I welcome different opinions. Gideon Kubai expresses his sentiment on Jubilee Supporters and their attachment to President Uhuru Kenyatta in his piece - Why Jubilee Supporters should leave the president alone.
Why Jubilee Supporters should leave the president Alone - By Gideon Kubai
As hard as
it seems nowadays to reason with the millions of jubilee supporters across the
country and in the diaspora I think this is an opportune time to direct a few
truths; cold hard facts to the jubilee army online and on the ground.
It must be
done now before it’s too late; too late to salvage the president and the
country. The message must be sent short
and clear: Leave the president alone. Stop impeding on his work to run the
country. And I decree you put a space between yourselves and the president.
President’s personal battle
First, we
acknowledge that you did a splendid job of carrying Jubilee and its flag bearer
to power. Against seemingly insurmountable odds you made him president! That
was a feat capable only in Kenya. But that dear Jubilee supporter was during
campaign period and so many things have changed since. The president has
acquired new important responsibilities that do not include appealing to your
narrow ethnic interests. He now presides
over Kenya and its important you adjust to these new realities. But sadly you
have abrogated to yourselves the role of the presidents’ defenders and you
insist to fighting his personal battles.
If the
president is a soldier you have stubbornly insisted on being his body armor
albeit a very cumbersome one that is impeding on his movement. The president assumed leadership in full cognizance
that he carried on his person some liabilities; some weaknesses that will
occasionally if not always impinge on execution of his state duties. And the
president on national and international television has consistently
acknowledged those personal liabilities.But Jubilee supporters in an uncontrolled
frenzy of arrogance and ignorance are pressing the president to dump his
personal liabilities on the shoulders of Kenyans who are already sagging with heavy
burdens. Again you insist on fighting the president’s personal battles and by
god you have done a splendid job both online and on the ground.
Your zeal
online is unrivaled and your dedication on the ground is unmatched. You have
literally taken over Kenyan social media; facebook, twitter and blogs are
buzzing with your handiwork. You have dedicated acres and acres of online space
to singing the presidents’ praises and defending his name against the agents of
devil and imperialists western powers. Alas you have even taken it a step
further and roped in his family – which by the way your knowledge of it is very
scant- in your adoration. I am sure many jubilee supporters can’t tell Jaba
from Jomo yet you have created and run their fan pages which status updates
read like a hagiography of Wango’mbe Waihura - the legendary Kikuyu warrior. But
that is not to say that the president’s boys aren’t two fine young men because
to do so would be unfair and malicious. Yet am sure they must also be secretly
wondering who these very dedicated jubilee supporters are talking about; just
what is going!
The ground
troops have not been left behind either. The Jubilee army in parliament led by
the very able captain Aden Duale has been in full battle mode. But did they have
to create such a fuss about withdrawing from the Rome Statute / ICC? Just to
please and ingratiate themselves to the president? Though the jubilee
supporters and legislators might deny it I am sure the president has heard of
the English saying ‘close the stable door when the horse has bolted’. If it was
not so the president wouldn’t be so keen on proving his innocence at a full
trial in ICC. Unlike the jubilee legislators spurred by sycophancy, boot licking
and self-preservation the president fully understand the pullout from the ICC
has zero advantage to his quest to prove his innocence and might likely be
detrimental to that very quest. But what do you expect from a bunch of
parliamentarians majority of whom owe their presence in the august house not
from the people’s mandate but the presidents’ campaign posters: all they did in campaign period was print over sized posters with their portraits next to the presidents face and the
magical white dove. The rest as they say is history.A foreigner would be
forgiven for thinking the president was running in a hundred plus
constituencies!
Sovereignty
Secondly, I
have noticed you have lately been lecturing the country on the subject of sovereignty,
imperialism and neo-colonialism. From the illiterate peasant to the brilliant
lawyer in your ranks every one of you seems to have an expert opinion about
sovereignty. It’s amazing how peasants and the elite can easily find common
ground! Your understanding of sovereignty
is summed up by the declaration that American and Britain should mind their
business because Kenya is a mighty and sovereign state! May I remind you that
contrary to your flawed notion and declaration Kenya is not a mighty nation and
our sovereignty has never been in doubt from any quarters that we have to shout
ourselves hoarse across the seas and oceans.
The United
Nations recognizes us as such so you are not telling the world anything new!
And that unwarranted braggadocio that leads you to proclaim our mightiness from
roof tops will be our downfall. We don’t have the biggest military in the
world, we don’t have the biggest economy in the world and our people are still
dying of hunger and preventable diseases in 21st century among many other
niggling problems. Or how can we be a mighty nation when the president has just
returned from an overseas borrowing and begging spree? Where is the logic here dear
jubilee supporters? Mightiness must be quantified with an advanced sense of
self-reliance.
And please
also spare us the national embarrassment with this liberation and
neocolonialism rhetoric. Who walks in a crisp western style suit in a
parliament that receives millions of shillings in American grants, stands on
the floor of the house bound by standing orders that are more British than
Kenyan and in a labored Queen’s English lectures the country on liberation and
neocolonialism? What happened to the national dress to at least cloth the
hypocrisy!Or on what grounds other than ignorance can a young man weaned on
Shakespeare, and a self-proclaimed fan of English football to the blood preach
to anybody about liberation in an exuberant tweet or post? How can somebody
still in mental chains lecture anybody on neocolonialism? How can a whole generation
of young people whose pastime has become English premier league manage to hate all
things west at the same time? Don’t you think it is high time Britain exercised
its sovereignty and told all these ‘liberated’ jubilee supporters to mind their
own business!And just to remind you the president has a degree from Amherst College
in Massachusetts; the state famously touted as the spirit of America. Have you
heard the president denounce his American education?
