From the look of things, State has declared all-out war on trees

Sometimes I miss Wangari Maathai, the iconic guardian of Kenya’s trees, whom the world honoured with a Nobel Prize in October 2004.

In this season of political madness, one wonders which side Prof Maathai, if she were alive, would support—would she be Tutam or Wantam? I am not sure about that, especially after recalling that her name was on the presidential ballot in 1997.

One thing I am sure of is that Wangari would not want trees cut down for any reason, including to make way for a State Lodge inside Upper Imenti Forest Reserve or a government facility inside Karura Forest.

When she lived, Wangari loudly made it clear that a government that cannot protect trees has no business governing.

Now, some African countries would find it hard to believe that Kenya has a fully armed paramilitary unit whose job is to protect trees.

And just when we thought we had succeeded in using trees as a cover to sneak back one of our many unnecessary national holidays (which we have renamed Mazingira Day, which has been converted into a national tree-planting day), someone raised the red flag on large-scale logging inside one of Kenya’s largest water towers.

Watching the long lines of lorries making their way out of the Aberdare Forest felt like watching a caravan of monstrous hearses.

Thankfully, the courts have since ordered a halt to the logging until the matter is resolved. Still, the story of logging in the Aberdare was a sign of what could be quietly happening elsewhere in Kenya, and a stark reminder that in this season of plunder, trees have become soft targets.

From the Aberdare, where we were told trees were being harvested in preparation for an El Niño that is yet to come, to Imenti, where acres of forest have been cleared to put up a State Lodge, it would appear that the government has declared an all-out war on trees.

Just the other day, trees that used to stand at attention along State House Road, silently saluting presidents and royalty heading in and out of State House, were brought down.

We have not forgotten how tractors and ploughs were deployed to clear a section of Karura Forest, ostensibly to create space for yet another government facility. To date, the tarmacking of what used to be a natural hiking path inside Karura Forest remains a permanent scar on its green face.

Which raises one important question: What is the logic of rallying Kenyans to plant 15 billion trees if, for every tree planted, we allow two or more to be cut down?

A Cabinet Secretary has called for another tree-planting holiday, but before we do that—before going out to plant 15 billion imaginary trees—we must first resolve to protect the ones standing at our doorstep from the dark spirit of plundering, cutting down, and grabbing that seems to have seized this country.

Poets say trees speak. They say that on the day Wangari died, trees appeared to bow in silence, as if mourning their fallen guardian. Today, walking inside Karura Forest, and any other forest in Kenya, one gets an eerie feeling that the spirit of Wangari and the trees are weeping again.

Perhaps what stuns the trees today is not just that Kenyans seem to have normalised cutting them down for all manner of projects, but also the doublespeak of fellows wearing environmental protection badges and chanting tree-planting slogans to drown out the roar of murderous chainsaws.

But in this season of political madness, we must remember that trees are neither ‘one-term’ nor ‘two-term’.

This makes trees some of the most non-partisan actors in the next general election. Perhaps it is time to ask ourselves: If trees were allowed to vote in Kenya, which political side would they support? Who, in the current noisy choir of Kenya’s Wantam-Tutam politics, has a record of protecting our trees?

Mr Muchiri is a media and public communications consultant. muchiri.karanja@gmail.com