Some weeks ago a Cabinet Secretary tried to
address belligerent mourners at a funeral in Kisii and was shouted down
even when forced to revert to his native tongue in an attempt to calm
them.
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who'd been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party's candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the 'conditions' of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government's ambitious school computerization programme - not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
"LET THE AIRPORT BURN!"
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region's main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they'd struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don't support (some don't even recognize) the Jubilee government as 'theirs'. The attitude was, "Let it burn! Let them learn!" The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move - all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn't seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto's case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc... This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to 'keep the peace' and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don't know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, "In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!" In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude "We need to show them" emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that 'the Gikuyu are the problem'. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the 'consequences' of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of 'the tyranny of numbers', which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country - especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza - one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces - the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan't be long before the Counties - which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a 'cold war' on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively 'checked out' and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can't utter the words: "Rais Uhuru Kenyatta". This 'belligerent' turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President's backers with a similarly belligerent - "mta do?!"
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER:
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What's clear is that they don't have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn't have an option, as the machinery doesn't exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
Kenya's soft Insurgency by John Githongo
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who'd been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party's candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the 'conditions' of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government's ambitious school computerization programme - not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
"LET THE AIRPORT BURN!"
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region's main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they'd struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don't support (some don't even recognize) the Jubilee government as 'theirs'. The attitude was, "Let it burn! Let them learn!" The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move - all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn't seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto's case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc... This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to 'keep the peace' and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don't know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, "In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!" In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude "We need to show them" emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that 'the Gikuyu are the problem'. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the 'consequences' of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of 'the tyranny of numbers', which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country - especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza - one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces - the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan't be long before the Counties - which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a 'cold war' on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively 'checked out' and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can't utter the words: "Rais Uhuru Kenyatta". This 'belligerent' turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President's backers with a similarly belligerent - "mta do?!"
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER:
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What's clear is that they don't have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn't have an option, as the machinery doesn't exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
Kenya's soft Insurgency by John Githongo
Some
weeks ago a Cabinet Secretary tried to address belligerent mourners at a
funeral in Kisii and was shouted down even when forced to revert to his
native tongue in an attempt to calm them.
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who’d been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party’s candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the ‘conditions’ of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government’s ambitious school computerization programme – not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
“LET THE AIRPORT BURN!”
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region’s main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they’d struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don’t support (some don’t even recognize) the Jubilee government as ‘theirs’. The attitude was, “Let it burn! Let them learn!” The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move – all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn’t seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto’s case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc… This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to ‘keep the peace’ and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don’t know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, “In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!” In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude “We need to show them” emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that ‘the Gikuyu are the problem’. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the ‘consequences’ of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of ‘the tyranny of numbers’, which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country – especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza – one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces – the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan’t be long before the Counties – which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a ‘cold war’ on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively ‘checked out’ and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can’t utter the words: “Rais Uhuru Kenyatta”. This ‘belligerent’ turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President’s backers with a similarly belligerent – “mta do?!”
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What’s clear is that they don’t have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn’t have an option, as the machinery doesn’t exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-132364/kenyas-soft-insurgency#sthash.kskNgJgJ.dpuf
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who’d been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party’s candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the ‘conditions’ of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government’s ambitious school computerization programme – not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
“LET THE AIRPORT BURN!”
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region’s main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they’d struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don’t support (some don’t even recognize) the Jubilee government as ‘theirs’. The attitude was, “Let it burn! Let them learn!” The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move – all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn’t seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto’s case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc… This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to ‘keep the peace’ and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don’t know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, “In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!” In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude “We need to show them” emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that ‘the Gikuyu are the problem’. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the ‘consequences’ of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of ‘the tyranny of numbers’, which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country – especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza – one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces – the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan’t be long before the Counties – which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a ‘cold war’ on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively ‘checked out’ and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can’t utter the words: “Rais Uhuru Kenyatta”. This ‘belligerent’ turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President’s backers with a similarly belligerent – “mta do?!”
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What’s clear is that they don’t have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn’t have an option, as the machinery doesn’t exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-132364/kenyas-soft-insurgency#sthash.kskNgJgJ.dpuf
Some
weeks ago a Cabinet Secretary tried to address belligerent mourners at a
funeral in Kisii and was shouted down even when forced to revert to his
native tongue in an attempt to calm them.
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who’d been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party’s candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the ‘conditions’ of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government’s ambitious school computerization programme – not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
“LET THE AIRPORT BURN!”
