Still Proud to be Kenyan.

I recently had an altercation with a colleague. He had just fallen short of accusing me of hijacking a project that I had come in (as a consultant) to help steer. He actually did accuse me of hijacking the project but lacked the vocabulary and eloquence to do it right.

A year into the project, nothing tangible had been done. And whatever was moving started moving after I came onto the picture (in less than a fortnight). I am not a genius, but some things can be so fucked up that any small thing you do after ward seems genius. Honestly, I expected jubilation that things were finally going right.

Therefore, this accusation (in front of everybody else) that I was hijacking the project really got me riled. But it also got me thinking.

The term hijacking has been used a lot by Kenyans. Most elected officials and others of their ilk who have the position back lack the skill, brain or ability to do anything usually fall back on this term whenever things do not go their way; even if their way is the wrong way.

It is just the same way the Government only cries sovereignty whenever they are accused of Human Rights abuses by the UN and other concerned countries. They however forget that we are a sovereign state when they go to grovel for food aid, request for grants and beg for aid from the same countries they told to butt out.

I am sure you have come across your fair share of such insecure, incompetent, yet arrogant personalities with the position but not the capacity. Those people you cannot help but question how they got to such positions. It was while looking at one, that it finally hit me…

How the hell does one hijack something which is not moving?

There must be a reason why hijackings take place on the highways as opposed to parking lots. Logic tells me that it must be because you are sure the car will move. And if you cannot drive it, you can have the driver continue driving it while you command the speed and direction.

You do not have time or the patience to repair the car first or to jump start one, which is what one risks by jacking a stalled vehicle; not to mention the loss of value if you were intending to sell it later on. The only way to be sure of a good vehicle is by jacking something that is already moving.

But who hijacks a car that has stalled? Who hijacks a car that has no wheels? Who indeed hijacks a car without a driver and which has not moved for close to a year?

Kenya is a big car with no driver, without wheels, stalled on the side of the road and sitting on four stones. Each of these stones represents the undying hopes of a people, the civil society, the dreams of better days, and the hard work of ordinary Kenyans. Where is Government? One may ask. Well, it is sitting on the car, trampling these four stones.

When Kenyans like me come along, their dedicated effort towards getting it back on the road is not called hijacking. It is called restoration. But since this restoration must involve removing those sitting on the car first, that is where the claims of hijacking come from.

But then, you have to question the motives of those complaining, terming such restorative efforts as hijacking. You will most likely find that they are those people who are getting funding by claiming they need to repair that very car. Their payment is contingent on the car remaining broken.

The Irony of the whole thing is that those complaining, claiming hijacking are the one’s with the power to do with relative ease what Kenyans like myself try to do. They are the one whose mandate it is to ensure that the car remains on the road. But they cannot; they have the position yes, but do not know what to do with it, and how to go about doing it.

Which brings me to what Lee Thayer says; “As a tool, power can be no better than the person who wields it.”

There are unfortunately too many people in the country with power but lack everything else that is needed to accomplish anything with that power. The struggle then becomes wrestling power from these incompetent idiots and putting it in the hands of those with the ability to use it well.

That is the Youth Agenda for this country.

A while back, I was standing in line at KPLC to pay my electricity bill when an interesting anecdotic incidence occurred. It was the characteristic last minute dash to pay the bills that most Kenyans are used to. The lines were long and room packed, and the temperature was just crazy high. Even so, the counter adjacent to ours remained closed. But moments later, a cashier who had probably come to work late, opened the counter. No sooner had she opened it than people suddenly left our line in droves to join the new one. As they left, I casually walked into the newly created space to the front of the line they had just deserted. A few minutes later, I paid and left. But as I left, I remember taking a glance at those who were initially in front of me before jumping lines. They had this anger filled “punked” look that like a dream plays into the theme of this post.

Clearly, their urge to leave was greater than the sense to stay.

