{UAH} Every African politician a potential dictator, every baby a potential refugee - Comment - www.theeastafrican.co.ke
|
6:14 AM |
No comments |
Every African politician a potential dictator, every baby a potential refugee - Comment
I once saw a poster on the wall of an office long ago. It featured a dishevelled man looking down at me with a haunted look. Under the picture were the words, "Even Einstein was once a refugee."
But of course, I said to myself, wanting to kick myself for not recognising Uncle Albert right away. Of course he was a refugee, having been driven out of Nazi Germany by Adolf Hitler's persecution of Jews and other groups he blamed his country's economic woes on.
So he emigrated to the United States, where he became probably the greatest physicist ever known to mankind with his work on relativity.
Still, as if to shame the Nazis and other loonies, he vehemently opposed the use of new scientific knowledge to make nuclear bombs. So he was not involved in Franklin Roosevelt's Manhattan Project, which was charged with the creation of the first atomic bomb to be unleashed on real people. He co-authored, with philosopher Bertrand Russell, the Russell-Einstein Manifesto against such use.
It is the man's supreme humanity that comes across: A man made to suffer the collective punishment that his people were subjected to and still not wanting revenge in any way that would not only kill innocents but also introduce an unacceptably dangerous precedent in world relations.
Science was for peace, not war.
That poster made me think. I realised that there were many illustrious people in world history and universal faiths who were not unlike Einstein. I could start with mere mortals.
In our neighbourhood, Yoweri Museveni was a refugee, and I think he knew precisely what Idi Amin would do to him if he ever laid his hands on him.
Paul Kagame was an infant refugee when he was taken across the Ugandan border by his parents, who were escaping from murderous Hutu supremacist gangs who were in reality experimenting with genocide. Raila Odinga was also a refugee, when he trekked long distances through forest and bush to get to Tanzania, from where he travelled to Germany for higher studies.
Further afield, people like Agostinho Neto, Edouardo Mondlane, Samora Machel, Amilcar Cabral, Oliver Tambo, Thabo Mbeki and countless other freedom fighters were refugees, forced to leave their countries to go live elsewhere, for both safety and space to organise their struggle.
Even more illustrious individuals can be cited in this context. The scriptures tell us that when Jesus Christ was born, he had to be spirited to Egypt by Joseph and Mary to keep him safe from the Roman governor of Palestine who had a hunch that a dangerous boy had been born.
The Prophet Muhammad (SAW), we are told, had to relocate to Medina — a form of divinely inspired IDP — for some time to organise his campaign against the infidels in Mecca, and he eventually returned and routed them.
Of course, the millions of refugees cramming the monstrous tented camps of today remain faceless, nameless and their bio-data amounts only to statistics and indices.
But all this shows — in mere mortals and in more elevated souls — that those who seek asylum do it out of dire necessity. Most times they are fleeing real and present danger to their persons, and often they are already hurt, such as women and girls who have been raped. It's a plight they did not wish on themselves and would be most anxious to end when conditions return to normal back home.
They thus need empathy, understanding and support. As we mark World Refugee Day on June 20 we should all be looking into ways to make them as welcome as we can and as circumstances allow.
Sometimes permanent solutions have proved to be workable, such as when Tanzania more than once granted citizenship to refugees from neighbouring countries. Or the US and Canada.
For the flow of refugees is not ending any time soon. They are the products of conflict, and conflict is our principal industry, alas. So much so that I can confidently say, show me an African politician and I'll show you a potential dictator. Show me a newborn African baby and I'll show you a potential refugee.
Jenerali Ulimwengu is chairman of the board of the Raia Mwema newspaper and an advocate of the High Court in Dar es Salaam. E-mail: ulimwengu@jenerali.com
0 comments:
Post a Comment