In March this year the Judges and
Magistrates Vetting Board fired nine magistrates. These magistrates were not
under investigation for allegations of corruption or professional malpractice. This
is unprecedented, especially in a criminal justice environment that is infested
with corruption and other vices.
Why were the magistrates fired? The Judges
and Magistrates Vetting Board found that the magistrates had no mastery of
basic skills in English language and could not write judgments that were based
on sound legal analysis and reasoning. This is simply mind-blowing.
According to Senior Counsel Paul Muite, the
problem with writing and competent legal reasoning is understated. Law Society
chairman Eric Mutua believes that incompetence among judicial officers is at
the heart of the problem. According to Ahmednasir Abdullahi, a prominent
lawyer, to say that lawyers are half-baked would be a compliment. In his view
most lawyers cannot answer the one-plus-one of law.
Mr. Abdullahi argues that the problem of
poor writing and the lack of intelligent legal discourse has its origin in law
school. According to Mr. Abdullahi our so learned friends are rather incurious
and do not read widely after they start professional practice. Personally, I
find the shelves in the offices of lawyers and doctors rather barren. But I
always assume they keep their books in their home libraries.
Mr. Muite believes
that the problem with language competency is not unique to lawyers. In his view
it is not uncommon to find a university graduate who is challenged in basic use
of English language. I would also add that the problem of professional
competence is not unique to the legal profession.
Every one has a physician story; ranging
from unnecessary tests to wrong diagnosis and wrong course of treatment or
horrible execution of an intrusive procedure. Look around your house or office
building; more often than not the quality of construction is appalling. If you own
a car you must have a mechanic story. You all must have incompetent teacher and
professor stories. There are countless shocking examples of incompetence across
a wide range of professional fields.
Think about the quality of leadership in
public service, in the private sector and in civil society. Our schools and
universities are badly managed. Our political parties are shambolic. The
quality of debate in parliament is wanting. Tune into local television and
radio stations or follow social media conversation on national issues; the
quality of public discourse is abominable.
The high levels of incompetence across a
wide range of professions do not bode well for our society. I think the
chickens have come home to roost. This is the bounty harvest of years of
neglect and underinvestment in public education. The obsession with an
exam-centric curriculum, which is driven by rote learning is now coming back to
bite us.
I argue that the levels of incompetence we
are seeing among professionals is what you reap from an education system that
demands nothing of the playful curiosity of learners and fails to build and
nurture critical thinking meaningful learning. An exam-centric system, which
privileges mindless regurgitation in high-stakes standardized tests stifles curiosity,
kills imagination, trashes analytical reasoning, and pulverizes lifelong
learning.
Professional incompetence and mediocrity are
creatures of a flawed and antiquated education model. What we have done over
the last half century is train incompetent individuals who go off to breed even
more incompetent individuals. A study by the African Population and Health
Research Centre revealed that 30 percent of Kenyan children are taught math by
teachers who can hardly score 40 percent in a math knowledge assessment.
It is therefore hardly surprising that
successive reports by the education advocacy organization UWEZO have shown that
despite a huge surge in primary school enrollment, our children are not
learning. Moreover, study conducted by the Inter University Council of East
Africa and in partnership with the East African Business Council revealed that
more than 45 percent of our university graduates are not employable.
Kenyans have an insatiable hunger for paper
credentials. We are falling over ourselves in colleges taking evening classes
for one more certificate or diploma or degree. But these have little bearing on
competence or productivity. This epidemic of incompetence undermines our
economy, chokes future prosperity. And it must end.
This next round of education reform must
ensure that teaching and learning translates into relevant and useable competences,
not just qualifications on paper.
So now wot do we do those who are in the situation because understandably the problem is not me. What do i do to gain knowledge from our institutions.
ReplyDeleteI agree this is well articulated. Now solution.
Rgds