THE NEXUS
Messaging: Revisiting
The State Of Nation
Address
By Walter Chabala
E
nd years and new years are always
moments of reflections. Today,
I reflect upon President Uhuru
Kenyatta’s 2019 State of The Nation
Address as I ponder upon the critical role
of messaging in communication.
Good listeners, they say; are like
trampolines. These are not my words;
these are the words of mighty scholars
from Harvard. After looking at data &
analyzing a number of listening traits,
researchers found that being a good
listener is more about the type of feedback
offered than it is just quietly listening.
“They are someone you can bounce ideas
off and rather than absorbing your ideas
and energy, they amplify, energize, and
clarify your thinking. This lets you gain
energy and height, just like someone
jumping on a trampoline.” The study by
Harvard Business Review went on to
conclude.
So folks, I want to use the findings of that
study clinically, elaborately and hopefully
usefully too in dissecting the Presidents
messaging during the State of The Nation
address delivered on Thursday, 4th April
2019. In doing so, not only do I seek to give
feedback to the president on his speech;
but most importantly I want to analyze
and dissect the president’s feedback to
us the citizenry as a communications
practitioner. Because truly, what the
president was doing, was basically giving
feedback to the citizenry; because the
citizens had been talking and talking a lot.
From the mama mboga across the street,
to the deacons in Church and even the
guilty and afraid; everyone had been
bouncing off ideas to the president. “We
Obviously, there were those who expected
some form of firing of CSs as the best ex-
pression of seriousness against corruption
but an even greater thing happened, the
reassurance that all was being done within
the law and being done by the legally em-
powered institutions so that when the ham-
mer falls, every man or woman would carry
their own cross. Kenyans love showy specta-
cles but emboldening our institutions guar-
antees institutional democracy and that, is
for posterity.
38 MAL33/19 ISSUE
want to see action,” they said. “We want
to see the President’s commitment both
in word and deed,” another group kept
screaming. “We can’t allow this war on
corruption to continue, let’s clip the DCIs
balls” the notorious group was also heard
conversing in hushed tones.
So with all the talk around town, did all
this amplify and energize the President?
Through his speech, did his clarity of
thinking resonate positively with you?
Could you see and feel a gained sense
of energy and height, just like someone
jumping on a trampoline?
Communication and
Messaging
There are countless definitions of
Communication out there and today I
don’t intend to deliver my points based
on any particular one. However, for all
who have been through a communication
class, there is always a convergence in
understanding as to what the components
of communication entail.
The main components of communication
are: Sender, message, channel (or
medium), receiver and response (feedback)
all happening within a given context.
These components are adopted from
the great Shannon-Weaver model of
communication that came to be adopted
by social scientists the world over as “the
mother of all models.”
Also, communication specialists of
good grounding will tell you this; that