan professional manger on the Ugandan scene is a well established phenomenon and shows no sign of subsiding. The entire senior management of many multinantionals and subsidiaries of kenyan companies have all been hired almost exclusively from across the border.
This in itself is not a bad thing as they have capabilities that the 'locals' may not have. and for ther economy to grow it is always necessary to import migrant skilled labour from anywhere on the planet if necessary. But is there really that dire a shortage of skilled local labour??
What isn't okay is the fact that ugandan professionals in Kenyan do not enjoy the same upward mobility. Getting a work permit is an absolute nightmare , even for someone who has lived and worked in Kenya for 10 years. You are treated like you arrived just yesterday.
It is also a fact that there is a very obvious glass ceiling in many compnaies above which a non citizen can not be tolerated......ask the Ugandan pilots in KQ. Their stories are tragic, they are confined to flying only the oldest planes in the fleet, 737-200, and thus can only fly in East Africa. Advancement is non existant, even after 10 years of service.
The fact one manages to hold a work permit does not mean your spouse will have one too. In fact the odds are never. This also applies to foriegn wives of kenyan nationals too. The pressure is basically on you to change your citizenship.
So it is quite painful to see how welcoming and should I say naive Ugandans seem to be. We are not being treated as we treat others. Hasn't the time to put ourselves first come! The lack of patriotism and self worth is disturbingly present in our psyche.
Our leaders willingness to hand over everything, including the family silver to anyone, especially foreigners, with unbeleivable prejudice towards fellow ugandans, without as much as a second glance is a tragedy that we need to confront, sooner rather than later.
In the shadow of Covid
2 years ago
2 comments:
DMX,
I agree with you very strongly. My family and I have lived attended school (from nursery to post-grad degrees) in Kenya for more than 20 years. I applied for a work permit on various occasions which were rejected, until I finally gave up and left. My sister recently went for a job interview, got the job, on the 1st day, as she was working, her new employer asked her for her ID. When she said she was ugandan, they simply said they don't employ ugandans.
Like you, this makes me very bitter since Ugandans in Kenya are anything but welcome!!!
Very bitter!!!
DMX and Very bitter,
If one decides to migrate from ones birth place you will always be an 'outsider'. My opinion is that complete welcome is only a myth. Somewhere, somehow, sometime warped attitudes will surface unelss you are in your OWN country. Sometimes they do even when you are home!! If you feel you cannot live in your country for whatever reason you just need to make the best of whatever situation you find yourself in.
Two wrongs do not make a right and retaliating by locking out Kenyans will not be good for our economy. However there are ways and means of enhancing the competitiveness of our people. So maybe we need to be thinking in that direction.
Nameless.
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