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region’s main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they’d struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don’t support (some don’t even recognize) the Jubilee government as ‘theirs’. The attitude was, “Let it burn! Let them learn!” The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move – all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn’t seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto’s case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc… This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to ‘keep the peace’ and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don’t know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, “In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!” In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude “We need to show them” emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that ‘the Gikuyu are the problem’. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the ‘consequences’ of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of ‘the tyranny of numbers’, which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country – especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza – one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces – the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan’t be long before the Counties – which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a ‘cold war’ on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively ‘checked out’ and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can’t utter the words: “Rais Uhuru Kenyatta”. This ‘belligerent’ turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President’s backers with a similarly belligerent – “mta do?!”
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What’s clear is that they don’t have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn’t have an option, as the machinery doesn’t exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-132364/kenyas-soft-insurgency#sthash.kskNgJgJ.dpuf
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who’d been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party’s candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the ‘conditions’ of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government’s ambitious school computerization programme – not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
“LET THE AIRPORT BURN!”
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region’s main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they’d struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don’t support (some don’t even recognize) the Jubilee government as ‘theirs’. The attitude was, “Let it burn! Let them learn!” The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move – all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn’t seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto’s case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc… This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to ‘keep the peace’ and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don’t know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, “In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!” In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude “We need to show them” emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that ‘the Gikuyu are the problem’. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the ‘consequences’ of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of ‘the tyranny of numbers’, which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country – especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza – one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces – the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan’t be long before the Counties – which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a ‘cold war’ on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively ‘checked out’ and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can’t utter the words: “Rais Uhuru Kenyatta”. This ‘belligerent’ turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President’s backers with a similarly belligerent – “mta do?!”
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What’s clear is that they don’t have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn’t have an option, as the machinery doesn’t exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-132364/kenyas-soft-insurgency#sthash.kskNgJgJ.dpuf
Some
weeks ago a Cabinet Secretary tried to address belligerent mourners at a
funeral in Kisii and was shouted down even when forced to revert to his
native tongue in an attempt to calm them.
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who’d been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party’s candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the ‘conditions’ of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government’s ambitious school computerization programme – not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
“LET THE AIRPORT BURN!”
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region’s main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they’d struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don’t support (some don’t even recognize) the Jubilee government as ‘theirs’. The attitude was, “Let it burn! Let them learn!” The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move – all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn’t seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto’s case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc… This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to ‘keep the peace’ and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don’t know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, “In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!” In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude “We need to show them” emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that ‘the Gikuyu are the problem’. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the ‘consequences’ of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of ‘the tyranny of numbers’, which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country – especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza – one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces – the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan’t be long before the Counties – which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a ‘cold war’ on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively ‘checked out’ and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can’t utter the words: “Rais Uhuru Kenyatta”. This ‘belligerent’ turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President’s backers with a similarly belligerent – “mta do?!”
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What’s clear is that they don’t have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn’t have an option, as the machinery doesn’t exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-132364/kenyas-soft-insurgency#sthash.kskNgJgJ.dpuf
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who’d been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party’s candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the ‘conditions’ of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government’s ambitious school computerization programme – not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
“LET THE AIRPORT BURN!”
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region’s main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they’d struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don’t support (some don’t even recognize) the Jubilee government as ‘theirs’. The attitude was, “Let it burn! Let them learn!” The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move – all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn’t seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto’s case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc… This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to ‘keep the peace’ and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don’t know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, “In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!” In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude “We need to show them” emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that ‘the Gikuyu are the problem’. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the ‘consequences’ of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of ‘the tyranny of numbers’, which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country – especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza – one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces – the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan’t be long before the Counties – which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a ‘cold war’ on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively ‘checked out’ and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can’t utter the words: “Rais Uhuru Kenyatta”. This ‘belligerent’ turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President’s backers with a similarly belligerent – “mta do?!”
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What’s clear is that they don’t have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn’t have an option, as the machinery doesn’t exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-132364/kenyas-soft-insurgency#sthash.kskNgJgJ.dpuf
Some
weeks ago a Cabinet Secretary tried to address belligerent mourners at a
funeral in Kisii and was shouted down even when forced to revert to his
native tongue in an attempt to calm them.
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who’d been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party’s candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the ‘conditions’ of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government’s ambitious school computerization programme – not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
“LET THE AIRPORT BURN!”
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region’s main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they’d struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don’t support (some don’t even recognize) the Jubilee government as ‘theirs’. The attitude was, “Let it burn! Let them learn!” The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move – all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn’t seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto’s case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc… This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to ‘keep the peace’ and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don’t know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, “In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!” In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude “We need to show them” emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that ‘the Gikuyu are the problem’. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the ‘consequences’ of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of ‘the tyranny of numbers’, which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country – especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza – one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces – the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan’t be long before the Counties – which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a ‘cold war’ on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively ‘checked out’ and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can’t utter the words: “Rais Uhuru Kenyatta”. This ‘belligerent’ turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President’s backers with a similarly belligerent – “mta do?!”
