DIASPORA AND ENTREPENEURSHIP
By Rexx Sitti
enyan Ambassador to the United States Robinson
Githae has come out in the past and encouraged
Kenyans in Diaspora America to borrow loans
from financial institutions and invest in Kenya as
an initiative to spur development back home, with the pretext
that loans are ‘cheap’ in the America. This is amidst the
continued influx in Diaspora remittances that have increased
over the years. In a different occurrence, Francis Atwoli, a long
serving trade unionist and the Secretary General of the Central
Organization of Trade Union (COTU) in Kenya has been
quoted discouraging Kenyans from seeking green pastures
abroad inferring that the situation is worse in Diaspora, where,
according to Atwoli, Kenyans are ‘forced’ to work menial jobs
to earn peanuts
And there are examples to back this up. For example, Peter
works as a computer technician at Flextronics, a computer
repairs and maintenance company in Memphis, Tennessee. He
currently earns $10 an hour, an increase from the minimum
wage ($7.5) he earned when he first joined the company. He
explains how mixing family and business is a recipe for
disaster having lost over $45,000. At first everything was on
track. His brother promised that the two 11 seater Matatu’s
would make profit within no time as plans were ongoing to
include them in a fleet of vehicles that transport tourists from
the airport to hotels and on safaris. After three months there
wasa deafening silence. His calls were ignored. He later
confirmed that the money he sent home was never invested
and the Matatu’s pictures sent to him were never real.
These instances not only illustrate how conflicting different
official representation can be, but also how investors, borrowers and job seekers in Kenya and Diaspora can become easily
misled if they chose to listen to just any source relative to
important topics. There have been many instances where
Kenyans in Diaspora have had to depend on relatives to
foresee their invested capital. One of the most known investments is the purchase of land and the construction of houses
either for rent or for personal ownership. Despite family ties
and trust among family members, such stewardship has led to
broken families. In common instances, money from theinvestor
in Diaspora is either mis-used or mis-placed from its intended
plan and detoured to meet the plan of the entrusted relatives.
This generates a great extent of reluctance by Diaspora where
relatives and development projects in the motherland are
concerned.
In order to acquire a loan in the U.S. you need a good cr Y]