BOOK REVIEW

This small book deals with big issues: the moral issues with which we struggle, or should struggle, from day to day. Marjorie Oludhe writes like an Old Testament prophet urging us to face up to our responsibilities for the society in which we live. She writes from long experience, having arrived in Kenya from England in the fifties, married into a Luo family, raised children, and applied her talents to selling books, teaching and creative writing. She is well known for her novels and poetry. In 1986, her novel Coming to Birth (recently reprinted by the Feminist press) won the International Sinclair Prize for Fiction.

In turning her literary talents and religious commitment to the moral issues facing Kenyans, Marjorie Oludhe has shown her deep understanding of the dilemmas with which we are faced. She urges her readers to equip themselves through serious reading, thinking and study to respond to the changes and challenges arising from development in education, technology, and the global economy. She tackles many of the issues that are hotly debated, such as the customs relating to the inheritance of widows, polygamy, dowry, weddings and burial rites. The value system with which she judges the rights and wrongs of current conventions is drawn from a profound knowledge of the Old and New Testaments and the moral precepts of the society in which she grew up.

Marjorie Oludhe was born an only child in a working class environment at the time of the great depression in England. She experienced the transformation in the structure of society that was brought about by the Labour government at the end of the Second World War. It created new opportunities for education, employment and health care for those who had been deprived in the past. She was among those who gained a university place as a right and not because of a privileged upbringing. From this background she queries the assumption that liberalisation, privatisation and a free market will bring a stronger economic and social order. Although African Socialism never became a political reality she still believes that there could be a fairer distribution of resources and that the wage differential ought to be reduced. On political matters the author deplores the cult of personality and the lack of any significant policy differences among the contending parties.

Moral Issues in Kenya is not without humour. The author points out that "gender" is a grammatical term and that we are really much more interested in the biological term, sex. She is not afraid to tackle sensitive issues such as contraception, abortion and homosexuality and she does so with great understanding and common sense. She believes that there has to be much greater frankness, and that parents who do not wish their children to take family life education at school should be willing to prepare them for examination in the subject along with other children. If not prepared in school, at home or in their faith community, children may suffer from ignorance and misinformation that can lead them into danger. She accepts chastity as a virtue but in a society where it is not traditional, young adults need preparation to handle the emotional pressures which arise.

Marjorie Oludhe draws on the Ten Commandments to give some very practical advice on how to deal with dishonesty, lying, theft, begging and borrowing. Although not ignoring the power of evil persons to wish or to cause deliberate harm to others, she believes that many problems arise from the failure of parents to practice the virtues of honesty and thrift and to inculcate them in their offspring. Even parents who are morally upright can become so absorbed with generating income and advancing their careers that they spend too little time with their children and leave much of the responsibilities of parenthood to domestic help. She believes that some women who rush to find work and leave their infants in nursery schools would do better to develop skills for self employment at home, at least till the youngest child reaches school age. Some parents forget that children need emotional security as well as material well-being.

Moral Issues in Kenya deserves to be widely read. It would be an excellent basis for discussion groups involving young people and adults. The author is a concerned and compassionate person with much wisdom; a wisdom that Kenya is in need of at this time.

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A JOURNAL OF SOCIAL AND RELIGIOUS CONCERN
Published Quarterly by DR. GERALD J. WANJOHI
Likoni Lane - P .O. Box 32440 - Nairobi - Kenya
Telephone: 712632/311674/312822

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