Guard against politicians out to cause chaos during elections

Lately, criminal gangs have been on the upsurge, especially in the low-cost residential areas of Nairobi and in informal settlements within the city. It is not hard to establish the reason for this, coming, as it does, in an election year. The National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK) warns that these gangs are indeed being financed by lacklustre politicians with nothing to offer Kenyans save for their greed for power. Most of them in actual sense are self-absorbed tribal chiefs using tribes as a means to an end.

Anxiety has gripped parts of the country, an understandable feeling if viewed against the atrocities that were committed against innocent Kenyans by faceless individuals in 2007/2008 as a result of contested election results. People lost lives, limbs and property in the madness that gripped the country at the time.

The heightened anxiety is as a result of politicians convincing the electorate that elections are a matter of life and death. Tribe, depending on which side of the political divide one is, has been criminalised to the extent Kenyans who have lived together peacefully for the past five years are hoodwinked to regard one another as enemies. But in reality, that is not true.

Women from Nairobi's informal settlements have given testimonies on why they are afraid of election violence. There are disturbing reports of members of certain communities being evicted from their rental houses in some areas because of perceptions on their political leanings. The brand of politics that leads to this threaten our social fabric, something we must guard against.

Unfortunately, businesses are cutting back on production and laying elaborate contingency plans in case violence breaks out. Needless to say, this is a threat to our economy.

Elections, even as they are becoming a costly endeavour akin to natural calamities, come and go every five years, but Kenya will remain. Politics should not be used to destroy the better country Kenyans are working tirelessly to build. Kenyans to reject trouble makers in the guise of leaders.