hard talk

ARTICLE by ROBERT YAWE hard talk

No Longer A Funny Joke

As I had predicted months before the elections that, based on the statements being made by our politicians, the presidential election petition will solely delve on issues to do with IT articulated by people who have never even done a document mail merge. The fiasco that played out in the tent symbolically placed outside the high court meant the nation was kept entertained with confused nursery rhythms and tales of sorcery. As is the norm, the IT practitioners kept quiet. Then we wonder why the country refuses to embrace technology beyond money transfer, nudity and gambling. Since the situation has repeated itself consistently over the past 20 years and five elections means it is now a culture fully engulfed in us. It is therefore no surprise that our industry’s poster child isn’t from within the core of the industry but from the periphery. Due to this abdication, the country continues to spiral into the abyss of technological mediocrity where quacks rule the space. We can live with the political shenanigans that drag us through the mud once every five years. But not the loss of lives as we remain insular to the need for advocacy for the application of technology in solving real human problems. A few days before penning this, the headlines in the mainstream media was about the drought ravaging through a third of the country. The images are something we seem to have become immune to as they have become so frequent they no longer stir any emotions in us.

Drought isn’t an event but a systemic failure of us to analyse existing data to produce information for decision making and thus shape interventions. The metrological department as well as those birds flying high above provide huge data spanning decades. It is interesting how we were able to hold elections in those same locations currently experiencing drought from digitally verifying the voter details to transmitting the tallied results. Yet for some strange reason we weren’t able to detect that the rains in the same locations had failed.

Even if one is not able to collect data directly from the locations, the internet has enough websites that have weather data for those locations. All that is required is for our globally recognised data scientists to access the data sets, extract insights, then share them on the various social media platforms for the public to get angry enough about that the governments - we promulgated many governments - are forced to take action. Sadly, that is not what happened. Instead, those skills have been used to participate in “global” challenges which offer the hope of winning dollar-pegged rewards or some bragging rights while all around us, our brothers and sisters die of starvation.

Now that images of death and destruction are circulating, we have remembered that social media can be used to rally the masses to raise funds while on the other end, they are fodder for political commentary. When you listen to the “experts” discussing the drought, one would think it has never happened before. Until we start applying technology to solve our own problems, all that knowledge we have acquired is of no value. We shall keep being shoved to the periphery as we share screen shots with statements like “data is the new oil” and “Africa’s leading technology destination.”

By the time this is published, the new government shall have been fully constituted with the cabinet secretaries and principal secretaries in office. It is my sincere hope that they shall not allow what is happening now to happen again on their watch. That we do more than just oppose bills to rein in the quacks amongst us.

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