As the days go by, it becomes clear that this country needs a solution and a savior from all that is wrong in terms of socio-economic and other kinds of injustices that continue to be visited on the citizens of this once noble country.
One could go on and on about what is ailing this nation and which we all know about, but conveniently choose to ignore because we don’t want to take the first step in setting the situation right since we have all been brow beaten to docility.
The minority continues to suppress and enrich themselves at the expense of the majority as the latter sits back and just watches as a once thriving nation gets plundered day by day. The grain stores have been swept clean. Oil reserves are being shared amongst the well connected. Government forests are being sold to individuals. Public utility land has been turned into private property.
Basically the entire country has been shared between the minority who constitute only 1/3 of the entire population and who continue to manipulate the constitution of this country to suit their corrupt minds and needs. They’ve played the electorate on strings like puppets, every five years. They bribe, coax, threaten and even kill to achieve their ends. They control what we eat, they decide who should live and where they should live, who deserves to live and who has no place in this world. They have turned themselves into demy-gods.
About two years ago the world witnessed acts of genocide that were instigated, funded and unleashed on innocent people that had nothing to do with ,“ stolen elections” as claimed by the political elite, dissatisfied with the outcome of the aforesaid elections. People were murdered, others were maimed as most were displaced and traumatized for life. Men were beheaded, shot and burnt alive as were the women who did not escape the agony of being raped by gangs of brainwashed militia. Children were not spared either.
As all this was going on, the instigators were haggling over who is supposed to have won the elections, and who stole whose votes. They shamelessly dined and wined as the common Mwananchi was being slaughtered out in the streets. They threw vitriol at each other while fueling the violence against innocent men and women.
It was genocide cleverly disguised as unrest sparked off by anger at a certain community from which the President whose election victory was being disputed comes. Whether votes were stolen or there was wholesale rigging, didn’t warrant the kind of atrocities that were later witnessed for close to two months on innocent people whose crime was to cast their votes on the morning of 28th December 2007.
There was speculation that the genocide (political violence as they called it) was sparked off by they apparent discontent from the election results, but contrary to that we all know that this was a plot to eliminate a certain community and that the same plot had been hatched over a period of several years. It was not spontaneous as they the politicians try to justify.
And after the fires had died down, the blood had stopped flowing in the streets and farms, the tears partially dried up, it was the common man who was left counting the loses as the politicians and the politically correct awarded themselves positions and prizes in what they called a grand coalition government that was meant to get people, angry at each other, talking and look for a lasting solution to a problem that returns to haunt this country every five years.
Two years down the line, the grand coalition government has done nothing but help protect the interests of the corrupt, murdering politicians, who form part of the minority and help cement their senior status in society. They the political class, continue to plunder the resources with impunity as they seem to be above the common mans law which is what it is. The common mans law to which the political class and their cronies seem to be immune. They are above prosecution.
More often than not we see the prosecutorial department of government, being arm twisted into calling off investigations carried out on certain politicians when they (politicians) retreat into tribal cocoons shouting persecution of whatever particular tribe they come from. The politicians seem to have this secret arrangement, “shield me now and I’ll do the same for you later”.
ANGLO LEASING, GOLDENBERG, GRAND REGENCY, MAIZE, TRITON and a myriad of other scams and scandals have all been investigated and the culprits mentioned but none prosecuted. Simple reason being that its the untouchables that have been involved in all the above mentioned deals that have seen the tax payer loose billions of shillings to the same gang of white collar gangsters.
All the while, the common man is dying of starvation, crime and disease.
Its high time we the electorate that has been shortchanged for too long rise up and demand our country back from this bunch of gangsters, murderers ,tribal chiefs, conmen and land-grabbers masquerading as leaders. The nation must rise-up against this collection of people who are the epitome of greed, selfishness and total disregard for the welfare of the citizens of this nation as demonstrated by their actions over several decades and witnessed by the whole world.
We must all rise above the petty tribal differences that have been brought to us by the same politicians that still continue to make hate speeches in the full glare of the media cameras, and without a care in the world as to what their statements could be misconstrued to mean. Tribal alliances must be shunned completely if we as a nation are to survive the imminent chaos that would befall this nation when the coalition collapses as it is bound to.
During the Nuremberg trials after the second world war, one of the main architects of the Nazi empire Herman Goering was quoted as having said, “"Naturally, the common people don't want war......., but after all it is the leaders of a country who determine the policy, and its always a simple
matter to drag the people along whether its a democracy, or a fascist
dictatorship, or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship...... voice or no
voice, the people can always be brought to the bidding of the leaders.
