Raila & The KKK Don't Care About NEP: They're Political Opportunists

  Raila came to Garissa today and as usual offered nothing more than the typical vitriolic bluster that he spews everywhere he goes. What was supposed to be a political rally soon devolved into partisan bickering, ad hominem attacks and subpar vitendawilis. I think he didn't get the memo on our disregard for vapid hollow statements that are not followed by tangible action.

 Any individual with a triple digit IQ knows that neither Raila nor The KKK care about the legitimate needs and interests of Somali Kenyans (Nepians). Both are self serving political vampires mainly interested in gaining political leverage in our city and region through proxies (our MPs). Our lives have been made all the more miserable by a Government that is propped  up by ODM as the price for 'peace'. They did not deliver half the change they promised us in 2007. The fake under funded ministry they setup has failed to alleviate the human tragedy that is gripping Northern Kenya today. In short, they are all double faced liars and snake oil salesmen.

Raila like Uhuru, Kalonzo & Ruto presided over the arrest, rendition and torture of innocent Muslims. His partly owned government still refuses to buy our livestock while it buys bad maize grown in Central and Trans-Nzoia to save their tribesmen from losses. Its only in Garissa where policemen can, in broad daylight, rob you of your hard earned wealth and usurp your business. Its only in NEP where you can be arrested and beaten for not carrying your ID with you as was the case during the colonial era. Raila just like the rest of them stands for the continuation of these racist policies. His duplicity and  inconsistency with regards to the rights of Somali-Kenyans is well documented.

 What was missing from the Rally? For one there was no substantiative policy discussion, there were no overtures made to our region and none of our complaints (ID issuance, police harrassment, systemic marginalization) were addressed. We only saw our MPs capitulating to a Luo overlord who offered no vision just vile personal attacks. Now don't get me wrong, I despise Ruto and all those who agree with his ethnocentric politics equally, I just don't see how telling us that 'Uhuru is a bhang addict'solves any of our problems.

 All those who attended today's rally to applaud Raila's prejudices and listened while he fanned the flames of hatred are not any better than those trained seals that beat the drums for the flip-side of this coin, The KKK.
Finally, any of you retarded tribalists that may think I have a vested interest in any of the issues discussed above, I do not. I just want to see my people wake up from this coma.

Its time Dualle, Farah Maalim and the rest of our political class stopped being subservient to vivisectional foreign interests. They should form their very own political movement and prudently chose who to support in the General election, if they do not wish to field their own Presidential candidate. The current divisions will lead to another tribal bloodshed in Garissa. The government has had its Jackboot on our throats for 47 years, time to vote for our own president!

Oh, those who jeered and heckled speakers were just classless goons-for- hire deployed by our so called MPs.
Here is a video of their visit to Marsabit on Monday;

Our Shameful Culture of Fatalism

  Something my friend and I discussed earlier this week has been gnawing at my mind for quite sometime now.Its the question any restless Somali youngster asks himself : Why is it that we Somalis are so tolerant of failure, so willing to buy into the concept predestination and so unwilling to free ourselves from the "Inshallah mentality" knowing very well that Allah said in the Qur'an "Inallaha la yughayiru mabiqawmin xataa yughayiruu ma' bi'afunsihim" (Allah does not change the predicament of a society unless the change is organically cultivated from within themselves).

 Our culture has become so steeped in destinism. An ingrained culture of fatalism has convinced most of us that standing up for our rights is not worth the risk because our efforts are inconsequential. We accept to be abused, set up ourselves for disappointment, for second class citizenship because we are made to believe that all our efforts will have zero public impact. None of us are willing to demand that the barrier at River Tana bridge be moved to the border because it has become culturally acceptable to tolerate humiliation at the hands of the Police. No one at 'Suuq Mugdi' thinks its better if they organized themselves and cleaned their place of business as a collective group instead of waiting for our blood-sucking Councillors. Everyone is waiting for a non-existent nanny state to change us because we are afraid of changing ourselves. No one is willing to ask where our CDF money went or why our public schools are so behind the rest of the nation.

 In Garissa and the entire Nep region, we have to confront this apathy that plagues us. We must realise that philistinism, lassitude and destinationism are deadly weapons capable of doing quantum amounts of  damage to our psyche than any marginalization by the state.

