Kenya's woes and the language of silence

The quest for unity, inclusivity or peace by any other name is not new to post-independent Kenya. Indeed, from the inchoate stages of the nation state’s development, ethnic rivalries were rife. Some culminated in assassinations of leading political figures. Yvonne Owuor in her critically acclaimed book ‘Dust,’ talks of the dystopian state following the murder of politician Tom Mboya. She writes: “After Mboya, Kenya’s official languages: English, Kiswahili and Silence.” In an interview, Ms Owuor spoke of silence as coming after “the loss of a dream, the loss of the imagined Kenya”. She further said that “with the death of Mboya, the One Kenya project came to an end”.

President Uhuru Kenyatta’s new ‘One Kenya’ project is expected to find expression in the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) campaigns in the New Year. Among the raft of benefits the BBI proposes is an expanded executive to promote inclusivity. The proposed creation of five positions at the apex of the Executive and the position of Leader of Official Opposition has been touted as the elixir that will cure perennial fights in Kenya’s ethnically diverse environment.