Vision 2030 Relies Heavily On Science But Forgets the Power of Witchcraft

Peter Mwaura

13 May 2011

opinion

Nairobi — If people believe faith can move mountains they will see no need to have the necessary technical skill to move mountains, if I may paraphrase American philosopher Eric Hoffer and author of The Passionate State of Mind.

That brings me to my quarrel with the makers of Vision 2030, the blueprint that aims to transform Kenya into a newly industrialising middle-income country providing a high quality life to all its citizens by the year 2030.

Vision 2030 recognises the role of science in transforming the Kenyan society but the makers of the vision forgot the power of witchcraft. This is no mean quarrel.

The vision neither factors in witchcraft nor tries to vaccinate us against witchcraft. As a result, the vision is doomed to fail for the most part.

This is no exaggeration. You cannot build a modern state with a population that is absorbed in witchcraft.

We live in a witchcraft culture. If a child falls sick with malaria many people blame, not the malaria parasite, but witchcraft.

And if you give them mosquito nets they will use them as fishing nets or window curtains. Many a politician, many a businessman, consults witchdoctors to increase their fortunes.

Many a person with a chronic disease looks not for modern medicine but a witchdoctor. Many travel to remote places looking for the hottest witchdoctors and magical cures.

Many will readily give their hard-earned money to conmen who say they can double their money through magic. The better educated go for pyramid schemes.

Vision 2030 needs to confront the ghosts of our witchcraft culture, as no modern society can be built on sorcery or the use of supernatural and magical powers.

Let me hasten to add, however, that here we are not talking of indigenous knowledge, which is distinguishable from witchcraft.

Indigenous knowledge, such as traditional medicine, is a form of knowledge or alternative science, accumulated over many generations. It is folk wisdom.

Witchcraft, on the other hand, is an occult art. It is anti-science, the use of the supernatural and magical, like turning somebody into a snake or flying on a broomstick.

In a witchcraft culture people, both educated and uneducated, wear good-luck charms and amulets to protect themselves and to attain good health, riches and prosperity.

They visit witchdoctors looking for miracle cures and solutions for their personal problems and economic problems and ambitions.

They look for magic, not science or technology. Instead of working hard to improve their lot in life, they prefer to hunt down suspected witches who they blame for their misfortunes, lynch them and burn their houses.

Vision 2030 is anchored on a science culture. It proposes to apply science to raise productivity and efficiency. Yet, that cannot be done unless we free people from belief in witchcraft and popularise science.

There is a need to educate people to adopt a more scientific culture and outlook and to build public awareness of the role of science in day-to-day living.

Science, or a scientific and technological culture, has been the driving force in all the newly industrialising countries including the Asian Tigers who Kenya seeks to emulate.

But nowhere in the 32-page popular version of Vision 2030 is the popularisation of science among the public planned or envisaged.

Vision 2030 only seeks to devote more resources to scientific research and technical capabilities of the workforce and to raise the quality of teaching science and technology in educational institutions.

Teaching science in educational institutions without a corresponding popularisation of science among the witchcraft-believing public is not of much help. It is like trying to beat a pillow with a stick.

We cannot continue to believe in witchcraft and still achieve Vision 2030. We must educate the public to become more scientifically oriented.

Only a predominantly scientific culture and outlook will enable Kenya to participate in an increasingly knowledge-driven world economy.

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