Mutahi Ngunyi: Views on Kenya Politics, Elections, Grand Coalition Government, Parliament

Last week my readers corrected me. They told me that the ‘‘ahoi’’ are not only in Gema. You find them in every community. And I agree. In the tribe, the ‘‘ahoi’’ are subjects, not citizens. When their masters ask them to jump, they do not ask why.

They ask how high! This is why the political support of some leaders borders on religion; the opium of the masses. And on this, I blame the ‘‘subjects’’. Although our leaders are zero, their followers are worse. I do not understand why the Luo ‘‘ahoi’’ are slaves to ‘‘Odingaism’’.

What is the benefit except chains? Similarly, I am lost with regard to the Kalenjin Nation. Now they have made Mr William Ruto their tribal ‘‘King’’. And then there are the “ahois” of Gema I spoke about last week.

On his part, Mr Ruto claims to be self-made. He is proud of this. Yet a self-made man is nothing but a work of unskilled labour! Unguided, he is a disaster. My point? The tribe is a prison of collective consciousness.

And its leaders are warlords of sorts; aggressive to the outside world, oppressive to the inside world. In sum, we cannot change the country without changing the tribe. The Luo ‘‘ahoi’’ must liberate themselves from the shackles of ‘‘Odingaism’’ for national liberation to happen.

Similarly, the Kalenjin must free themselves from the ‘‘green-horn politics’’ of their young leaders. And likewise the Gema “ahoi”. But how does this happen? Consider some thoughts.

Politics is about “… who gets what, when and how”. It is about ‘‘getting’’. If you ‘‘get’’ nothing from it, do nothing about it. In economic language, we call this ‘‘quid pro quo’’ or ‘‘mali kwa mali’’.

Similarly, ‘‘politics is perception’’. And the perception that the tribe is a beneficiary of politics is a fat lie. In fact, the tribe is a myth. To the contrary, good politics is personal; bad politics is about ‘‘group think’’.

Dictatorship thrives on ‘‘mob psychology’’, democracy is about individuality. In other words, the individual is more important than the group. And for us to overcome our national darkness, we must retreat to the personal away from the groupies. Allow me to expound with a story I read this week.

A boy was walking on the beach with his father when they saw a man fishing. Getting closer, the boy noticed a bucket full of live crabs. To his surprise, the bucket was not covered. And so he asked his father “why hasn’t the man covered the bucket? Won’t the crabs escape? ”

“You see, my son,” the father explained, “if you have only one crab in the bucket, it will crawl out so fast you will not catch it. But when the crabs are many, if one tries to escape, the others will pull it down to the bottom of the bucket. This way, they all share in the misery and in the ultimate fate.”

We are all in a bucket called tribe. And the fisherman is the ‘‘tribal king’’. So long as we are together in the bucket, we are enslaved. But if we are put in the bucket as individuals, we will escape with speed. This is why we must reject tribe as our unifying factor and organising ideology. Instead, we should act in self interest.

Besides, Kenya is you, your woman and your children. Period. Everyone else, including the beloved ‘‘tribe,’’ is a material lie. Or is it? Allow me now to flip my argument. The Luo tell us this; “… if you want to go fast, go alone; if you want to go far, go with others”.

And in search of others, the most familiar people are those of our tribe. Yet the tribe is never about the future. It is about a shared history; a common heritage. It gives a false sense of belonging, but it rarely feeds your children. This is why I call it a material lie. My proposal to the country therefore is this: We should all commit ethnic suicide.

For the ‘‘ahoi’’, poverty and not tribe is the denominator. If the Kalenjin or Kikuyu ‘‘ahoi’’ are arming themselves, therefore, it should not be to harm the poor. It should be to fight poverty and those who entrench it.

But committing ethnic suicide has another two benefits. One, we will be able to see things as they are. Not as we are. Currently, the country is sober. But once Mr Moreno Ocampo lands, the polarities will emerge. Similarly, we have no views about the constitution. But what the politicians will oppose is what we will follow.

But with ethnic suicide, we will become human beings not tribal animals. Instead of supporting the politicians over the constitution, we will make a constitution for our children. And this is why we should listen to the church over the ‘‘stabilisation reforms’’. Our tunnel vision is limiting us on this matter.

Two, ethnic suicide will jump-start the process of healing. According to the ‘‘Law of Nature’’, something must die for the new to emerge. And nothing illustrates this better than the metamorphosis of a butterfly. After the egg hatches, it begins life in the ‘‘pupa’’ stage before entering the ‘‘larva’’ stage as a caterpillar.

