A LAND OF THE BROKEN PROMISES.

I have broken many promises in my life, small promises and big promises, promises made to myself and promises made to others, promises made while few people were present as well as those made with many people present. You would be right to call me a serial promise breaker. But what did You expect? Am only human (Read, am only Kenyan). Furthermore, a big promise broken or a small promise broken are all the same, at least it is so in God’s eyes because to Him, all sins are the same. Sometimes I feel like God is unfair on this ruling. Imagine just looking at a pretty woman lustfully is the same as doing the act with her in a secret room somewhere? It always sounds unfair to me. Maybe we need to petition God on this or use the Kenyan way, enlist Gen Zs to demonstrate and have God rank sins from small ones to big ones. Unfortunately, God cannot be corrected, his kingdom is a theocracy and not a democracy.  

Let’s talk of promises big and small. Guilty as charged, I accept that I broke even big promises but guess what, am just the same with you who broke a small one. You behind there, you who said you would call and never called. Same with you, you who said you would look into it and never did. You, you who said, ‘I will look for you’ and never did. You, you who said, ‘I will follow it up for you’ and never did. You, you who said I will come at 4.00PM but came at 4:37 PM. We are all guilty of lies.  Of course, these are the promises that we make rather casually, just as a by-the-way and have no plan or intention of keeping them. Talk of, ‘I will keep you posted’. Talk of, ‘I will let you know’. Talk of, ‘I’ll send you a message’. We just say things and peoples’ words, especially in Kenya nowadays don’t have meaning. Next time we just need to shut up. I believe that our words should bind us to the action attached to them, otherwise, they are meaningless.

But there is one we Kenyans are most notorious for. And this is, ‘I will pay’. I have heard so many of ‘I will pay you’ promises made to me, and I can tell you for free 95% of the time, that promise is never fulfilled, at least not exact as per the promise. And there are so many versions of it. ‘I will pay you next week on Friday’. ‘I will pay you next month’. ‘I will refund in two weeks’ time’. ‘I will refund next month’. Kenyans will make these promises left right and centre with no intention or plan to keep them. A few months ago, I made a personal decision to try and be making promises more carefully and ensure to keep them. The first test I set for myself was to borrow money from a friend. So, I borrowed Ksh. 100,000 and promised to pay on the 23^rd, the exact date I was to receive my salary and for sure, I paid on the exact date. The second test I set to myself was to clear all my payslip-based loans before I left employment and for several months before, I started paying more than the required monthly repayment amount, as much as I got from all my sources. As to whether I was able to clear before leaving employment or not can be anyone’s guess. So, as a custom from that time, I don’t promise to pay without having a clear plan as to how and from where I will pay and any promise I make needs to have clear timelines in respect of ASAP principle. I know of a few people who borrowed unsecured loans from banks, intentionally left employment to run away from paying their loans and enjoyed their loot. As much I respect that as their personal choice, my personal opinion considers that to be theft. If you did that, you are a thief in my opinion. (I could be wrong)

I have some good news for you Kenyans and any of us who would be a victim of lies from borrowers, a formula to test whether the promise is true or false. A few days ago, a close relative of mine needed to borrow around 10 thousand shillings from me. And this is how the formula goes……... But cautious though, don’t use it if you don't want to hurt or break your relationships because, it can easily break your relationships. The formula is about interrogating. Interrogate, interrogate, interrogate. Like for me, I asked the borrower some hard questions like, ‘why do you need the money?’ And they said, ‘I need to pay rent for my business premise’. And I asked, ‘How come you didn’t earn enough from your business to be able to pay rent?  And they said, ‘Business is a little bit down, competition is high and of late, it's not doing very well’. And I asked, ‘did you not say you will pay me next month?’ Then they said they would pay as promised. Then I asked, ‘How will you be able to pay if your source is the same business and the conditions are not changing?’  And they said, ‘I know but I will pay you’ At this point I knew that, though their promise to pay could be genuine, it would result into a lie because the promise was not backed up by a good plan to fulfil it. Of course, I gave them the money but after some intervention from another close relative, but I would be surprised if the money would be paid, and on time.

