Two decades of bad choices to blame for current predicament

From left; politicians Kalonzo Musyoka, Musalia Mudavadi, Raila Odinga, William Ruto and Uhuru Kenyatta in court in 2006. [Boniface Okendo, Standard]

Chinua Achebe, the celebrated African writer and novelist, once remarked that if you see a frog jumping in broad daylight, then something is after its life.

We can also surmise that when all our country's leading newspapers carry the same alarming headline as happened last week, we are hanging precariously on the edge of the cliff.

Both the scale of loss of life and destruction of property should shock our collective consciences. The running battle between law enforcers and the protesters has caused a mounting humanitarian crisis. And the question we must all ask is; “Is it just?” The bulk of those in the streets battling it out on both sides also happens to be the very segment of society that has borne the brunt of small politics that has persistently sought to transform the buoyancy of hope into despair.

The police have had to endure not-so-humane living and working conditions. The protestor who they seek to combat is someone who has never experienced the miracle of prosperity that this country has to offer. We must remind everyone who cares to listen that the citizens possess the right to dissent; show dissatisfaction with the policies of a governing body. The government’s responsibility when confronted with the exercise of the right to dissent does not include the right to use excessive force.

What we have witnessed in parts of the country as police response to the protests is inexcusable. It does not matter whether these protests are spontaneous or precipitated by political actors, the government turning the muzzle of the gun on its unarmed civilian population can’t be left to stand. As the clergy and other players plead for dialogue between the two political formations, let’s take a mental flight back to that era when Kenyans were voted the most optimistic people on Earth.

That moment when Kenyans were fired up enough to institute citizen’s arrest against a corrupt policeman. That moment when we said that the imperial presidency must remain something of the past. That era when Bomas was synonymous, not with the contestations over the conduct and declaration of presidential election results, but with an inclusive, consultative constitutional-making process. As Gaius Cassius remarked in that celebrated play Julius Caesar, “The fault is not in our stars, but in ourselves.” We, the people must boldly chart our destiny.

The choices we have made in the past 20 years have brought us to this grinding gridlock of insensitive politics. We killed the constitution-making process that helped end Kanu’s 40-year stranglehold. Our political leadership at the time then adopted the repressive edifice that Kanu had presided over. Tribalism as a basis for appointment into civil service became the order of the day. We entrenched extrajudicial killings, we removed economic stumbling blocks for the owners of capital instead of creating mass prosperity.

It’s the ghosts we didn’t exorcise under Kibaki that are still wreaking havoc in our midst. The cost of living, while legitimate, remains a mere convenient decoy. Our fallout is political and is the clearest indication that ultimately, we must evolve bolder measures with which to tinker with our governance and, by extension, politics to accord and conform with our unique history, political culture and traditions. The mismanagement of the Bomas process not only brought upon us the shame that was 2007, but also the dragon that was the ICC.

The new Constitution was, for all intents and purposes, a ceasefire document. The ICC process may look like a bad dream, but in its wake, it birthed the selfish politics of self-preservation that has held our politics hostage for the past 10 years.

The attendant wastage and corruption of the last decade has its roots, to a large extent, to the pound of flesh that our politicians had to pay in the ensuing skullduggery within and without the geopolitical order. Fixing the economy, however scrupulous the president maybe, could take four years with both bold policies and all hands on deck. As he works on the economy, he must deal with the politics as well.

Mr Mwaga is a policy and governance Analyst. [email protected]