Then the caterpillar weaves a silky cocoon around its body, suspends itself on a leafy branch and takes a long deep, deep sleep. Warmed by the sun, and protected from the rain, it waits. Then, one day movement occurs and a butterfly emerges. After drying its new wings in the morning breeze, it takes off into the air.

In each of the stages, something dies. But no loss is experienced because something new, even better, emerges. And this is what nature is calling us to do for Mother Kenya. Something must die for the new to emerge. Are we ready for this? My name is Mutahi Ngunyi, citizen number 4855678, and I will commit ethnic suicide for the love of Kenya!

Mutahi Ngunyi is a political scientist with The Consulting House, a policy and security innovation think-tank for the Great Lakes Region and West Africa.

This is a letter to the ‘‘House of Mumbi’’, those of the GEMA community. I address you as the son of a ‘‘Mau Mau hustler’’.

I have three thoughts from my late father. When I was a boy, he gave me stories about a guy called Gikuyu and his girl, Mumbi. The two founded the tribe. They had nine girls or something like that. No son. And they lived happily there after. But I had questions about this romantic relationship. As a boy, I asked my father, who married the nine girls?

He kept quiet. Then I asked him; if they got children, who was their father? How was the tribe created? He got violent. In fact, he gave me a beating for asking questions ‘‘… without legs’’. But then later, I figured that may be he had no answer. Or may be there was a hidden secret in the tribe. I became curious. And so I began my boyish inquiry. If the only man in the tribe was Gikuyu, did he have children with his daughters?

This thought was appalling beyond. My father would have killed me for thinking so. I had to settle on a more acceptable deduction. That is: If Gikuyu had nine daughters, their children must have been fathered by other tribes. That is the Maasai, Ndorobo, Luo, Luhya, and all. But even this, my father would not accept. I had to rest my case.

Allow me now to interpret my boyish deductions. To reproduce your GEMA tribe, you have only two choices. One, you can choose the path of incest. This is the path of in-breeding and sin. Although shameful, it is the path you chose in 2007. And the results are obvious: Political incest can only produce mongoloids.

This is what you have in the coalition government. The second choice is the one taken by Gikuyu and Mumbi. They sent their daughters to breed with others. This is how the tribe survived. Your survival, therefore, depends on others; the Maasai, Ndorobo, Luo, Luhya and all. And, on this, the alternatives are zero.

My father’s second thought was given when I got circumcised. But not explicitly. He had a telephone at home; what you would call an antique today. As a way of controlling it, he locked it using a padlock from the government. He always carried the key. One day, he came home for lunch. He needed to call his boss badly.

Unfortunately, he had forgotten the key at the office. The man was disparate. And from the ‘‘kindness’’ of our hearts, my brother Peter and I decided to help. We tapped the phone for him. He watched in amazement as we handed the receiver for him to talk to the boss. When he finished his call, he stared at us with a ‘‘kali sana’’ face.

But instead of punishing us, he decided to remove the padlock for good. He knew we were smarter now. After all, we had just gotten circumcised. And this is how he gave us the second thought about the tribe. Explaining his frustration with the phone call, he told us that the Gikuyu had two categories of people; the ‘‘ahoi’’ and the ‘‘athomi’’. The ‘‘ahoi’’ were the poor.

In rural areas they walk around without shoes, their feet all cracked up. And in urban areas, they are the ‘‘shamba boys’’, the drivers and the cooks. As a driver, he told us he was in the urban group of ‘‘ahoi’’. The ‘‘athomi’’ were the educated and propertied. They were also arrogant, insensitive and ruthless.

This is why he needed to make the phone call; he had to drop their children somewhere. His point? The ‘‘athomi’’ did not think much of the ‘‘ahoi’’. They saw them as slaves of sorts. And this is how you must understand President Kibaki. Most of you follow him blindly. In fact, because you are in the ‘‘ahoi’’ group, he expects you to.

Unfortunately, and together with the ‘‘athomi’’, he dragged you into a state of civil war. They used you. And since the ‘‘athomi’’ are untouchable, you bore the brunt of the violence. Where are your IDPs today? In the meantime, you think the presidency is yours. Zero. It belongs to the ‘‘athomi’’.

Allow me to describe your position as ‘‘ahoi’’ using a story. A man set out on a journey through a thick forest full of thorns and rocks. Suddenly, an elephant appeared and gave him chase. He took off and went to hide in a well. To his horror, he saw a huge snake at the bottom of the well.