I do not wish to be simplistic or even sound facile in my diagnosis of NEP's problems by laying all the blame on our footsteps because its absolutely true that consecutive regimes have oppressed us and that may have made us become psychologically captive to the condition I have addressed earlier but that shouldn't be an excuse for the continuation of that debilitating state.

 We Somalis have a proud culture that holds individual achievement in high regard. Our nomadic culture glorified bravery and personal risk for the good of all. Social justice was not only a defining ingredient of what it meant to be a Somali, it was also an article of faith. We need to go back to those roots. We need to transcend the petty divisions that characterize politics in NEP. If there is anyone capable of achieving that fete, its us; the youngsters, the new generation of leaders.

This is not our destiny. Second class citizenship is not our birthright.

Lessons From Tunisia

 You can imagine conversations around dinner tables in the Middle East and much of Sub-Saharan Africa are rife with speculation on what the revolution in Tunisia means for the strongmen that have had an unrelenting hold on power for decades. The hallmarks of a great revolutions is that once the masses rise up against repression, what formerly seemed like insurmountable peaks turn to pedestrian plateaus. Revolutions normally have a domino effect in surrounding areas once people get to see their collective power. Whatever delusions African 'supermen' have had of endless elitist rule is surely bust and now capitals from Cairo to San'aa are certainly bracing themselves for similar events should reform not materialize.

 The parallels between NEP and Tunis is sufficiently impressing. Our educated, unemployed youth should learn that rising up against the existing entrenched political aristocracy is winnable. I hope we all take away the important lesson that no amount of marginalization and political repression can suppress our desire for a more meritocratic and equitable government.

 More than anything else, the young men and women of NEP, Kenya and Somalia need to vigorously question authority and not accept their position at the bottom of the heap as part of the natural order of life. It maybe hard to live in Garissa and Mandera today but it shouldn't be acceptable to live life without learning the enduring value of human dignity and the rights of people pursue their dreams. If it takes protests, civil disobedience, elections or community organizing to overthrow the decadent current system then we should agitate for that sooner rather than later.

Beautiful Horn of Africa: Garissa: The Largest City Between Nairobi and Mogadishu

Beautiful Horn of Africa: Garissa: The Largest City Between Nairobi and Mogadishu

By Adan Makina (cleanthehorn.com)

The City of Garissa in Kenya’s North Eastern Province (NEP) has been on the top list of the most peaceful cities in East and Central Africa for over twenty years. It is the provincial headquarter of NEP as well as the administrative center for Garissa District. Named after a riverine local Pokomo elder or farmer called Karisa, Garissa became a recognized settlement in 1936. Majority of the inhabitants of Garissa are ethnic Somalis. Besides subsistence and small scale farming and local business initiatives by urbanites, livestock raring remains the major sustainer of the region’s economy. From 1963 when Kenya became a sovereign republic until the late eighties, the region suffered tremendous insecurity resulting from recurring banditry, poaching, and cattle-rustling.

However, according to Kenya government figures, Garissa District has continuously for years recorded the highest concentration of livestock in East and Central Africa. Traders in Garissa get their surplus livestock from Somalia’s southern regions consequently making Garissa a haven for livestock merchants primarily between the months of January and April when the volume of cattle substantially increases. Cattle trading in Garissa attract traders from as far as Machakos, Nairobi, Nyeri, Mombasa and other coastal towns during this time of the year consequently transforming the city into a beehive of activity. Despite generating enough revenue from the taxation of cattle sales, Garissa city has lagged behind other cities of Kenya in all aspects of development. The district’s markets in southern Somalia include Baidoa, Dinsor, Qorioley, Jowhar, Afgoi, Salagle, Bardhere and Afmadow, among others. However, anecdotal evidence suggests that 60-80% of livestock in Garissa originate from the Somali region in Ethiopia, Somalia, and other divisions with NEP.

In the past, the district experienced remarkable government involvement after health concerns related to the epidemiological outbreaks of Rinderpest (cattle plague or steppe murrain) and other devastating foot and mouth diseases necessitated in the enforcement of veterinary regulations, consequently and at times, leading to closure of cattle markets.