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What’s clear is that they don’t have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn’t have an option, as the machinery doesn’t exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-132364/kenyas-soft-insurgency#sthash.kskNgJgJ.dpuf
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who’d been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party’s candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the ‘conditions’ of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government’s ambitious school computerization programme – not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
“LET THE AIRPORT BURN!”
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region’s main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they’d struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don’t support (some don’t even recognize) the Jubilee government as ‘theirs’. The attitude was, “Let it burn! Let them learn!” The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move – all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn’t seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto’s case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc… This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to ‘keep the peace’ and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don’t know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, “In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!” In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude “We need to show them” emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that ‘the Gikuyu are the problem’. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the ‘consequences’ of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of ‘the tyranny of numbers’, which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country – especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza – one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces – the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan’t be long before the Counties – which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a ‘cold war’ on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively ‘checked out’ and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can’t utter the words: “Rais Uhuru Kenyatta”. This ‘belligerent’ turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President’s backers with a similarly belligerent – “mta do?!”
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What’s clear is that they don’t have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn’t have an option, as the machinery doesn’t exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-132364/kenyas-soft-insurgency#sthash.kskNgJgJ.dpuf
Some
weeks ago a Cabinet Secretary tried to address belligerent mourners at a
funeral in Kisii and was shouted down even when forced to revert to his
native tongue in an attempt to calm them.
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who’d been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party’s candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the ‘conditions’ of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government’s ambitious school computerization programme – not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
“LET THE AIRPORT BURN!”
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region’s main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they’d struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don’t support (some don’t even recognize) the Jubilee government as ‘theirs’. The attitude was, “Let it burn! Let them learn!” The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move – all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn’t seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto’s case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc… This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to ‘keep the peace’ and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don’t know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, “In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!” In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude “We need to show them” emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that ‘the Gikuyu are the problem’. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the ‘consequences’ of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of ‘the tyranny of numbers’, which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country – especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza – one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces – the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan’t be long before the Counties – which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a ‘cold war’ on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively ‘checked out’ and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can’t utter the words: “Rais Uhuru Kenyatta”. This ‘belligerent’ turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President’s backers with a similarly belligerent – “mta do?!”
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What’s clear is that they don’t have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn’t have an option, as the machinery doesn’t exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-132364/kenyas-soft-insurgency#sthash.kskNgJgJ.dpuf
Government officials who tried to address members of the Maasai community who’d been evicted from their homes in Naivasha met a similarly hostile reception and were forced to beat a hasty retreat. This was followed not long after by a by-election in Makueni in what was Eastern Province, where a CORD candidate who had campaigned for merely four days and won over 90 percent of the vote pulverized the ruling Jubilee party’s candidate.
All this transpired as the government and our Kenya National Union of Teachers (KNUT) went back and forth in an increasingly acrimonious negotiation over salaries. Eventually, it took the intervention of the Deputy President and President themselves to work out a solution which nevertheless left a bitter taste in the mouth when teachers realized the government had deducted the days they had been on strike from their July salaries.
This was eventually sorted out and the salaries paid in full in August. Curiously, one of the ‘conditions’ of the deal was that the teachers support the Jubilee government’s ambitious school computerization programme – not a sign of confidence.
I spent a week in Western Province recently. Mainly listening to groups of citizens of all ages as they analyzed their condition and the general Kenyan one as well. I was particularly keen on visiting friends in Bungoma and Trans Nzoia where episodes of criminality and violence against individuals and families had seemingly escalated dramatically since the election in March.
People I knew had lost their lives in the spate of insecurity that is ongoing to this day. Indeed, as I left a gang raided Kumukuywa Market in Bungoma North and killed one administration policeman and injured another. The officers were reportedly responding to calls for help by villagers who were under attack by the gang.
This violent incident was merely the latest of many since the election that have turned the lives of many Kenyans from Trans Nzoia, through Bungoma and into Busia Counties upside down. More than the violence itself and the succession of funerals it has caused, the apparent helplessness of the security forces in the face of it has been the most confusing and disconcerting. It has done much to undermine already low confidence in the security services and administration generally.
“LET THE AIRPORT BURN!”
Then a week and half ago the arrivals terminal of the region’s main transport hub, our Jomo Kenyatta International Airport (JKIA) burnt down. I was late in catching up with this shocking news. The fire happened on the anniversary of the terrorist attack on the US Embassy in Nairobi in 1998 so unsurprisingly initial speculation was that they’d struck again.
