An open letter to the people

Dear Kenyans, We don’t get lots of open letters. But the constitution of the republic in Chapter 1 Article 1 states clearly that we are the owners of all sovereign power. We simply lend it to the government for efficient exercising, while reserving the right to take it back. The problem with Kenya is that tribe is a very entrenched source of not only identity but opportunity. We like to think this is changing, that the youth are oblivious of ethnic identity and that intermarriage is resolving a lot of the tribal tensions that Kenya has. But if we are honest, we all have relatives who have strong opinions about the other tribe. Especially when it comes to the Luo and the Kikuyu, two communities whose prominent sons happen to have held political power somewhat equally at independence and then very quickly fell out. The 2007/2008 PEV showed us that even with years of urbanisation and education, we still hold tribe very very dear, almost having a pack mentality. So when we have “We the people” in the constitution, what we actually mean in reality is “we the peoples (that is tribes)”. The reality of Kenya is that as a unitary state we are an ethnocracy. Whichever community holds political power, their people do benefit. Many people find it popular to say “even if Kibaki won, he has not helped me as a Kikuyu” or “even if Raila wins, he won’t add food to my table as a Luo”. It sounds nice and wise and unifying. But it is also patently false. The independence government did benefit the founding president’s community immensely. From the land allocations in the Coast and Rift Valley, civil service appointments, location and number of national schools, the president’s province did benefit. The Moi era saw great economic mobility come to the Rift Valley. This is when agriculture in the province began to thrive, Eldoret became a major urban center complete with an international airport and thousands of youth got places in the military and police force. So much that the default accent for a Kenyan police officer is a Kalenjin-sounding accent. The Kibaki era introduced open ethnocracy - no longer was it hidden as government policy. From cabinet positions to parastatal slots, each wing of NARC appointed persons based on the ethnicities of its leaders. And the culture filters down to how tenders are awarded, how recruitment is done and thus has a direct effect on the wealth and well-being of the beneficiary society. If you still aren’t convinced, it is now indisputable that the compensation for PEV victims was significantly biased, with some communities having victims receiving 400,000 KES and a few acres of land to rebuild, while others got 10,000 KES. Michela Wrong writes about ethnic hegemony here, and the New York Times also traces the history of ethnic dominance in the face of the PEV here. This reality spawns two types of motivation for having a strong ethnic identity. The first is simply people who love their culture genuinely and their ethnicity forms a large part of their worldview. These are usually older people or people raised in their ancestral areas. The second is ethnic identity as an economic imperative. If you are Kisii and your tribesman wins the presidency, you may soon find that tenders, grants, scholarships, government partnerships are very heavily falling on the Kisii applicants. Which may motivate you to ‘show your tribal bonafides’ at appropriate moments - such as chatting in vernacular with the procurement guys for example. This is our reality as a country, and the greatest act of admission of this is our hearty embrace of devolution. Devolution avails resources at county level, and our counties largely represent tribes. Only the ignorant would imagine county boundaries are based on anything else. And devolution is that safety valve that is letting off the pressure that has built up from envy and resentment by those communities outside government towards those inside. So whether devolution is efficient or not, it is the glue holding Kenya together now. Be very careful when you criticise devolution and call for its reversal. Devolution must succeed, and even go further into federation.

An open letter to the people

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