Despite being the major supplier of beef to major cities in Kenya and to as far as Tanzania and despite being the largest city between Nairobi and Mogadishu, Garissa greets its visitors with grim reality. With the exception of a teachers’ training college and one Islamic school founded by mindful businessmen and overseas-based organizations, the city has no university; it has no feasible infrastructure; the only visible tarmac located in the city center measures a few kilometers; its dusty potholed streets transform into lakes during rainy seasons; the municipality and the city council have no refuse collection systems in place thus making inhabitants susceptible to waterborne and airborne diseases; it has no manufacturing industries; unemployment is rife; drug addiction among the youth continues to skyrocket; poverty, beggary, and street children remain an eyesore and a social menace, and worst of all poor land allocation strategies riddled with corruption has been the major cause of civil skirmishes among the tribal-minded inhabitants resulting in government application of emergency laws such as extended curfews and deployment of the dreaded General Service Unit (GSU) together with the rapid Deployment Unit (RDU) to quell disturbances.

The city has a long history of election rigging; harassment of electors and opposition groups is common-dirty tricks and techniques inherited from past fallen autocratic regimes. Just like their cousins across the border, Somalis in Garissa and other parts of NEP have over and over again championed clan domineering approaches by unconventional means especially by rampant warring and ethnic animosities. Reminiscent of Somalia’s “Guulwadeyaasha” or revolutionary youth during the military junta, Kenyatta and Moi era governments relied on a force that recklessly represented the Kenya African National Union (KANU) Party-a consortium of embellished, underfunded youth wingers whose arguments rested on the just war doctrine of “kill or be killed”. Such political plunders ensured the uninterrupted reclamation of political structure and extension of inheritance for the old guards.

The trouncing of Moi’s single-party regime and the birth of multiparty democracy in 1992 did little to alter the pervasiveness of past odious events. In fact it exacerbated the political scenario when new contestants found their ambitions obstructed by the same old guards who jumped on the bandwagon using the same old tricks inherited from their past masters of deception.

The district has suffered poor county and parliamentary representation since Kenya’s attainment of independence in 1963. The reason the region is underperforming is due to the government's discriminatory practices of allocating resources, unfair distribution of wealth, outright marginalization of the people who inhabit the land, and diversion of funds earmarked for the region to other more prosperous regions.

Ironically, because of their adroitness at accumulating wealth, majority of the region’s uneducated councilors and parliamentarians have promoted their self-esteem and thus harbor elitist mentality such that even those who bowed out of politics remain a force to reckon with. These men have the power to imprison, kill or regain one’s freedom. While the poor suffer dental decay due to unhygienic eating habits coupled with shortage of dentists, the uneducated honorable parliamentarian or councilor displays sparkling white teeth because of abundance of money at his disposal. For a long time, stealing from state treasury has been a hallmark of African politics and Kenya, because of its corruption ranking profile, is no exception.

The Offspring of a Snake is a Snake
The above phrase is a translation of the Kiswahili saying “mtoto wa nyoka ni nyoka”. It has been used by corrupt Kenya leaders as a rallying cry to provoke non-Somalis to hate and oppress Kenya-Somalis. The saying inspired Kenya leaders after the succession of past Somali governments instigated political irredentism and supported the repossession of what used to be the Northern Frontier District (NFD) from the Republic of Kenya. This idiomatic expression and phraseologically provocative aphorism applied to almost every Kenyan-Somali and that its widespread use slackened only after the collapse of the Somali central government in 1991. The bitter territorial dispute that kicked-off between Kenya and Somalia in the 60s has gone down in history as the “Shifta War”. The word Shifta (or “shufta”) implies a bandit, outlaw, or rebel. The name became an allusion and nom de guerre for every Kenyan-Somali regardless of whether one was a law-abiding citizen or a contextually sadistic law-breaking criminal.
Thus, Kenya-Somalis saw themselves wedged between two diametrically opposed forces with profound conflicting ideologies-one a civilian authoritarian government (Kenya) with western inclinations and a dictatorial regime (Somalia) -espousing a plethora of political dimensions.

