Ruto’s Affordable Housing Dilemma Takes Center Stage at Kenya National Drama and Film Festival
The Kenya Kwanza administration’s contentious affordable housing initiative has found its way onto the stage of the ongoing Kenya National Drama and Film Festival, with appeals for the project’s compassionate implementation.
Kitale National Polytechnic’s performance of the choral verse Nguzo wa Uchumi (Economics Fundamentals) depicts a government that conducts forced evictions with insensitivity and lack of empathy for its citizens.
Isaac Anyolo wrote the verse, which criticizes the government for leaving people homeless in the name of constructing inexpensive housing. This work aims to take a cautious and participatory approach, considering both the environmental impact and the human crisis that such decisions produce.
Engineers John Akola, Bill Water, and Priscilla Mweru have teamed up to draw attention to the project’s hidden funding source: the tax.
A Cry for Freedom
Kabarak University gained a standing ovation when they performed their play ‘A Cry for Freedom,’ which depicted a continent under neo-economic colonization by the West. Veteran playwright Silas Temba’s play serves as a mirror for the audience, reflecting both pain and delight.
Sorrow depicts the sorry state of a cyclical circle of impoverished societies and hopelessness, whereas happiness signifies actual leadership for people who do not have to be subject to the whims of the West.
“Ovushi” (honey)
With their ethnic, creative dance, Eldoret National Polytechnic brought the roof down. Ovushi performed magnificent Luhya moves using rich Isikuti idioms.
“Ovushi” is a Luhya name meaning “honey.” To illustrate how humans ruin Mother Nature, the writer metaphorically uses bees and their struggle to produce honey. Bees establish their hives and strive to produce honey, but humans pick honey in an unprofessional manner, causing the colony to collapse.
The bees become irritated, regroup, and rebuild their colony, vowing to protect it, but undaunted humans return, meaning to extract not just the honey but also the hive, and this time the sting from the bees is so strong that humans go blind.
Soloists Jesse Chalwa, Stanley Lumbasi, and Patrick Simiyu lead this melodically beautiful dance in which humans visit every hospital in search of treatment for bee-induced blindness but are unsuccessful.
The sole medication is an antidote derived from honey, and they must replace flowers and trees and rebuild bee hives that they destroyed. Once the bees return, they expertly extract the honey without harming the hive or plants, fostering a healthy ecology.
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Sironga Girls identified the benefits of the government’s Talanta Hela initiative, as shown in the modern dance The Baton. Directed by Victor Onana and Robert Onyancha, the verse featured functional costumes that brought track events from national athletic meetings to life.
The Kenya Institute of Mass Communication staged a play named “Drama at the Festival.” The drama stars Bilha Wangui Muthui, a girl who began her acting career at Lions Primary, then moved on to Laiser Hill Academy and KIMTC before becoming a famous actor.
She plays Nereah, an innovator at the local National Polytechnic.
Ruto’s Affordable Housing Dilemma Takes Center Stage at Kenya National Drama and Film Festival
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