Yes, the trouble with us is political dishonesty

The most profound lesson for our children and future leaders from US President Barack Obama is that you can be both powerful and graciously unassuming.

I watched the most powerful man perched on a high stool – the kind we have at my local – and engage civil society members in a candid talk that reminds you of a brainstorming session at a blue-chip boardroom or an Ivy League academy.

It is the kind of thing that works today, engaging with everyone, including the perceived ‘trouble-makers’ and appendages of the ‘meat-wrapping’ industry. But what I liked most was that the man refused to pander to partisan interests of either side of our political divide.

A week before his visit, Jubilee noise-makers on social media were all sovereign and independent, and going on interminably about Kenyans’ capability to rule their own destiny. The Opposition, on the other hand, had even started believing the comical theory that there was tension over what they would tell Obama. Really!

Until the man came and gave them all a balanced and brutally honest analysis of who we are. First, we are an intolerant polity where freedom of the Press and speech is largely curtailed. While I agree freedom comes with responsibility, my thesis is that the Jubilee government has not acquitted itself well on media freedom. Look at the laws that have been pushed that affect the media by Parliament. Do they point to respect for the role of a free press in a democracy? Search me!

Then came the shocker for the Opposition. Unlike the first time Obama came to Kenya to a low-profile reception – when he could only have relied on the information from those who chaperoned around – this time he came as US President. Which means he did not need facts from either the Government or the Opposition. Neither did he rely on the civil society, and its alleged penchant for taking partisan positions. Anyhow, Obama this time had at his disposal the best intelligence network in the world, second perhaps only to Israel’s Mossad.

All he needed to do was ask the CIA director to get him a report on governance in Kenya and the way forward and the guy would just ask: “How many pages, sir?” To the Jubilee government, skewed distribution of the national cake, lack of inclusiveness in dishing out opportunities, intolerance to a free media and civil society were as obvious to him as they should have been in any objective analysis.

To the Opposition, the blunt message was that not everyone buys the lie that anyone who is in the Opposition is a reformer. It captured succinctly what has all along been as plain as a pikestaff in our politics; that we have a frightening culture of intolerance where we decide who is good or bad based on which side they are, and not their actions. In this highly divisive culture, whoever is not with us is evil. Period!

So much that if today you are the greediest thief in government, all you need to do is cross over to the Opposition and from then on you are a ‘reformer’ who will be defended as such. The converse is also true. If you are an honest and patriotic civil society or Opposition leader who points out excesses in a government, you are branded a troublemaker out to derail “development”. The only story the government wants to hear is that all is okay, even as Auditor General Edward Ouko says we misused a whopping Sh450 billion just last year! Development and patriotism indeed!

Then there are the pseudo-human rights activists who may go to any lengths – including violating animal rights and instigating violence – before you see their political ambitions plastered on boda boda reflector jackets in the city. It is this culture of dishonesty that leaves us with no clear heroes, as we believe the lies of ‘our side’ on who is a ‘reformer’ or ‘enemy of development’. Of course I don’t believe everything Obama says, as he serves his country’s interests. But on the dishonesty that our politicians peddle as truth, he hit the damn nail on the head!

The writer is a Revise Editor for The Standard