Your President is Your Employee

You wouldn’t know by looking at them in their big cars and expensive clothes behind layers of security, but, all those high flying politicians, the presidents, prime ministers, members of parliament and senators and governors and mayors and top level government workers are your employees. Even kings and queens. As long as you pay them, then yes, they work for YOU.

Isn’t it funny though that half the time they spend shooing you off the road, or out of the way at venues or declining to book appointments with you or sending police to chase you away from a location where you want to express a grievance against how they are running things? Isn’t it funny that they create the laws that make it harder for you to do business and therefore make it harder for you to pay their salaries? Isn’t it funny that they incur huge debts and force YOU to pay for them?

The president or prime minister of your country is your employee. Through whatever process of selection that your country uses (even coups – because those always have internal supporters somewhere that authorize and back them) you identify the individuals that you want to go and sit together to discuss how to make your life easier, better, safer, healthier and smoother.

What they do by going into public service is intended to make it easier for you to have the time you need to focus on other aspects of your life. Particularly if running a country is not your primary interest. They are to take instruction from you concerning how you want things done, to correct what you are unhappy with and ask your permission when making major decisions that will affect your life or your children’s lives.

They are ordinary people. They laugh, they cry, they struggle, they forget things and yes, they even go to the toilet. They’re just people selected from your midst to sit in certain spaces and think about your welfare. You authorize it by your vote or your complacency. Which is why you are encouraged to make very wise choices during elections and other public participation processes like referenda or public feedback meetings. Because, whatever decision you make, you are going to have to live with.

So, if you vote for the guy that will come in and decide that poisoning your drinking water is what is best for you, then you are responsible for having picked that particular person and you are responsible for letting them know whether you approve of their choices or not.

It’s not some great mystery. That you see them fly overhead in some helicopter, using your money to do so, doesn’t make them God. There is only ONE God. And it is not them. That you hear their sirens and see their security men and women flashing walkie talkies and guns around telling you to move because someone ‘more important’ is passing, doesn’t make it so. They too were born by the act of copulation by man and woman and they too had their rear ends wiped because they used to poo on themselves.

It is very important for you to gain the right perspective about what those people are. Why? Because if you fear them, then you have lost your voice. If you honor them as gods, then you have given them your worship and authority over you to determine how you live and die. But if you remember that you made a choice, believing that they would do right by you, then you can hold them to account.

Keep in mind that every single visit to a supermarket, or payment you make via mobile money, or bus or plane ticket you buy, or liter of petrol you pay for, or item you import or export has a fee charged on top of it that goes to the government in the form of tax. Meaning that, whether you are employed or not, engaged in business or not, a registered voter or not, you are paying money to the men and women who shout loudly on TV or drive through your neighborhood every few years asking you to put them in those chairs. YOU are paying them. They do not pay themselves.

So, if they do not show up for work or if they take your money and use it for projects that fail, or if they choose to steal that money, or put you in debt, they have stolen from you or wasted your resources on some fool’s errand, rather than spending what you entrusted to them for your good. You don’t have to be earning a lot of money and paying some form of income tax to be a government salary payer.

You get to decide and assess them to see whether or not they are doing a job that is worth the salary you are paying them. It doesn’t matter whether they are still in office or not. You don’t have to wait for their term to expire before you review their working conditions. For those of you who have been employed, your employer doesn’t wait for you to work for 50 years before they decide whether you’re doing a good job or not. No! They know that they are spending money on you and they want to make sure that you are delivering against your promises. So why allow non-performers and wicked people who come to ruin your life to stay in positions of power? Why bow down to another human who goes to the toilet just like you do? Does it make sense?

In some European countries, the leaders of the government take buses and trains with the public. They walk along the street. No heavy presence of security surrounding them as if when they took oath of office they suddenly turned to gold that someone could steal. In the Ukraine, those who do not perform are even literally thrown in the trash. They know who they represent. And it is not themselves.

In the prophecy of the promised Messiah in Isaiah 9:6, the prophet says, ‘and the government will be upon His shoulder’… do you know what the One Person Who was given all authority upon His coming to earth did with the authority He had been given? He washed feet. He walked around in the hot dusty, rocky climate to serve the people. He healed, delivered. He served. He sacrificed. Yes, the One Who was sent to save us did so by service and sacrifice. Did you know that the word Minister means to care for, to tend, to nurse, to look after? Minister is a term of service not domination. The magi came looking for a king, remember? What type of king did you see in Jesus? Fancy houses and palaces all around the world? Fast cars and tinted windows? Body guards and food testers? Sirens announcing His presence? Hoarding of all the finances for the ministry to make Himself fat? Or did you see One with no place to lay His head? Or God in a mere man’s body, Who allowed His bum to be wiped as a baby? Allowed Himself to be spat on, whipped, judged wrongly and killed for the sake of the very ones who killed Him?

It is important that we turn our thinkers back on as a continent. And very fast.