Circumstances dictate what ‘dialogue’ means

Words can have multiple meanings, depending on the times and occasion. The mutations are often social and political, so much that, like Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, they lose the original meaning by blending into new “word” species. With time, therefore, people create excuses for changing the meaning in order to serve social or political ends. These words include tyrant, man, democracy, and most important “dialogue” which has metamorphosed into condoning illegalities.

Ideally, “dialogue” implies discussions on assorted topics and to refine thoughts. Among the best known dialogues is the one in which Plato the Athenian presented his teacher, Socrates, as a questioning man. Euro opinion makers subsequently decreed Socrates to be the greatest philosopher simply because he admitted his ignorance and made intelligent Athenians look foolish. In the 1990s, there were also heated “dialogues” on the relativism of truth. These included heated “dialogue” on human cognitive and organisation origins during which renowned “scholars” accused each other of intellectual fakeness. And there were “dialogues” on the relativism of touchy postmodern-related issues, giving rise to the language of political correctness. 

In the Kenyan political context, the word “dialogue” politically mutated to mean orchestrated demands that winners in political contest surrender to losers. It is normal for students, having read books or paraphrases of some books, to imagine themselves as “revolutionaries” to agitate for something and diet is often at the top.  At the University of the Toilers next to the Kremlin in Moscow in the early 1930s, for instance, “revolutionary” Jomo Kenyatta griped about bad food and the habit of calling other people “petty bourgeois” instead of “big bourgeois”.

Mutations

Roughly 50 years later at the University of Nairobi in the 1980s, after reading a few heavy books, students sounded “revolutionary” as they chanted “petty bourgeois” and griped about food. Using the euphemism of “dialogue” to demand diet improvement attracted powerful politicians that included Nakuru KANU boss Kariuki Chotara. Endorsing the “dialogue”, Chotara wanted the police to arrest “Karl Marx” for inciting students. Thereafter, when chapati was introduced into the diet, “dialogue” mutated to mean chapati for university students.

From university chapati, “Dialogue” acquired other political meanings. Among them is the Euro habit of using international institutions to discredit national organs and impose their will, as happened with the violent events associated with Kenya’s 2007 presidential election. Previously, regime changers had been unhappy that the Kibaki administration refused to toe prescribed Euro line and to subordinate Kenyan interests to their whims.

In insisting that Kenyans determine their own fate, Kibaki inspired Euro regime changers to try negotiating Kibaki out of office. They financially and logistically supported the “Orange” side of the 2005 Orange-Banana referendum in loud expectation that the Kibaki administration would fall. When that did not happen, the Euros two years later helped impose a “dialogue” that produced the 2008 nusu-mkate government.

Envoys

In pushing regime change “dialogue”, the Euros led a Triumvirate Alliance of local religious leaders and proxies called NGOs and civil society. At times, the triumvirate alliance sounds ridiculous, contradicting itself with statements that imply condoning illegalities. Members talk of the rule of law only to countermand the very concept as they entertain open criminality. Instead of discouraging those who declare intent to commit criminal acts, and are bent on criminal behaviour to achieve political objectives, “men of the cloth” take front seats in demanding that the government sit down with law breakers to determine how much law breaking to allow.

The clergy often take their cue from their two allies, Euro proxies in the NGOs/Civil Society and Euro-diplomats in Nairobi, led by the United States and Britain. When they stand together in issuing statements instructing Kenya on what to do, those “diplomats” look peculiar in that they tend to be all white, representing the interests of white powers, and sounding very colonialistic. Although they have serious disputes in their countries, they dare not suggest that Hillary Clinton break the law or demand “dialogue” with Donald Trump. In Nairobi, however, Euro “diplomats” appear to read from the same script as chaos manufacturers whose intent is back door power grab and for whom “dialogue” means government surrender. Thus the “diplomats” turn “dialogue” into a euphemism for disregarding procedures, rules, dismantling institutions, and encouraging illegalities.

The Triumvirate’s repeated use of the word “dialogue” to subvert the Constitution and the law ends up being political absurdity and at best an insult to common sense. It still expects to be taken seriously even as it tells the president entertain would-be law breakers in their intent to break the law. This type of “dialogue” encourages selected people to foment chaos, successfully shift blame to victims, and receive Euro endorsement. Instead of promoting respect and obedience to the Constitution and law, it champions impunity.

Prof Munene teaches at USIU