The police service should stop doing Government's bidding

In the heat of things before the October 26 presidential poll, the police unleashed terror on nonconformist residents in parts of Luo Nyanza who refused to be party to what they believed was a charade. The obnoxious tear gas was liberally dispensed. Police batons acquired more stains from the blood of the unfortunate while bullets snuffed out lives.

If ever there was anything that came close to a horror movie, that was it. Students of history could easily see the similarities with Heinrich Himmler’s Gestapo reign of terror in Germany in the mid 1930s. In a nutshell, the Gestapo ruthlessly suppressed opposition to the Nazi rule. In the purge, millions of Jews ended up in concentration camps where most died.

In the Nyanza demonstrations, an online photo of a subdued policeman shedding tears was poignant. It was a manifestation of the desperation among some police officers forced to do what their conscience would otherwise not allow them to. The police often come under heavy flak, but on reflection, save for a few sadists in their midst, they are innocent pawns in a bruising political game. The real culprits are the political elite.

Misplaced loyalty

There is a bonding between the police and the State akin to what is famously known as the Stockholm Syndrome. This syndrome highlights a peculiar relationship between a captive and the captor where the former warms up to the latter simply because they either did not kill, or harm them during a hostage situation. The police (captives) are conditioned to believe they need the Government (captor) for survival because the Government pays their salaries; the ignominy of their despicable housing and working conditions notwithstanding. But, for how long is this expected to last under the prevailing circumstances?

The ‘breaking-point’ concept is not abstract. A human being can only take so much strain. And where such being has the wherewithal to force change, it happens as the recent coup in Zimbabwean proves. The breaking point is an acute moment of stress in which a person completely breaks down. Watching the police engage civilians in running battles on Tuesday this week in the vicinity of the Jacaranda grounds, I had the feeling many do not relish the moments. Being a multi-tribe police service, a time could come when order completely breaks down within the service unless the tomfoolery by politicians and a largely sentimental top police command stops.

It was depressing that on the day President Uhuru was being sworn in, Kenyans could be teargassed, baton-beaten and killed for exercising their right to peaceful assembly as enshrined in the constitution. An innocent seven year old boy was killed at home. The adrenaline that seems to copiously flow in the veins of opposition supporters is triggered by illegitimate orders to disperse peaceful assemblies. Left to their own devices, under the watchful eyes of restrained policemen, I doubt that any opposition rally would last more than two hours, leave alone turn chaotic. Teargassing Jubilee supporters at Kasarani, whose only crime was a desire to witness the swearing in of Uhuru was equally unfortunate; many will not be singing Jubilee praises with broken limbs and the trauma caused by police truncheons.

Anticlimax

More depressing was Uhuru’s post swearing in speech. It was an overused script. Several months to the August 8 general election whose presidential results were later nullified by the Supreme Court following a petition by the National Super Alliance, and for several months thereafter, Jubilees script has remained the same. No mention of corruption. Cheaper electricity? Tell that to the birds. There is a more pressing problem that should have been addressed at length. The country craves healing for suppurating, deep wounds inflicted on its citizenry by an obtuse political class.

There is no denying the deep seated divisions that have needlessly given rise to secession talks. There is no running away from the fact that exclusivity is largely responsible for the precarious situation the country finds itself in. We cannot afford to hide behind devolution to mask the unequitable distribution of the national cake. The culture of talking at each other across the political divide cannot heal evident rifts in society. President Uhuru Kenyatta is expected to leave behind an admirable legacy. To achieve this, he will need to muzzle some of his acolytes who possess the knack of making bad situations worse by condescendingly remarking on issues of national import.

Uhuru has not shied away from the fact that retired President Daniel Arap Moi, the man who cast him into politics at a time he appeared reluctant, is still his mentor. Moi had a penchant for order and discipline; a man for whom nobody pretended to speak. Uhuru must speak for himself and never feel beholden to anybody within the Jubilee consortium.

Mr Chagema is a correspondent at The [email protected]