Lang’ata pupils taught us a lesson in courage when they brought down wall

There is one lesson that Kenyans should learn from the Lang’ata Primary School incident. And this is: our children are aware of what is going in Kenya, including corruption and who are involved.

The only difference before Lang’ata happened is that the children had not collectively experienced the effect of corruption on their day to day life at school.

Look at it this way. A child is at home during the holidays. He is watching TV and reading newspapers. Quite often he hears mum and dad talking about corruption at the workplace or on the way to work.

That kind of conversation is held so often that the child begins wondering why the parents don’t do anything about it. Finally he hears on TV that his school playground has been grabbed.

When he goes back he will have nowhere to play with his fellow schoolmates. Again corruption is blamed on TV, radio, newspapers and by the gossipers on the streets who he encounters on the way as he goes to buy bread for mum from the kiosk.

The children begin to call each other on their mobile phones. “ Wanjiku, have you heard?” “Heard what?” retorts Wanjiku. “That our playground has been taken away from us” he replies. “Taken away?” Wanjiku asks. “Yes taken away!” “Tabu you are behind the news: it has been grabbed, stolen, nyakuad!” asserts Wanjiku. “By who?” “I don’t know. Ask the government.”

For days the question “by who” dominates the media. It is on the lips of all the gossipers on the way to the kiosk. Tabu begins wondering why the government, this very powerful and awesome creature, cannot solve this problem. Everybody, including the government, is behaving like his parents. When he next calls Wanjiku, he has a brilliant idea. When they go back to school they must demonstrate; at least that is what Okiya Omtata does all the time he is angry about corruption.

“You know what Wanjiku?” he calls his friend: “We must demonstrate the very first day we get back to school.” “How shall we do that?” Wanjiku asks. “Like everybody else does: carry twigs, placards, debes....you name it. And march and shout at the top of our voices around the school and at the gate.” “I have an even better idea: we go to the wall and bring it down by force. We can do it: we have the numbers. We can use the tyranny of our numbers,” Wanjiku confirms with some authority.

“That’s good. Now let us think of the slogans. What shall we say as we march and bring down the wall?” asks Tabu. “I have been putting down a few ideas. Here is one: hatutaki laptop: tunataka play field!” Wanjiku announces. “That’s beautiful! How about this: hatutaki grabbing: tunataka netball!” “Let’s get some crayons and write placards. Let’s call all our friends to share the idea, learn the slogans and write placards. We shall carry them with us to school. Our paros don’t need to know about this?” “ And the teachers?” inquires Tabu. “Forget about them: who cares about that bunch, crying for their salaries everyday to the government and nothing happens”.

Since Lang’ata happened there have been litanies of complaints how the teachers let their pupils engage in such a dangerous demonstration where the wall could have killed one of them. My response is: go tell it to the birds. The pupils can plan their activities even much better than their parents, teachers and all the walalahais now pretending to wail better than Rahab even before a single one of their child loses a life due to the iniquities in our society.

The police, of course, were fools: but they were doing the bidding of their masters who have agonised for days to concoct a tale of who the grabber is. Another piece of truth: no Kenyan, let alone the children of Lang’ata, believes that a bunch of Asians could have caused that mayhem and remained unknown for days.

The more likely story is that, even if the Singhs and Prakashes have some document in their name claiming ownership of that piece of the earth, they must have been at an advanced process of selling it to some powerful individual who could order the police to do what they did. The children will still ask: who is this fellow. As usual, the government will continue to be economical with the truth: putting it politely!

I have a slogan for the children of Lang’ata: “hatutaki uongo; tunataka ukweli!”

The children were not used by anybody. Being used by someone else is what the Kanu government used to accuse us of at the university in the seventies when we called for democracy in Kenya. And we were adults for God’s sake. But there is a way in which absolute power, and those who benefit from it or hope then can benefit from it, believe that what they are doing is right, however much it hurts society. No. You can’t simply tell them they are wrong: you must be deranged or you are being taught what to say by some awesome power you hold in enormous regard. So the apologists likewise claim that the children could not have done what they did without some wicked civil society activists poisoning their minds. Add the Opposition to this claim then you find the plot of apology thickening.

This is like what happened in Soweto in 1976 which initiated the final intense struggle against the apartheid regime in South Africa. Apartheid became real to the school children in Soweto when its effects were brought right into their classrooms: they were being forced to learn Afrikaans as a basic requirement in advancement in education. Just think about it: the master telling you to earn his language so that you can get it clearly from him when orders are issued about your own oppression. In the case of Lang’ata: the children were to forget about playing games as part and parcel of their education. They would have been totally stupid if they did not rebel on the first day of school against this oppression. They did it in style: brought the walk down.

Walls falling have been a great symbol in history. The Berlin Wall fell in 1989 and marked the beginnings of democratisation processes in Eastern Europe and beyond. Now, of course, you will remember Joshua and the battle of Jericho when the walls came tumbling down.

There are many such walls in Kenya enclosing grabbed land or land anticipating being grabbed as people are made to believe that “an investor” is just about to do wonders there. Let us follow in the footsteps of the Lang’ata children and bring these walls down. But more menacing are the walls of fear that we have erected around ourselves believing that the corrupt are so powerful there is little we can do about it. After all, so the saying goes, every Kenyan is corrupt! That, again, is balderdash: hatutaki uongo: tanataka unweli.