Such ideas were quickly set aside, however, as it became clear the cause may have been very domestic and the response hugely embarrassing in its ineptitude. What struck me, however, was when I raised the issue with individuals who don’t support (some don’t even recognize) the Jubilee government as ‘theirs’. The attitude was, “Let it burn! Let them learn!” The them here being very much the Jubilee administration and more specifically when pressed, them being Gikuyus first and Kalenjins second. This depth of polarization astounded me.
When the Ufundi Cooperative House collapsed as a result of the 1998 attack on the US Embassy I remember the way Kenyans rallied together in one of the most inspiring moments of national unity and pride in decades. Even President Moi, Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Charity Ngilu and Kijana Wamalwa temporarily set aside their political differences and in a tremendously shrewd and unifying move – all visited the site of the collapse together.
The current atmosphere most certainly doesn’t seem to allow for such episodes of nation-building displays of leadership. This should be of considerable concern to all of us all. This is especially the case, when one considers the fact that the divisive ICC process kicks off next month with the start of William Ruto’s case.
I was struck this week by the number of questions put to me about what this case would mean if it emerges that some of the over 40 witnesses the Chief Prosecutor has lined up against him are Gikuyu or Luo etc… This disconcerted quizzing is caused primarily by the fact that, in my opinion, in an effort to ‘keep the peace’ and play down the ICC cases as interrupters of national events, supporters of the President and Deputy President and elements of the media have played up the fact that with every witness who falls by the wayside, the cases will collapse.
So much so that in some parts of the country there are those who believe such a collapse to be inevitable. It may very well be. I don’t know. On the other hand it may very well not be the case. Then what? Similarly, with regard to the Makueni by-election, the comportment of area residents that I have spoken to changes immediately you gently enquire into why the community voted so overwhelmingly against the government; for it was more a vote against than for anybody or anything; it was a demonstration of feelings collectively and deeply held. One voter told me, “In Makueni we could have elected a dog as Senator to teach them a lesson!” In the same vein Kisii acquaintances I ask about the fate of government officials who found themselves on the receiving end of epithets at the funeral last month are more likely than not to respond saying the incident filled them with pride and satisfaction.
This attitude “We need to show them” emerges out of a narrative among many non-Gikuyus that ‘the Gikuyu are the problem’. Prior to the elections there was much talk of the ‘consequences’ of electing individuals who are defendants before the International Criminal Court (ICC) especially from the international community.
These have not materialized in a manner that Kenyans feel or take seriously. Indeed, the more profound consequences have emerged out of the toxic narrative of ‘the tyranny of numbers’, which essentially holds that the Gikuyu, Embu and Meru plus one other large community and a pliant electoral body have elections sown up in perpetuity.
A soft insurgency has grown out of this that has gained a currency so compelling that in entire swathes of the country – especially in Eastern, Western, Coast and Nyanza – one can ask if there exists in coherent form any legitimate and functional central authority in Kenya. For indeed, it is the central authority of the regime that has suffered the most dramatic attrition as a result of the accompanying process of devolution. Among the security services, one senses an almost existential discombobulation on the part of forces – the provincial administration and police in particular - that are at sea in this new order. It almost makes one conclude that it shan’t be long before the Counties – which are political units in which wananchi have most vested their ownership and legitimacy, make a robust claim to the provision of security at the County level too.
In some of these areas, Gikuyu traders have already started to complain of a ‘cold war’ on the business front, for example, with non-Gikuyu customers opting to take their business elsewhere.
Regimes whose legitimacy is questioned by certain communities and in certain parts of the country are not new to Kenya. During the Moi era, especially after the reintroduction of political pluralism, much of Central Province and other parts of the country inhabited by the Gikuyu community effectively ‘checked out’ and turned their backs to the regime. The provincial administration in these areas treaded carefully in the understanding that they were in politically hostile territory. A similar fate has befallen the Kenyatta presidency this time around. There are parts of the country where people can’t utter the words: “Rais Uhuru Kenyatta”. This ‘belligerent’ turning of backs to the administration is, however, received on the ground by the President’s backers with a similarly belligerent – “mta do?!”
UHURU HAS THE ANSWER
These two belligerent narratives are bound to clash. The ICC process may kick them off. What’s clear is that they don’t have a technical fix, only a political one. President Kenyatta has the instruments and wits to appreciate this and act on it. He really doesn’t have an option, as the machinery doesn’t exist to protect his tribesmen from opprobria directed against the most dispersed ethnic group in the country. It will be an exercise of managing the end of the post-colonial state that will be as messy as he and his advisors decide it should be.
- See more at: http://www.the-star.co.ke/news/article-132364/kenyas-soft-insurgency#sthash.kskNgJgJ.dpuf
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