The big question is, why do we make promises that we are not even sure we are going to keep?  With no intention nor a plan to keep? I think that the answer is simple, we know we are lying but make the promise as sweet as possible and our aim is only to get what we want. Simple. In Kenya nowadays, ‘I will pay back’ stories is what Kenyans call, ‘stori za jaba’ (unfounded theories).  Of course, I have lost so much money given out to people in the manner of false promises, including one born again brother who has been paying me as he wishes since 2018 and is yet to clear 85K but he does business worth millions every few months. But he is a Kenyan you know and Kenyans never pay back money, at least not as per the promise. In my observation, only 5% do but the rest? They will just pretend like nothing happened. They don’t care what the money giver thinks or feels or the plans they had for their money. That is nothing to them. It is worse if they believe that the person they borrowed from is wealthy. They tell themselves that the borrowing is small and that it is nothing to the giver because they already have too much. How these guys are able to calculate the wealth of their lenders amazes me, so much.  

So, at this point I would wish to ask you. Why did you say you would pay that person but you have kept it for nearly 2 years, 3 months, 6 weeks? Why are you unfairly keeping what is not yours? What if we called you a thief?  Would you feel insulted? You still insist that you will pay. Okay. But when? If you don’t have an exact plan and timeline, then you may as well be called a thief because, it is highly likely that you will not pay. Sometimes, I tend to compare that which is unfairly acquired to wolf among sheep, and I think, it eats up your genuine resources and you eventually end up with nothing.   

 So, I have one more formula that I used while I worked in the service industry. This helped me keep many of my promises unbroken. Instead of saying, ‘I will call you’. I used to say, ‘I will call you by tomorrow evening but if I don't call you, please call me yourself instead’ and at that point, I would give out my phone number. That made the promises easier for me because, I would be exonerated for not calling and that shifted the responsibility to the other person. That is a beautiful secret, or what do you think?

I don't know whether we should talk about Kenya’s president and his promises or his political brigade and their promises!!!  The courage with which these people make and break promises is just amazing. The latest I heard is the 1M chapati production machine. But this calls for introspection for each one of us.

We need to look into ourselves and count the number of promises we still need to fulfil. You can probably begin with that debt that you promised to pay. Just do a plan. You don’t have to pay everything at once. Call that person and tell them that you want to start paying 500 shillings every month and begin to pay. Just do it. In that way, you begin to gain credibility in the eyes of God and men. And in that manner, we can begin to fix this country one step at a time and one person at a time.

Maybe the next step would be to try and make less and less promises, be careful what we promise and concentrate on keeping every promise we make. Am not totally innocent but I have learnt to make less promises and to keep the ones I make. For example, I don't say, ‘I will call you’. Rather I prefer to say, ‘I will call you at exactly 4:00 PM and I do exactly that and if something comes up, I will excuse myself before. When I Know that the meeting starts at 10.00 AM for example, I leave the house 15 minutes earlier so as to be there the exact time the meeting should begin. Some Kenyans will come 35 minutes later and feel nothing. Seriously Kenyans!!! We need to be serious about what we say because, Kenyans cannot be trusted with what they promise. And as we blame the president and politicians for broken promises, how many promises do we ourselves break on a daily basis? It is true that the fish rots from the head but for Kenya, the entire fish seems rotten.

I wouldn’t want to say any word more. But that is my opinion. Do you mind us considering God’s perspective from the holy book?

In Numbers 30:2, God says, “When a man makes a vow…he must not break his word but must do everything he said.” Psalms 15 would also be a good chapter to wrap it up.

Let us remember that God notes every promise that we make and needs us to keep it and while most of us are guilty on this area, we can begin by keeping the promise we make next. Shall we?

                  

@ Stephen Mungai