In a world currently convulsing over the ethics of generative artificial intelligence, the colonizing of Mars, and whether we should let algorithms decide who receives a heart transplant, the city of Kisumu has decided to take a bold, courageous leap into the mid-twentieth century. The local administrative gentry, ever desperate to justify their taxpayer-funded existence, have officially declared the installation of traffic lights on the Jomo Kenyatta Highway a 'major milestone.' It is a phrase that suggests we are witnessing a feat of engineering on par with the Large Hadron Collider or the moon landing, rather than the simple act of screwing three colored lightbulbs into a post and hoping the local power grid doesn’t have its usual daily nervous breakdown.

Let us pause to admire the sheer, unadulterated cynicism of the term 'milestone.' In the lexicon of the modern African bureaucrat—and indeed, their counterparts in the West—a milestone is any basic requirement of a functioning society that has been delayed for forty years and is finally delivered at three times the original cost. To call a traffic light a milestone is to admit that, until this very moment, the city’s approach to urban transit management was essentially 'may the odds be ever in your favor.' It is an admission that for decades, the Jomo Kenyatta Highway—named, predictably, after the founding patriarch to lend it an air of undeserved dignity—was governed by the organic, Darwinian chaos of the matatu driver and the hopeful prayers of pedestrians.

One can almost see the scene: a gaggle of politicians in poorly tailored suits, standing around a metal pole, waiting for a red light to flicker to life as if they were witnessing the birth of a new sun. There is a specific kind of performative glee that erupts when a government finally provides the bare minimum. They want a parade for doing their jobs, even when they are eighty years late to the party. The Right will undoubtedly point to this as a sign of 'developmental triumph' and 'investment-friendly infrastructure,' while the Left will find a way to make it about the inclusivity of the signal timings or the carbon footprint of the plastic lenses. In reality, both sides are simply ignoring the fact that a city of Kisumu’s size should have had these 'milestones' before the invention of the cassette tape.

But let us consider the psychological trauma this will inflict upon the populace. For generations, the Kisumu driver has operated on a system of pure, unbridled instinct. Driving was an art form, a tactical dance of aggression, horn-honking, and the occasional bribe. Now, they are expected to submit to the tyranny of a glowing green circle. We are asking a population that has survived the structural adjustments of the IMF and the endemic corruption of successive regimes to suddenly respect the authority of a 100-watt bulb. It is an exercise in futility. In three weeks, the lights will either be permanently stuck on yellow, looted for their copper wiring, or simply ignored by everyone with a loud enough horn and a sufficiently heavy foot.

The tragedy is not that the lights were installed; it is that we are expected to be impressed. We live in a civilization of low expectations. We have reached a point where the absence of total collapse is celebrated as a 'milestone.' The authorities talk of 'modernizing' the transport sector, a euphemism for finally catching up to the standards set by Detroit in 1928. It is the same global grift: promise the people a 'Smart City' and then hand them a refurbished traffic signal and act like you’ve solved the riddle of the Sphinx.

Furthermore, the placement on the Jomo Kenyatta Highway is poetic in its absurdity. Naming every major piece of crumbling infrastructure after the same handful of 'Big Men' is the ultimate distraction technique. It’s hard to complain about the lack of basic sewage or reliable electricity when you’re standing on a road named after a national hero. The name provides a veneer of historical importance to a stretch of tarmac that is now home to the city’s first-ever automated invitation to wait in a queue. It is the perfect metaphor for the human condition: standing still, staring at a red light, on a road named after a revolutionary, waiting for a future that was supposed to arrive decades ago.

Ultimately, Kisumu’s new traffic lights are not a sign of progress, but a reminder of our stagnation. We celebrate the arrival of the basic because we have forgotten what the exceptional looks like. These lights will blink, the cars will eventually crash into them, and the politicians will move on to the next 'milestone'—perhaps a functioning sidewalk or a bin that actually gets emptied. Until then, we can all bask in the artificial glow of the red, yellow, and green, pretending that we aren't just rearranging the deck chairs on a ship that has been stationary for half a century.