Historically, at least in Kenya, people have always seemed predisposed to follow what their tribal leaders (politicians) claim to be true. Kalenjins followed Moi, Kikuyus followed Kenyatta, Luos followed Oginga et cetera and all these tribes are now more or less following these men’s sons. I am not a follower, and extremely rarely do I declare to be a fan of anybody or anything, let alone being a fanatic. Being a skeptic by nature, you must therefore understand how baffled I get when suddenly, every tribe has one mind, that of their lead politician; when each tribe has one line of thought, that peddled by their lead politician; and when in an discussion, each tribesman has one retort; that old one liner perfected by their lead politician. Very few people have extended their eyes beyond this tribal horizon, and even fewer have dared stretch their minds beyond tribal stereotypes.

And I expected those few to be those learned men and women of this great literate nation of ours. But No! If I have not yet said that our Universities are highly overrated, I should be writing a post on it soon. I reached this conclusion after recently going through four years of University education. But luckily, Kaasa, my new favourite blogger puts it best in not going back to Live in Kenyawhen she talks of intellectuals in Kenya. Walk with me…

Earlier, in 2005, when I was a second year student in Egerton University; we had the Constitutional Referendum that gave birth to the vitriol that fed the fumes in the 2007 post election violence. But being in Campus, an Institution of higher learning, various talks were organized to give insight on the various contentious issues that our politicians were peddling around the country, based on their skewed understanding of the proposed constitution. Their interpretations divided the country down the middle and neither side helped in making things clear on what the pros and cons of Centralized or Federal systems of Government were. They were only interested in exaggerating the cons of each others position, and it us, as always, who became the victims just two years later.

When I saw advertisements on notice boards about a meeting set up by the Economics Students Association to discuss the true pros and cons of the proposed Constitution, I was naturally elated, especially at the prospect of expert knowledge from the invited lecturers. Suffice to say, the lecturers never showed up. Discussions on the topic however went on. Unfortunately, from the moment somebody introduced him/herself (tribe) prior to his/her contribution, you could already tell who they supported and their reasons for doing so. Nothing new came from this discussion. Every person that spoke basically regurgitated the reasons that politicians from their tribe peddled. It was so sad and disappointing that I stood up and told the whole congregation off before leaving. I told them to go read and develop opinions of their own.

That has been the curse in Kenya. Tribalism has taken away from people their ability to think independently. Rather than make objective observations, we wait for the tribal consensus of our political leaders, which we then forge ahead with as if it is the gospel truth. In the 2005 referendum, our politicians exposed our perennial tribal wounds, exaggerated tribal stereotypes and sure enough, provided the ammunition for people to kill each other after the 2007 elections while they watched at the sidelines. Just like the idiots people were, they forgot what the real crime was and who the actual criminals were, and instead went ahead kill, maim, and rape their innocent neighbours. I am targeting you today. Yes, you. Have you ever asked yourself why you support a particular leader? And I am not talking about those reasons that everybody gives; your own reasons. Has it hit you that you probably support people from your tribe only or mostly? Do you find it curious that you are compelled to support an idiot from your own tribe as opposed to an intellectual from another? Do you that there is no rational explanation in defense of your support for leaders from your own tribe alone?

Going back to those people who jumped lines at KPLC to join the new one, their urge to leave was greater than the sense to stay, and they paid for it. Similarly, for those who supported people on the basis of simply being from their own tribes, their urge to follow was greater than their sense to reason first, and the post election violence is what we had to show for it.

I would like to think that most youth in this country are learned. And it is because of this that I would like to call upon their capacity to reason. Reasoning means avoiding the rush to take sides. Reasoning means asking the right questions. Reasoning means not jumping without accessing other viable options. Reasoning means consolidating the youth vote and commanding the direction of politics in the country. Reasoning means denying the current political crop audience for their hatred speech. Reasoning simply means taking a long walk, mentally. But today, reasoning means being blatantly unreasonable with these political leaders, for there is no reasoning with them. It is either us or them. No more compromises. No more being taken for a ride.

‘You either have to trust your view of reality, or someone else’s. You are no more fallible than they are.”