He had to cling to a thorny creeper that was growing around it. Looking up, he saw two mice chewing the creeper he was hanging on. But just as he was contemplating his next move, he saw a bee hive next to his mouth. Occasional drops of honey were trickling from the hive. And this man tested the honey. He got confused.

Although a kind man offered to help him out of his trouble, he refused. He wanted to be excused until he had enjoyed himself to the full. Not clever. Good people, you are behaving like this man. You have seen a bee hive dripping with honey.

And although you are hanging on a thin creeper between an angry elephant and a snake, you don’t care. You want to enjoy the honey, the presidency. Unfortunately, the creeper will snap and you will have to deal with the snake at the bottom of the well. On this, the choice is yours.

The third thought regards Mungiki. When my father joined Mau Mau, they called it a Mungiki-type movement. Yet it was a group of restless young people whose ‘‘wazees’’ had lost direction. I want to put it to you that you have no leadership. The ‘‘wazees’’ in your ranks have reached intellectual menopause. And in this state, they have exhibited unnecessary arrogance towards others.

As a shareholder in your tribe, I submit that you need new leadership. A leadership that will cause you to climb down in the interest of the country. One that is not beholden to the ‘‘athomi’’ and one that will respect the other communities.

mutahi@myself.com

As a country, we suffer from a disease called the ‘‘herd instinct’’. We are like a herd of goats, or a school of fish. In crisis, a herd or a school will follow its instincts.

It will do it blindly, ferociously and uncritically. And if its direction is wrong, it will not correct. Instead, it will increase its speed in the direction of the wrong.

But as a country, we are not even goats. We are more like sheep. Let me explain. A scientist put a herd of sheep in line. He then placed a stick in front of them, two feet from the ground. The first sheep came and jumped over the stick. The second did the same. After the third sheep, he removed the stick.

To his surprise, when the fourth sheep came, it jumped over an imaginary stick. Every sheep there after jumped over this imaginary stick. Their minds were fixed on a stick; they never realised it had been removed. I will return to this thought in a bit. And I will relate it to the false notion that there will be war in 2012.

For now, I want to accuse the country. Good people, we are following Mr Kofi Annan like a herd of goats. We have become animals. No dignity, no pride, just ‘‘herd instinct’’. Very soon we will be eating grass. And on this, I must clarify: I have nothing against this Annan guy.

In fact, we should rename Koinange Street in his honour. My problem is this: his methods are pedestrian, his track history is zero. Allow me to summon evidence to support the claim. One, the wise men tell us that “… things never go wrong; they start wrong!”

This is true of romantic relationships as it is of political ones.

Regarding reforms, we started wrong. Emphasis was on power sharing, and not on covenant-making. And once the power was shared, the covenant-making was abandoned.

Issues of the constitution, transitional justice, poverty and land ‘‘died’’. What is more: Mr Annan is responsible for this. After he signed Agenda 3 of the Peace Accord, the man vamoosed. He was in a hurry to leave. He left behind a non-descript professor to conclude the peace deal.

Yet the remaining part of this negotiation was the important one. The original sin, therefore, is this: reforms were never negotiated. And because the process was wrong, it has to end ‘‘wrong’’.

Two, and borrowing from experience, every country rescued by the ‘‘Annan types’’ has eventually collapsed. Somalia never recovered. Iraq is over. Liberia had the ‘‘Annan types’’ from the 1980s.

Today, the country is on its knees. Sierra Leone, Ivory Coast and the Democratic Republic of Congo suffer from political constipation. They ate half-baked solutions from ‘‘Annan types’’.

But look at Ghana, the aliens could not touch it. And because they kept away, the country emerged from its cycle of coups. As for Rwanda, the country was too small for the UN to intervene.

In fact, the genocide happened when Kofi Annan was in charge of peace-keeping at the UN. They ignored it. Because of this, the Rwandese decided to re-build the country themselves. We can only envy them now.

My point? To follow Kofi Annan like a ‘‘herd of goats’’ is to be unwise. And this is why I will disagree with the mood of the nation this week. Sorry, but Mr Annan is not the saviour.

Allow me now to return to the sheep experiment. I submit that the idea of war in 2012 is an ‘‘imaginary stick’’. And for Mr Annan to declare that we will fight if reforms are not carried out is alarmist.

Indulge my reasoning. One, we did not fight because we were starved of reforms. In fact, pushing for reforms could make us fight. In 2007, the fight was about the dominance of one community over the domination of other tribes. And the conflict between the dominant and the dominated is common in politics.

