Throughout my life, I have received numerous letters from readers and other individuals regarding private matters. Some of them are interesting, eye-opening, and insightful, but others fall into the category of, and I say this respectfully, stupid.

In this latter list, three letters stand out, starting with the most recent, which is also the stupidest. It was from one Bernard Orwassa, the Ugenya sub-country director of the Teachers Service Commission.  

It was in the form of a text message, in response to an email I had written to him on behalf of my family acting for our youngest sister, who has a permanent hearing impairment.

No need to divulge much about its contents, but should we take legal action against the St Mary’s Ukwala High School teacher who was the subject of my email, Orwassa will be enjoined in the suit for being incompetent.

The second letter in that stupid category came from Sam Nyamweya when he was the president of the Football Kenya Federation.

I had written that Harambee Stars will not qualify for the FIFA World Cup in our lifetime, and Nyamweya wrote a long letter ranting that I wanted to kill Kenyan football the way I had killed cricket.

Methinks he was worried that I was taking his job of killing Kenyan football!

The letter that comes third in that stupid category is the object of this article. It was poorly worded with long-winded sentences and grammatical mistakes.  

It was sent in May 2011, from Kenya’s Central Organisation of Trade Unions (COTU), and was written by one Barasa Adams, who said he was the personal assistant to Bro Francis Atwoli, the COTU secretary general.

Atwoli has been untouchable for a very long time. That was 14 years ago when he had been COTU’s boss for 10 years, and that is why it is understandable when people complain that it is time for a change.

I had written an article calling on him not to call for a nationwide workers’ strike because it would fail, and Barasa Adams felt I was not being nice to Bro Atwoli – that is how he referred to him.

Unlike now, when some younger Kenyans want Atwoli to leave the position, I had not demanded so, but Barasa was “bemused” by my “verbal attacks and hallucinations…”

“COTU is not and has never been a welfare or co-operative society, but since its inception in 1965, it has remained and forever will be a pressure group operating under a constitutional and membership mandate with Atwoli as its spokesperson by virtue of his duly and democratically elected position of the organisation’s Secretary General.”

Grammar was poor, but there was a fact: COTU is a membership organisation. While it is truethat Atwoli has held that position for far too long, those of us who are demanding he leave are largely not members, since we do not belong to any of its affiliate unions.

At COTU functions, Atwoli is flanked by elderly folk, and that gives the image that COTU is exclusively for octogenarians and has no room for younger Kenyans.

That is not entirely true. Most of the younger Kenyans are not in trade unions because of the kind of jobs they hold; thus, as much as we want to kick Atwoli out, we have no say on COTU matters.

Disclaimer: I am not and have never been a member of any union affiliated to COTU, and do not hold brief for COTU or Atwoli, but younger Kenyans need to see the importance of trade unions and either join existing ones that align with their trade or form new ones, then fight Atwoli from within.

We can argue that the images of elderly COTU officials discourage younger people from joining trade unions, but there are several examples globally of trade unions championing their members’ rights and playing important roles in governance, leading to regime changes.

Trade unions were instrumental in the fight for independence in many countries, and some of the icons in Africa’s liberation struggles, whom we want to emulate, were trade unionists who mobilised workers against the colonisers or oppressors, gained political power, and eventually made it to the negotiating table.

We have been calling on Atwoli to look at the ages of officials of COTU equivalents in other countries, be embarrassed and resign, but we forget that these young people meet our elderly Atwoli because they are members and officials of their respective countries’ trade unions.

Atwoli has also been the general secretary of the Kenya Plantation and Agricultural Workers’ Union since 1994 when he was 45, and it is by virtue of that position that he was eligible to be elected COTU secretary general.

That means Atwoli joined the labour movement when he was younger, and we can do so too, instead of waiting for him to leave the position for the younger us.

We can complain to international agencies about Atwoli, but we will not make much progress, since they might also be “bemused” by our “verbal attacks and hallucinations”.

Atwoli can and must be fought from within the Kenyan trade union movement.

The writer is the Managing Editor of the Alliance for Science (AfS). These views are solely his and do not necessarily reflect the position of AfS or its partners.