Thousands of families lacking guidance or controlling force or influence crossed the border into Somalia to escape rampant hostilities on the Kenya side. Leaders of the Northern Province People’s Progressive Party (NPPP) incorporated Somalis of diverse clans, Borana, Rendille, and others.

For decades, Garissa had been under the radar of Kenya security and intelligence agencies primarily because the region was under martial law decreed immediately after Kenya’s proclamation of independence. Besides the insecurity that came with the shifta menace, widespread illegal poaching by Somalis scavenging for better living conditions decimated-if not-drastically reduced wildlife concentration in Kenya’s internationally-acclaimed national parks and game reserves. Besides the hazards of wildlife plundering, poachers stealthily brought with them dangerous small arms that endangered the lives of government game wardens whose task implied the protection of wild game and the preservation of Kenya’s vigorous tourist industry. Since independence and till this day, tourism has been a cornerstone and sustainer of Kenya’s economy. The best the Kenya government can do for the moment and in the future is to fully integrate Kenya-Somalis and give them a share of the national cake.

Business Daily: �- Northern Kenya deserves attention

Ibrahim Mwathane


Northern Kenya deserves attention



Please look out and tell me what you see below,” I asked my Burundian friend as we entered Kenyan airspace from a Trans-Atlantic journey.

“Nothing. Just darkness”, she said.

“That’s the northern part of my country. Looks like it’s uninhabited, doesn’t it, compared to what we saw while overflying America and Europe at night. Yet it forms a major part of my country”, I told her.

As if to vindicate, the space below suddenly lit up as we approached Nakuru and proceeded through Naivasha to Nairobi.

The neat darkness was gone. Rather humbling. This undeveloped North challenges our national economy and business enterprise.

After six years, I returned to Garissa, provincial town, Northern Kenya. End of tarmac. To Isiolo, Wajir and Mandera is a very rough road.

And the many extras we take for granted out here in “ developed Kenya” are scant.

I for instance remember newspaper vendors bursting into laughter when I asked for a newspaper at about 12 noon.

“Not yet arrived”, they told me.

Six years back, they’d just shaken their heads, amused and in disbelief when I made a similar request at about 8 am.

I thought things must have improved. Not at all. Residents read rather stale news here.

Challenges in aspects like entertainment, accommodation and travel are galore.

Yet Garissa, compared to the wider arid North, is modern and well connected to “Kenya”.

But in many aspects, the town is fighting back admirably. It’s growing. The skyline, given what I had seen earlier, has changed.

New and higher commercial buildings have come up.

And numerous modern residential units have mushroomed all around.

Garissa will soon force itself to national attention.

But we need to be more proactive about its growth and its central role.

We must remember that it provides co-ordination and entry to the rather “dark North”, the Kenya we need to reclaim.

Reminds me of the book, “Confessions of an Economic Hit Man”, where author John Perkins observes how in the ‘70s , America helped to transform the desert Oil Kingdom of Saudi Arabia into a modern Industrialised Nation.

Through massive investments of capital and technology, shopping malls, housing complexes, hospitals, water and sewerage, communication, electrical and transport networks replaced the once archaic systems of the Kingdom.

Of course, the take for America too was immense. But the lesson here is that our arid North can be turned around.

If America, limited by distance and language, could achieve such a feat in under a decade, what about us?

With a common language, fairly short distances and compelling national reasons, we should transform our North.

That is why the President’s Madaraka Day speech indicating that feasibility studies are on going for a railway network to connect the Indian Ocean port of Lamu to Isiolo and Juba in Southern Sudan with a link from Isiolo to Moyale to connect Ethiopia to promote tourism, trade and investments must be lauded.

These plans should incorporate modern highways and an oil pipeline alongside.

And Garissa must be connected too. It is gratifying to note that the Vision 2030 sectoral plan for Lands 2008-2012 incorporates plans to source land for this important transport corridor.

The recent pronouncement allocating Sh4.2 billion for the development of roads to open up Isiolo as a Resort City by the Finance Minister in the 2010/11 budget also aligns well to developing Northern Kenya.

Those keen on tapping the latent business opportunities from irrigation agriculture, livestock production, real estate, the provision of service infrastructure and oil exploration in this area must therefore gear up early.

Makes good business sense.