Ndemo wrong to bare fangs at civil society for oversight role

Typically, I don’t devote my column to refuting – and exposing – drivel published by columnists in other papers. Dr Bitange Ndemo’s screed (“David Ndii’s position exposes hypocrisy of civil society,” Saturday Nation, July 8) cannot be allowed to stand unchallenged. In the piece, Ndemo trash-talks Dr Ndii – the distinguished economist – and scurrilously accuses him of being a hateful double-dealing hypocrite driven by anti-Jubilee partisan bile.

He charges Ndii of hiding under the cover of the academy and civil society to advance an anti-Kenyan, unpatriotic, and un-interrogated mountain of crap to undermine and discredit Kenya. Read between the lines and Ndemo is accusing Ndii of treasonous conduct. Let me bring out my sickle and hammer.

Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time Ndemo is baring his fangs at civil society. He has an uncanny penchant for crawling out of the woodwork as a reactionary attack dog for ruling elites just before elections. I should know. Just before the pivotal 2013 elections, Ndemo – then Information PS – appointed himself police over political critics and bloggers.

In a scathing attack against me (“Makau can do better than prophesying doom,” Sunday Nation, January 13, 2013), he mauled me for calling out the corrupt and incompetent IEBC. In my piece (“Why loser of March election may not concede,” Sunday Nation, January 6, 2013) I argued that the IEBC couldn’t be trusted to conduct a free and fair election.

Bent on censoring

Ndemo didn’t stop there. Flanked by then Deputy Police Spokesperson Charles Owino and then Chair of the National Cohesion and Integration Commission Mzalendo Kihunjia, Ndemo tore into me live on national television. He called me “unpatriotic” and labeled my Sunday Nation column “garbage.” The three railed against “hate-speakers” like me and vowed to arrest and prosecute them.

Simply put, theirs was an attempt to overthrow the 2010 Constitution by chilling free speech and silencing dissenters. I thought Ndemo was Orwellian – and bent on censoring and concealing the truth through propaganda and the use of the police state. His column against Ndii last Saturday shows he’s been unleashed against democracy again. He’s clearly a gun for hire.

Ndemo represents a type. He’s one among a small cabal of regime ideologues who carry water for the status quo. I don’t question his bona fides as an academic with a doctorate. Although it’s curious he’s been stuck at the level of associate professor unable to ascend to full professorial status. His two partners in crime are more notorious.

The first, Mutahi Ngunyi – he of the tyranny of numbers fame, purports to be a professor with a doctorate. But there’s no evidence any university of known pedigree has ever accorded him either honor. The second, Peter Kagwanja, is a bona fide PhD although a professor he’s not. These two and Ndemo are the Jubilee’s “intellectual” pit bulls.

I won’t dwell on their credentials – or lack thereof. But it’s important to raise because Ndemo maligns Ndii’s intellectual acuity in his piece. He questions Ndii’s grasp of economics in a futile attempt to debunk what plainly the eye can see.

As for Dr Kagwanja and Mr Ngunyi, it is well known they trade on their status as “public intellectuals” to hawk their defective wares. In the days of yore, Ndemo would’ve been known as a “Kanu professor.” Today he spits fire in the service of Jubilee. Ndii is smiling wherever he is. That’s because he has clearly rattled Jubilee’s cage. But Ndemo must know it will take more to discredit NASA.

Let me now debunk two of Ndemo’s arguments against Ndii and civil society. The first is that Ndii is a sheep in wolf’s clothing. The argument is that Ndii is masquerading as a “neutral” civil society doyen while trafficking in partisanship. What riles Ndemo is that Ndii isn’t thinking for Jubilee but has instead chosen to work with NASA.

How come Ndemo doesn’t indict Kagwanja and Ngunyi for same offense? That’s a rhetorical question. I will give Ndemo a free tutorial lesson. Non-partisanship doesn’t mean that intellectuals and civil society actors can’t offer ideas and advice to political parties. In fact, they must. There must be a dialogic relationship between the intelligentsia and the political class.

Non-partisanship

Ndemo’s second argument is that civil society shouldn’t have a voice in politics and the political process. He thinks the political voice of civil society must be extinguished by phantom non-partisanship. Baloney.

Civil society is a political actor – but distinct from the Opposition and the State. Let’s be clear – it would be a dereliction of duty if civil society didn’t engage the State and the Opposition on governance, democracy, and human rights.

- Makau Mutua is SUNY Distinguished Professor at SUNY Buffalo Law School and Chair of KHRC.

@makaumutua