But in 2007, our situation was peculiar. The dominant, led by the President, were incompetent, while the dominated led by ODM were reckless. This kind of situation could only result in war.

The question for 2012 is this: will it be a repeat of 2007? I doubt it. The dominant GEMA tribe will not be gunning for the presidency. As such, the other tribes have no reason to regiment against them.

And if this is the position, why should we fight? Because of a constitution or because of failed reforms? Zero. My take: because there was a stick in front of us in 2007, we imagine it is still there. As we approach 2012, therefore, we are galloping over an imaginary stick like the sheep in the experiment.

Two, and an argument I have made in the past, we are afraid of 2012 because a new order is coming. With or without the reforms, the stage for the new dispensation is set.

If this is true, Mr Annan is just a complication delaying the emergence of a new Kenya. Many will disagree with me on this.

And this is because the leadership of the new order has not emerged. But when the cowards overcome their fears, then we will together make a declaration of independence from the colonial relics in power and the foreigners supervising them. This, in my view, will not be easy.

But it is the starting point. And we can model our struggles here using the American history. Fifty-six Americans signed the Declaration of Independence. They liberated their country from British colonialism.

From these, five were captured as traitors and killed. Twelve had their homes burnt down. Two lost their sons in the revolutionary war. Nine fought and died from wounds or the hardships of war.

But what kind of men were they? Twenty four were lawyers and jurists. Eleven were merchants, nine were owners of large plantations. All were well educated, men of means.

And they signed the Declaration of Independence knowing fully well that the penalty would be death if captured. My point? If a new order is coming, it will have to be led by the middle class.

Are there middle-class dare-devils out there ready to sign our Declaration of Independence from the Annans and the colonial relics in power?

mutahi@myself.com

This is a letter to the President. Greetings and a happy Sunday. I write to you respectfully and with restraint. And, in so doing, I speak for my generation in its 30s and 40s. Good sir, you are in a weak place.

First, the Ringera fiasco blew up on your face. Your response: Political surrender! Then you wrote to the Americans for threatening your ministers. You demanded some respect. Their response:

A contempt card. Now Kofi Annan and his “sister” Moreno Ocampo are in town. Some ministers, like Mr Mutula Kilonzo, are rejoicing indecently. Our response: We have become a “failed state”. Yet what we have is a “failed presidency”. I write to you, therefore, to suggest the reasons why. I have three.

One, you need mentorship. This might sound flippant, but kindly indulge me. Those who know you say that you read a lot. They also say you are a clever man. And I believe them. In your readings, you must have come across the idea of “reverse mentoring”. This was developed a decade ago by “grey-haired revolutionaries”.

Their leader was Jack Welch, the then CEO of General Electric. These wazees were frustrated by a new discovery: the Internet. It was fast; it was furious. And only young people understood it. Mr Welch hated this. He therefore ordered his 600 top executives to be mentored by the youth in their 20s.

It was painful listening to an ignorant and youthful “earthling”. But the more he listened, the more his eyes were opened. The novice showed him the future; made him understand “pop culture” and coming trends. It changed his life.

Mr President, this is what you need; “reverse mentoring” from my generation or some crack head in their twenties. And I am informed here by the late Jomo Kenyatta, your teacher. His leadership had charisma, his vision was real.

Why? He was mentored by his young children. The man was home early to supervise their growth. And as he pondered national matters at home, he watched Uhuru Kenyatta climb the trees like a monkey. This gave the 70-year-old president vision. It connected him with the future.

To the contrary, Sir, your evenings are uneventful. If you are not with the Makerere Wazees, you are like most men in my father’s generation: chatting with, or staring at the dozing wife. With this, your vision can only be informed by the past.

This is why you need “reverse mentoring” from the younger generation. Your generation owns this country, my generation runs it. From banks to schools; business innovations to mega investments, the generation in its 30s and 40s are in charge. In sum, “reverse mentoring” could re-engineer your failed presidency.

Two, although the 2007 election was a fiasco, we re-elected you in 2008. Let me explain. Sir, we held two elections. The first one was on December 29, 2007. It was a sham and we annulled it. This is why we held a second election.

This happened on February 28, 2008 under the supervision of Mr Kofi Annan. When you signed the Peace Accord, we gave your presidency legitimacy. If this is true, why are foreigners pushing you around? Why are they accusing you of sabotaging reforms? In any case, which reforms are they talking about? Is it a local tribunal?

