So a new constitutions has been promulgated. Everyone is jubilant and the masses wait for their lives to change (for the better). But if u were expecting the partisan bickering to stop, tribalism to magically disappear from the public sphere, sorry the Messiah is still residing in heaven. The Bashir visit has re-invigorated PNU Vs ODM politics. Politicians have started to strategize for 2012, Governor's races etc. And the usual Gema against the rest of kenya match up is fully on, albeit less vociferous.
I really wish we could have an intelligent, thoughtful dialog that sheds a little more light on what is happening in this country. It is just too easy to lump Gema and the Kamba brothers together into some vast tribal conspiracy out to take over Kenya. We call them names and wring our hands because that does, in fact, seem to be their strategy. But what is the truth, really? Is it really a concerted effort on the part of all the monied class to wipe out the poor and middle classes? When and where are their secret meetings held? Is there really a cadre of evildoers bent on taking the powerless down? Did they actually go out and recruit chief justice Gicheu and Attorney General Amos Wako and the rest to hand down decisions in their favor? Are well-educated, thoughtful judges really that venal? If not, we need to try harder to find out what, besides money and tribal supremacy, drives them.
We have focused on what makes people without much money vote against their own best interests, and a lot of us have concluded it’s ignorance and institutionalized clan-ism, fed by a quasi media propaganda machine. What I’d like to know is what drives KTN and their ilk? Is it really just money or tribal alliance? I have to think that after a point it simply can’t be. How many top government positions, grabbed land, yachts, helicopters, and expensive cars can one person really keep track of? What really goes on in their minds? Can we ever find out if no one speaks with an authentic voice anymore? When have we last heard people on either ODM or PNU really speak from their hearts instead of in carefully calibrated sound bites? Can it be that if Kibaki or Raila did speak from his heart we would find he is truly Machiavellian, with a Hitlerian vision of a Kenya full of super kikuyu or luo men like him? If they really are megalomaniacs motivated to create a super tribe, then they ought to be exposed. If they aren't, can they please rationally and seriously rebut the arguments that reveal that so much of what they stand for is divisive not just economically but in every other way?
My hope is that this time round, the dreams of children from Garissa to Busia will not be dashed. That the blood shed for this second deliverance will not be wasted like it was in the years following 1963. I dream there will be a Kenya where the Police will respect the rights of individuals, where being a muslim does not carry with it the label of a terrorist and a somali will be as much a citizen as wanjiku of central.
So my friends, I have a dream or maybe I'm hallucinating!!
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