Author, Stella Riunga Rop.
What is a cow-antry (pronunciation: ka-wa-ntree), you may ask, dear reader? Thank you so much for your good question.
In our present context, you and I live in cow-antries. What is a cow-antry? I will explain by showing you what a country is.
A country is a nation that is governed and displays order. At the moment, I am currently outside of my cow-antry and inside a country. My brethren, the pedestrian crossings here are not just patches of randomly selected tarmac hastily painted with white stripes (ready to be washed away by the next rains), they actually work!
The moment the lights turn green you, as a pedestrian, are free to walk, dance or cartwheel your way across the road, and the motorists can only watch. Imagine that!
Secondly, the streets are clean, and intentionally kept that way, unlike our cow-antries where there is an ongoing competition between pedestrians, drivers (of tuk-tuks, boda-bodas and vehicles), and cows, goats and marabou storks to see who can litter or defecate the most.
A cow-antry is a place where the dishonourable somebodies in power have an idea what order looks like, but are completely unwilling to effect it, mainly because order is economically unprofitable to them.
For example, in a country where the road system works, why would you elect an MP with nothing but fermented porridge in their heads on the basis that they will build you a road?
In a country where people can expect to find some sort of decent employment, there is no need to bribe people right, left and centre to get a job. This, dear brethren, is why cow-antries rarely grow up to become countries.
A country is a place where people are usually content to remain. A cow-antry is a place that people are always trying to run away from.
If your main airport is full of citizens trying to run away from the chaos and disorder, or if they’re always being deported and unceremoniously returned from the countries they were trying to run away to then yes, yours is a confirmed cow-antry!
May God transform our cow-antries. Amen.
