Mere Talks Will Not Stop Chaos
If Kenya’s National Intelligence Security Service is to be believed, last week’s massacres in Tana Delta, Mandera and Wajir where close to 70 innocent Kenyans were massacred and homes torched, were planned operations funded by politicians and executed by local government officers.
The killings are reminiscent of the tragedy that befell those who had sought sanctuary in the Kiambaa church in Eldoret during the 2007 post election violence. Suspects for the violence are due to face justice at the ICC in April next year. But the recent massacre in Tana river raises the question, if we can have repeats of what we did to fellow Kenyans in 2008 now, does it mean that the ICC may not achieve the desired effect after all?
It seems we have not learnt our lesson from the post election violence. Just a mere seven months to yet another election, it seems out politicians, including some Cabinet ministers, are planning and funding more violence. It is tragic that 10 days later, no arrests have been made. Is this not a powerful message to the lords of impunity that the government has neither the balls nor the will to protect its own citizens?
Of greater concern is, if we can have this scale of violence before the elections, what can we expect during elections? If Kenya is to be respected and taken seriously by the international community of civilized nations, those politicians who planned the killings in Tana, Mandera and Wajir should be arrested, tried, convicted and put behind bars for life. This will send a more potent message than the threat presented by the ICC process. Instant senseless murders need instant justice. Justice delayed is justice denied even for the dead.
I felt sad for Kenya that the violence and mayhem happened on the day we celebrated the second anniversary of the new constitution. I felt small as a Kenyan when I compared our high sounding fluent speeches from our top politicians, security chiefs and the judiciary as Mombasa city was literally on fire! The irony was that while our leaders were receiving accolades for talking peace, sections of the Coast region were literally ablaze! The highest irony was that the Internal Security minister, the head of the Civil Service and Police Commissioner were seated at Bomas listening to political rhetoric as Mombasa burned!
Kenya, once described as an island of peace is no more. Today, we have more ethnic clashes in a year in all parts of Kenya than all the five EAC member states combined. Uganda and Rwanda have learnt from their past mistakes. Outbreaks of ethnic violence in Ethiopia or Tanzania are unheard off too yet they too have their diverse tribes.
In the last five years, I have never heard a single national peace forum held in Dar es Salaam, Kampala, Kigali or Addis Ababa to reconcile the nationals of our neighbors. Yet in Kenya in the last two months alone, we have had a high level Peace forum in Mombasa, 47 in all counties and this week, another national forum addressed by Kenya’s top leadership.
I may be wrong but I think this government is talking to itself. Kenyans switched off a long time ago.
I have a suggestion to make. Instead spending millions of shillings on peace meetings that nobody cares about, how about using those resources to recruit and train more police officers and give them better equipment to combat lawlessness? If one miserable MP can hire and ferry hooligans from as far as Hola to go and murder people in Tana Basin, why can’t the government recruit and transport the GSU to trouble spots?
The Mombasa fiasco on the day a peace forum was in progress at the Bomas was an indictment on this government. It proved that the entire security apparatus including the intelligence department that are supposed to preempt and prevent crime went to sleep a long time ago.
It is only in Kenya where a known terrorist can be caught red-handed with an assortment of weapons without the requisite firearms license and still release the hooligan on bond and later acquit him for lack of sufficient evidence!
It is only in Kenya where loss of human life carries less value than the rights of the murderer! Keeping law and order including maintaining peace does not require peace forums. All we need is a working penal code and a diligent police force. The law is the law and it must be obeyed by all. Those who break the law must be dealt with swiftly and punitively to send a clear message to would be offenders that there is something called crime and punishment.
No comments:
Post a Comment