{UAH} Pojim/WBK: Here is another "confused" Kikuyu! Fear and loathing on Saba Saba: How Uhuruto missed their 'teaching moment' - Comment - www.theeastafrican.co.ke
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Fear and loathing on Saba Saba: How Uhuruto missed their 'teaching moment' - Comment
In order to achieve conformity of thought, the Kanu state used a fearsome array of tools — detention, prison, systematic torture and sometimes even murder.
But the regime had also perfected a propaganda method aimed at casting anyone proposing a different vision as unpatriotic, deranged, self-serving, traitorous, dangerous, immoral and even blasphemous.
Thus Wangari Maathai's marital status was used to paint her as an immoral woman with "insects in her head." Oginga Odinga was taunted as a senile old man who wanted to force godless communism on the God-fearing people of Kenya.
Civil society was deemed to be working with "their foreign masters" to bring about a form of government alien to African culture. Others were accused of going against God's wish "as leadership comes from God."
To this effort, the regime mobilised wananchi, church and business leaders to produce a cacophonous refrain of "let us concentrate on development, not politics."
There were screams of "love, peace and unity" and "nyayo, juu, juu zaidi" and other nonsense, all designed to drown out voices asking whether the rapacious Kanu dictatorship was the best of all possible forms of government.
So it was deeply disturbing — post promulgation of a liberal Constitution in 2010 — to hear a Kanuesque din against the Saba Saba Day rally called by the Opposition.
There were irresponsible attempts to link the opposition to the killings in Mpeketoni, for which Al Shabaab had already claimed responsibility.
There were intimations that Raila Odinga was being used by the Americans and British to effect regime change because the two governments were unhappy with Kenya's "Look East" policy.
Prayers were held in which it was clear who represented God-ordained leadership and who was the agent of the devil. Politicians allied to the government hurled diatribes against members of the opposition who they claimed were hell-bent on destroying the country.
Wananchi, church and business leaders tried to out-compete one another in singing, "Let us concentrate on development, not politics." Some governors banned opposition rallies in their counties.
Meanwhile, the fear and hate-mongering brigade engaged higher gear, and right on cue, threats against communities deemed to be sympathetic to the opposition began to fly about.
In a matter of a month or so, mass hysteria had been created over an integral part of the democratic process.
Now, a brief statement from the president or his deputy to the effect that the opposition's right to hold rallies anywhere and on any day was guaranteed by the Constitution and that the government would provide security for those attending the rally and those not attending would have done a number of things.
First, it would have calmed the situation down. Second, it would have signalled that criticism or dissent is not criminal or demonic, and that it is now an integral part of our new democracy.
Third, it would have sent a clear message that the Kanu politics of diatribe, lies, hate and fear-mongering was now behind us, and that politics would now have to be conducted on the basis of logic, policy, morality and the Constitution.
All of these things in concert would have constituted a lesson on the meaning of the new Constitution.
The difference between this desirable outcome and the dangerous neo-Kanu mobilisation is the difference between a leader and a politician.
When President Barack Obama was running for office the first time around, he was confronted with a racial incident that had the potential to unravel his candidacy.
He could have called in his spin doctors (his Aden Duales and Jamleck Kamaus), used it to play the race card (the tribal card all our politicians employ when the chips are down) or simply ignored it (the way successive regimes here have avoided sensitive issues such as past political assassinations).
Instead, he chose the more difficult path of confronting it head on, calling it a "teaching moment." The option Obama took calmed the situation down, helped his nation to rationally debate the race question and greatly improved race relations.
What a shame that Uhuru and Ruto missed their "teaching moment."
Tee Ngugi is a political and social commentator based in Nairobi.
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