Kenya -- We'll kill each other as long as Big Man syndrome remains

By: Lucy Oriang
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[ Posted On: 2008-01-11 ]

Somewhere in this land(Kenya), some 500 families or so are in mourning. It is bad enough to lose a loved one in “normal” circumstances.

Knowing that they died violently at the hands of rampaging mobs is devastating. Knowing that they died over issues and events that they had little or nothing to do with, is soul destroying.

Those of us who are still standing have to live with the fact that these people died for a cause that was not worth it. No political leader is worth dying for. Not a single one is worth killing for. There is no mileage to be gained from dying for a leader who does not know you exist and, worse still, does not give a damn about what amounts to just another statistic in the national tally of votes.

This thing we are going through is not about the love of Kenya and Kenyans. It is about power and money, hence the hardline stand that dominates events and discussions. There is plenty at stake, but it is not the people of Kenya who top the list.

NO AMOUNT OF LIGHTNING VISITS to the flash points, or messages of sympathy, and very belated at that, can make up for the fact that the victims of the recent violence died pointlessly. The living are in turmoil, and fear rules Kenya again. And our leaders are stuck in mortal combat, unable to rise above their ambitions and put the interests of the country and the people first.

In villages, far from Nairobi, residents listen keenly for the sound of aircraft and motor vehicles. They worry about unusual sounds that are likely to mean trouble. The bush telegraph is quick to relay information on where the violence has shifted to, and many of them are reluctant to venture too far from home, lest they run into trouble with government security agents as much as hooligans masquerading as protesting democrats.

Our political leaders must be held collectively accountable for the state of affairs that this country finds itself in. The blame game will not change anything. Whenever you point a finger at the other person, remember that the other four are pointing at you. We are in this together, so we might as well cut the grandstanding and get ready to listen.

There are no degrees of guilt or innocence when it comes to taking the life of a fellow human being, whatever the circumstances. The violence and chaos that has followed the elections, which have been described as falling below democratic expectations, have been coming for a long time.

Truth be told, we did not need foreign observers to tell us that the elections were flawed. How could they be anything else when the political developments and campaigning over the past five years were hardly the model of democracy?

The Kenyan nation—some people question whether it is not just an uneasy union of tribes brought together by artificial boundaries—has been operating pretty much like a pressure cooker. That it has finally come to this impasse is evidence that you cannot sweep every issue under the carpet and expect the rubbish to sit there quietly. It will turn toxic in the long run, as we have learnt – not for the first time. We just never seem to learn from our mistakes, which we almost fondly refer to as ethnic clashes.

We have had more than 40 years to forge a nation. It has been four decades-plus of opportunities thrown to the dogs. Take a look at the voting trends in each region and a clear pattern emerges. When a reporting error made it appear that President Kibaki had more votes than his archrival, Raila Odinga, in one station in southern Nyanza, there were collective gasps of disbelief. It was simply not on, and the response would have been precisely the same had Mr Odinga scored significantly against Mr Kibaki anywhere in the Gema zones.

There are questions we could ask about the blind loyalty games that we like to play in this country. To paraphrase former president Moi, how many sufurias does it add to your kitchen if your man is in State House?

Unfortunately for Kenya, the true answer is plenty. Development skewed in favour of the ruling community has been the hallmark of independent Kenya. The winner takes it all in every sense of the word, and every man and his dog in the winning community has expectations of dominating prime positions in government.

The tribe becomes not just a cultural factor, but an instrument of power, hence the horse trading that has been turned into an art form in contemporary Kenya—and the violence that now haunts us.

AS LONG AS THIS REMAINS THE modus operandi, Kenyans will remain a bargaining chip in the power stakes rather than voters with specific needs and concerns. And they will continue to die like flies in a polarised society. Today’s victims will be forgotten before dark, and the hostilities will roll on to the next election.

It need not be so. We can invest our faith not in our tribesmen but in institutions, laws and policies that set out in precise terms our rules of engagement. The Big Man syndrome that bedevils our politics must go if we are to reclaim a sense of nationhood.

If we made that position less attractive and powerful and transferred some authority to other centres of power, we might weed out all the diehard opportunists and return sense and sensibility to the top office in the land.

Now there’s the challenge: Who will lead legislation that will strip them of demi-god status and turn them into mere mortals?

Article Source: http://www.afroarticles.com/article-dashboard

About The Author: Lucy Oriang -- is the deputy managing editor of the Daily Nation.

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