That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked,
and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the
country to danger. It works the same in every country."
We must choose between protecting people who have used the electorate time and again as their stepping stones towards attaining power and wealth, and safeguarding our lives and the future of our children regardless of ethnicity, religion, color and age. We must ignore propaganda constructed to divide us on tribal lines. We must resist attempts to be bought off. We must ignore the threats as just that. They will come with all manner of empty promises as they have always done, but we have all grown wiser and ought to be wary of these enticements.
As it is, the Grand Coalition as they call it is on its deathbed trying to take its last breath and it is upon us the millions of ordinary citizens to decide what direction this country takes for the sake of our children and generations to come. We need to take back our country from the few individuals that have taken this country as their personal property and divided it among themselves, by way of instigating and funding violence.
We the humble, hardworking citizens of this beautiful nation
In order to correct all that is wrong, and get this country moving in the right direction again, we must ask this imitation of a government to step aside and pave way for elections that will be free and fair. We must put pressure on them to dissolve this joke that has already become stale. They must leave office peacefully, go back to the electorate and seek for a fresh mandate which will be most unlikely, given their past record.
This will preempt a situation where the nation becomes a danger to itself, as is ours, for at some point we can see this, as a nation waiting to tear itself apart. Its seams are already stretched to breaking point. We need to come together as a society wronged by a few and set the record straight for posterity, and the only way to do this is by invoking Satyagraha upon ourselves.
Satyagraha means vindication of truth. Not by infliction of pain on the opponent but on oneself. It means denying one self all the pleasures and luxuries of life to attract attention. It means not going to work, not paying taxes in order to be heard. It means not attending state functions and gatherings in order to be listened to. It means pulling our children out of schools. It means boycotting public transport. It means staying at home for a certain period of time. In short it means Civil Disobedience by peaceful means.
While practicing Satyagraha, one is supposed to reflect on ones life, pray to ones God for strength and guidance as well as the will to persevere all that comes in ones way. It’s a non-violent protest cum refusal to obey laws that have been found to be unjust, as it is the right of any individual to refuse to obey any law that is found wanting. As is the case in this country there are laws that have been made for the different classes of people that are the population of this nation.
It is time to prevail upon the ruling class to leave and let other fresh uncorrupted minds lead this nation out of the quagmire that is the life we lead today. It is a life of poverty, crime, disease that the bigger per cent age of the population live in day in day out. They (corrupt ruling class) must be persuaded to let go of the reigns of power albeit by peaceful means,” Satyagraha”.
JF Kennedy once said, “Each time a person stands up for an ideal,
or acts to improve the lot of others or strikes out against injustice, he or she sends forth a tiny ripple of hope. Crossing each other from a million different center of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.”
When an individual embraces the tenets of Satyagraha, believes in them and lives them to the full thereafter spreading the word, it slowly builds itself into a life force to reckon with as the powers that be, fall into a dilemma on how to curb the movement that with time gathers momentum and becomes an entity with a life of its own.
Satyagraha is the only way to make the ruling elite cede power and call for fresh elections before they can plot another round of violence due to the predicament they have found themselves after His Excellency Koffi Annan handed over the envelope with names of persons implicated in post election violence to the ICC prosecutor.
Gitau Warigi, a news editor with one of the local dailies reckons “It is the worship of sovereignty that has given free reign to impunity. It is this, in fact that has bred indifference to human rights and, fostered corruption and nurtured the homegrown warlords that we must destroy. What’s the point of being sovereign when we can’t even bring to account the criminals in our political class plus their foot soldiers? Who needs this kind of sovereignty anyway?”
The rest of the world laugh in our faces at our apparent ineptness to confront what is wrong and correct it. We, the citizens of
We also need to go a notch hire and let them know we aren’t their pawns any more. We need to hasten change or otherwise we shall be left behind by the rest of the world if we let the current political class rule for another five years. We need to uproot the foundations of social, political and economic injustices that have been wielded on the hardworking citizenry of this wonderful and beautiful country. We need a complete change in mind and deed. We need to discard Tribal ideologies that are preached by our leaders’ day in day out. Most of us in this day in time have grown up in a cosmopolitan society, that does not recognize where and which tribe one comes from , but goes on to recognize ones capabilities in education, business, technology, arts and sports.
It is with this thought in mind that we must reflect on the wrongs in our society today and blame them squarely on the political ruling class, thereupon we must demand change by peaceful means, Satyagraha.
Authored by Andrew Njoroge