Suffice it
to say that we are just another family in the family of nations. A family
struggling to feed its people and improve their quality of lives and towards
this endeavor we need all the support we can get from our neighbors both across
the borders and oceans. The old adage still ring true: no man is an island.
China - the god father you have suddenly grown fond of – with its mighty army
and booming economy still maintain diplomatic relations with America. In fact
you might say China is taking over America going by the number of china towns
inside of America. And mind you Hu Jintao still pays courtesy calls on Obama at
the white house.
The concept
of sovereignty has many elements to it and while the jubilee army obsesses on
internal sovereignty there is another element to it called popular sovereignty.
The one practiced in representative democracies like Kenya. It is not without a
reason it is enshrined in our constitution. And for your information we can choose
to exercise it directly or through elected representatives like we have
done. But once in a while will be called
upon to exercise it through referendum. So we can have a referendum debate in
the country without appearing to support your arch enemies CORD because Kenya
is not just about you versus them.
Jubilee Manifesto
As you can
see jubilee supporters popular sovereignty places an important responsibility
on the people of Kenya to oversight their government. To make sure the
sovereign authority is exercised in accordance with the people’s aspirations.
And seeing the president has severally acknowledged this oversight on national
television you do him and the country a great injustice to demonize every
criticism directed to the government. And what is very annoying about your
defense is the fact that it is peppered with fallacies, propaganda, illogicality
and insults rather than reason. You call people traitors and betrayers and
remind critics that elections are over when they point out the governments’
short comings. Please note not all government critics are CORD affiliates or sympathizers
or want jubilee to fail in delivering its manifesto. It’s simply about holding
the president to the promises carried in that jubilee manifesto which many of
jubilee supporters did not read. It was not important for you to read it
because you dislike deep understanding but like sound bites! So I want the
president to succeed because he is also my president and if he succeeds in
delivering all the goodies promised in the jubilee year I will share in the
merriment regardless of my political leanings, creed, tribe or even religion. And
to that end I will be more useful criticizing the president than praising him.
Civil society
Lastly,
jubilee supporters you have made known your abhorrence of civil society or
anything that look like one. You have been unforgiving in condemnation of what
you variously call the agents of devil and imperialist forces of the west. You
have branded personalities in the civil society movement traitors, sell outs
and betrayers. In your eyes everyone in the civil society has fallen short of the
glory; you read a devilish scheme to sacrifice the president at the ICC. I must
say you operate from a very short and poor memory. If you rewind back to 2008 /
2009 period when the contents of now infamous envelope were not in the public
domain the ICC at The Hague was the court of choice for a majority of Kenyans to
deal with post-election violence suspects. No less than the president’s deputy
shared and openly supported this choice. But you don’t like opinions polls
because you think it’s a con game orchestrated by civil society and the west to
fix your man. Well, I have little trust for these polls and although I don’t
embrace them whole-hearted like the gospel some of their findings are often
accurate. It’s true that presently the support for ICC among Kenyans is at an
all-time low.
Because you
forget fast and are impervious to reason you have conveniently erased from your
collective memory the fact that it is indeed the PNU now TNA cum Jubilee
legislators in the tenth parliament who put the president in the ICC mess in a
baffling feat of myopia. They rejected a local tribunal! Let me remind you of a
simple truth. To imagine Kenya can thrive without a vibrant civil society is to
take naivety to the extreme. It’s to lose all sense of our country’s history.
The freedoms you enjoy today came courtesy of brave men in civil society who
stood up against Moi’s dictatorship. And during this period the imperialist
western powers you detest very much were on hand to lend their support to the
movement. I am reminded of one American Ambassador Smith Hempstone who many
Kenyans had nothing but admiration for. So you see civil society is not
necessary evil but rather a bulwark to safe guard against government excesses
and abuses. If our democracy has to grow we must support a vibrant civil
society and more so because Kenyans starting with you are very timid people
when it comes to defending the country against internal imperialists sitting in
parliament and other executive offices.
Finally, not all in the civil society want to
fix the president. I have personally worked in the civil society. The youth
movement I work for has received money from American government to implement
peace and civic education programs in Naivasha. I can confirm to you that in
approving a grant for a proposed project the key considerations are viability,
objectivity and political neutrality. In addition, the Americans have sponsored
me for training in their country. At no time in our association have I been
asked to participate in a scheme to overthrow my government or fix anybody in
the political circles as some in the tenth parliament made you believe.
So dear
jubilee supporters my undertaking of my civic duty as a Kenyan will not always
make you happy but the loss here is yours not mine. You all will do well to
appreciate that Kenya is much more than you and CORD. There are other voices
struggling to be heard above the maddening cacophony you have generated in
defense of the president. If you will be civil enough to crank it down a decibel
or two the nation will begin to engage in a civil dialogue that will be
meaningful to all of us.
Gideon Kubai
The writer is the Founder and Program coordinator for
Vijana na Mageuzi Initiative and grandson of the Late
freedom fighter Fred Kubai.
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