Let’s swiftly move on beyond The Hague

By ABABU NAMWAMBA
Posted  Saturday, April 9 2011 at 20:21

In Summary

• " We’re doomed if we don’t abandon greed, anger and pride ” Ababu

I watched live our six countrymen appear before the ICC in The Hague, and I must admit it was a most humbling experience.

Seeing the apprehension etched on their faces as they sat pensive in the Pre-Trial Chamber, I was saddened that because of inertia, poor judgement and petty politics, the opportunity to handle this matter here at home had been wasted.

We say in my profession that you’d rather set a thousand guilty men free than send a single innocent man to the gallows. And so I wish the six a fair trial.

Heart-rending

Ten thousand miles from The Hague, I beheld even more heart-rending images. Images of Bernard Ndege, wailing outside the house in Naivasha where his entire family of nine were burnt to a horrifying end.

Images of charred remains of the Kiambaa church fire victims. Images of innocent passengers pulled out of PSVs and hacked to death.

Images of police officers shooting dead unarmed young men. Images of IDPs languishing in sickening penury. Images of 1,133 dead and their disconsolate mothers, widows and orphans ... Images from hell.

Their pain, their thirst for truth, justice and closure remain palpable. I felt ashamed that we haven’t done much to heal the pain and quench that thirst. May justice be done.

Physically scarred

The harrowing post-election pogroms stained our national fabric indelibly, and left the motherland physically scarred and emotionally shattered.

But we seem to be forgetting the devastating lessons from that dark period, and are allowing forces of malevolence to creep back into our midst.

We continue to poison the atmosphere with searing political vitriol and inflammatory twaddle, too much heat and little light.

So, where exactly are we headed? After we have insulted each other, demonised our rivals and awoken the demons of ethnic passions. After scoring cheap political goals and squeezing some miserable political mileage from this reckless posturing. After we defeat justice and fix our real or imaginary foes.

What then? What kind of country will we be left with? What heritage will we bequeath our children?

Yogi Berra warns that you got to be careful if you don’t know where you are going, because you might not get there! As we fight like the proverbial cats of Kilkenny, do we really know our destination?

No problem can be solved from the same consciousness that created it. That is why we are doomed if we do not abandon the path of suspicion, greed, anger, pride and prejudice that led us to the gates of hell in 2008.

As the country boiled in the cocktail of our collective vices, neither our tribes nor our political affiliations could save 1,113 of us from being butchered, thousands from being uprooted from their homes and billions worth of property from being wasted.

Why is it so hard for us to change our ways? Could we be possessed by malevolent demons that have turned us into sadists that draw beastly pleasure from the suffering of others?

Martin Luther King taught that the ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.

This is the time for true leaders to stand up and end the reckless spiral masquerading as political competition.

Let us consider these three options. One, we should declare a 30-day national political truce and freeze all rallies, press conferences and other avenues of inflaming passions.

The media would be useful here by blacking out news that breaks this armistice, while religious leaders would help by offering real healing prayers instead of hypocritical political noises.

State of the Nation

Two, we need to get leaders talking with and not at each other. I challenge any one of Mwai Kibaki, Raila Odinga, Uhuru Kenyatta, Kalonzo Musyoka, Martha Karua or William Ruto to take the initiative of inviting the rest for a candid chat on the State of the Nation, to break the ice.

Three, we should start the long walk towards national healing. And I don’t mean empty rhetoric. I mean concrete measures like the Rwandan/South African mechanisms of getting to the truth, taking responsibility, facilitating forgiveness and respecting the cause of justice.

ababumtumwa@yahoo.com