The title of the human rights account of the 2007 post-election violence published by the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights (KNCHR),
‘On the brink of precipice’, aptly captured the gravity of the situation that our country faced at the time. Ten years later, it behoves us to reflect on this near apocalypse and its aftermath.
Reflecting on the political developments of the last ten years as we come to the end of a highly dramatic year, it is clear that Karl Marx was right when he noted that history repeats itself first time as a tragedy and the second time as a farce.
After the tragic and unfortunate loss of more than 1,000 lives and displacement of hundreds of thousands, our political leaders agreed to a mediated resolution to the crisis. This included establishment of a Grand Coalition Government and an agreement on deep reaching reforms including the adoption of a new Constitution. Underlying all these was the question of resolving economic and social injustices, real or perceived.
Two items had been predominant on the agenda at the time, anchored on the arguments of what might be termed the ‘intellectual left’ and the political patrons, devolution and a parliamentary system of government.
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These were projected as the panacea to the incessant governance crisis that the country faced. Devolution was anchored in the new Constitution adopted in 2010 but the parliamentary system of government did not make that far. Personal ambition and political games left us – by and large – where we had started.
As the 2013 election returned an unexpected result, it appeared that the ‘do-gooders’ had, in a sense, scored an own goal. In a truly ironical way, choices turned out to have consequences.
Fancy ideas, beautiful documents with catchy titles and catchy speeches are great – but they just won’t cut it. To put it simply, building a mud house requires a lot more than jumping up and down in a muddy puddle, even if that is what make the required mud. This was obvious in the 2013 election where advocacy encountered statecraft.
As the defeated party regrouped, the farcical part of our political drama started to unfold. Since then, our politics have turned into a theatre of the absurd, staging a political class riven by raw ambition for power at whatever cost.
The forest and the monkeys may have remained the same – but there are a lot more monkeys now. George Hegel was probably right when he observed that experience and history teach us that people never learn anything from history. What, pray tell, is one to make of a national discourse that swings from debating who amongst our leaders is more corrupt than others to their, often dubious, educational qualifications to their drunkenness.
All this while, we are being bombarded with what ought to be serious discourses about nationhood, secession, sovereignty of the people, and so on, that are never fully discussed, developed and dispensed with. The result: we constantly find ourselves on the edges of our seats and we’re often left gasping for breath. The reality has become stranger than fiction.
This is why, even when the year is at its end, it still feels like there’s still a much longer way to go.
It turns out that the opposition are hell-bent on continuing with the charade. Most disturbingly, to prove their ‘legitimacy deficit’ hypothesis.Attempting to move on will continue to feel like a herculean task, precisely because - as Francis Imbuga wrote - “When the madness of an entire nation disturbs a solitary mind, it is not enough to say the man is mad.” One needs the energy and the patience to do more.
But as I’ve argued before in this column, “we the people” are the safety valve. So, let’s bid 2017 adieu and welcome 2018 – and go back to the work of building our nation.
To play our critical role of citizenship of stating that we are happy to engage on how we can solve what problems our political elite have, but not at any cost. We have seen the tragedy and the farce continues to unfold.
Hegel, Marx’s associate, said that what we learn from history is that we do not learn from history. I doubt that we want to contemplate the meaning of this for now. Have a happy and hopeful 2018!