Being proud of having a few youthful members in parliament is like hitching a ride on somebody’s car, and then gloating about it like it’s yours. There is always the chance that you will be kicked to the kerb. And on the kerbs is where all those youthful leaders we elected are as I write this. None is in a position to do shit. The other problem with hitching rides is that, maybe out of politeness, or courtesy, or even as a condition for being allowed in, you abide by the rules of the car.  That also means hitching a ride on the ideology of the drivers the way we witnessed in the “gag the media” chorus in parliament. The cars are ODM and PNU, and the youth have already lost with both. We need a vehicle that we are the ones driving, a car whose direction we are steering, whose rules we are the ones setting, and whose drivers are properly vetted; i.e. valid driving licenses, vast experience, strict integrity, and more importantly, human.

In the book Leadership, by Lee Thayer, he says; “Seduction always involves consent and collaboration. Lead, follow or get out of the way – seduce and be burdened with followers, be seduced and suffer the consequences, or get out of the way.”

Don’t you feel that you have been seduced and thrown out of the way?

Detention without trial is of course nothing new to Kenyans. Illegal arrests (i.e. for nothing in particular) which usually end up in such detentions are one of the reasons, apart from extra judicial killings, why we so fear our police force. But I digress.

The first detainee has been released from Guantanamo Bay Cuba under Obama’s presidency. Binyam Mohamed, an Ethiopian who was staying in Britain at the time of his arrest was detained for 7 years without trial in the various CIA detention camps around the world and later, until his release yesterday, in Guantanamo Bay Cuba. His lawyer says that after he was arrested, he was taken to various CIA detention facilities in Morocco and Afghanistan where he was tortured, and that allegedly, at times under the watch of British Agents. A frail looking Mohamed landed in Britain, but the British Government cautions that he may not stay.

Amnesty International issued the following press release following his release…

This brings to light some of the key issues that Amnesty International has been fighting for. Under the Amnesty International checklist, it calls for the US Government to ensure Guantánamo detainees who would be at risk of serious human rights violations if returned to their country of origin are offered the opportunity to live in the USA, if they wish to do so, and work with other governments to ensure that other such detainees are offered protection. The fact that Mr. Mohamed might be forced to leave Britain for Ethiopia is what I am clearly against.

I am very skeptical about Mr. Mohamed’s return to Ethiopia for the simple reason that all the Kenyans taken to Guantánamo went through Ethiopia. Ethiopia was the first place where they were tortured before they were somehow shipped to Guantánamo or some other CIA detention facility. The Kenyan Government may be due the strong Civil Society here thought it would be easier to take these detainees to Ethiopia, from where the US agents got them. This may have been in an effort to claim deniability,  but which in retrospect was not so clever for this Government is still in every way criminally liable.

With British seeming reluctant to let Mr. Mohamed to stay there, the risk to his life when he returns back home to Ethiopia is clear and present. And that is the reason this checklist requests that these detainees are offered the opportunity to stay in the USA or that their protection is assured if they go back home.

Though happy with this release, there is still opposition to habeas corpus hearings which continue to ensure that illegal detentions persist. And that brings me to Kenya. Mr. Mohamed was detained for 7 years without trial, and this was mainly because the US opposed full habeas corpus hearings to detainees, but in Kenya, I am not sure whether people, including the police, even know what habeas corpus is. Detentions here go into years, even decades, without trial because of so many abuses that should shame the judiciary and minister of justice into resignation.

For those not familiar with habeas corpus, the Encarta Dictionary defines it as; “A Writ (writ being a written court order demanding that the addressee do or stop doing whatever is specified in the order) ordering a detained person into court: a writ issued in order to bring somebody who has been detained into court, usually for a decision on whether the detention is lawful.”

There is a backlog of over 800,000 cases in the Kenyan courts. Many of these cases have gone unheard for years while those arrested for these crimes remain in remand. Need I mention that the conditions here are far much worse than in Guantanamo! The prisons are overcrowded, the food sickening, the hygiene deplorable, and the hope of getting a full hearing slim to none. Torture is also norm for the police and they rarely if ever investigate anything. Just by getting arrested, you are already convicted. Guantánamo Bay Kenya indeed…

As you ponder over these issues, here is the link to the petition that Amnesty International is running. Signing it is you doing your part in trying to make this world a more humane place.http://obama100days.amnesty.org/petition.html