You and the prime minister supported the idea. But the people rejected it in toto. Or are they talking about a new constitution? You set up this Committee of Experts but we will reject its constitution as well. At this rate, they should be advised to send travel bans to all the 40 million Kenyans.

And the reason is simple: the Annan reforms were half-baked and shoddy. To implement them blindly is to sink our nation. We refuse to do so. If your presidency is failing, therefore, it is because you have been targeted for “shock therapy” by the West. In her book, The Shock Doctrine, Naomi Klein explains how this works. She borrows from the CIA electroshock experiment in the 1950s. In fact, this experiment was used to develop the torture manual used by the US in Guatanamo Bay.

During these experiments, electroshocks were given to suspects. Those who failed to respond to the shocks were given a higher voltage. And the greater the resistance, the more shocks a suspect received. The idea was to subdue the suspects, not to help them in the development of a better personality.

Klein uses this example to show how the West applies “shock therapy” on political individuals they want to subdue. And my hypothesis, sir, is that you are targeted for this. In fact, Mr Annan and his “sister” Moreno Ocampo are bringing the “shock machine” this week. The question is: will you succumb?

My third reason is evangelical. And it borrows from Leo Tolstoy’s book War and Peace. In this book he says “… we lost because we told ourselves we lost”. Similarly, yours is a failed presidency because you have told yourself so. Allow me to demonstrate using a story. A son and his father were walking on the mountains. Suddenly, the son fell, hurt himself, and screamed: “Aaahhhhhhh!” To his surprise, he heard the voice repeat itself from the mountain:

“Aaahhhhhhh!” Curious, he yelled back: “Who are you?” It answered back “Who are you?” At this point, he screamed at the mountain: “I admire you”. The voice answered back “I admire you”. Angered by the response, he screamed back “Coward”. He received the answer “Coward”. Now he got confused and turned to his father and asked “What is going on?”.

The father smiled and asked him to pay attention. At this point, the father shouted at the mountain “You are a Champion!” and the mountain shouted back “You are a Champion”. The boy did not understand. Then the father explained: “People call this an echo, but really, this is life. It gives you back everything you say or do. Your life is an echo of your actions!” Sir, if you go around like a “failed presidency”, we will believe you are one. And so, “… don’t just sit there, do something!”

mutahi@myself.com

The American Ambassador is an irritant who should either shut up or ship out. Or should he? I have some thoughts. One, we are a very proud nation; a proud people. And when an alien lectures our leaders, we get violent.

More so if the alien is right. This ambassador guy is right, but his approach is naïve. He is bullish, patronising and eager. Or maybe he is following orders from cousin Obama? Zero! This man has misadvised Washington. He must have told them that “mukoras” in government understand only one language: The whip. On this, he is wrong.

Naive approach

He is like this South African farmer and his young labourer in Grahamtown. One morning, the farmer woke up to find the labourer down with an axe lodged in the middle of his head. He kicked the poor fellow twice to see if he was alive.

To his surprise, the chap responded. Unbothered, the farmer left for work. After all, he reasoned, the labourer could not survive. When he returned home late that evening, he kicked him again to see if he had died. Amazingly, and hours later, the fellow was still conscious.

Shocked by this, he decided to have his evening beer first. Later that night, he took the labourer to hospital. They extracted the axe from his head and the man made a full recovery.

What is the moral of this story? Two things. One, no amount of pain will put a nation down. Not Kenya. In December 2007, we had an axe lodged in the head. It is still there. In fact, Mr Raila Odinga went to New York with an axe on his forehead. And we share in his pain. Especially the ridicule and humiliation over the Barack Obama luncheon.

In my view, and like the African labourer, we will survive the pain. Two, and in the meantime, we must ignore irritants like this ambassador. This is why. As we wriggled in pain in December 2007, President Kibaki was sworn in at night. We were in shock.

But the good ambassador was the first alien to acknowledge the false victory. Like the Boer farmer, maybe he did not care. Or maybe he lacked in judgement. My hunch? He has poor judgement. And because of this, he has misled his government. Issuing threats to our leaders can only turn the public against the Americans.

Because of his actions, we are even prepared to tell cousin Obama to take a walk. On this, I could also be wrong. This is why I will flip my argument now. Maybe this “ambassador guy” is right. And maybe our leaders are “mukoras”. What is more: they have no self respect. This brings me to my second thought. During President Obama’s inauguration, we were not invited.

But our Foreign minister insisted on going to Washington. Then he attended a disgraceful ‘‘street party’’ next to the ‘‘real party’’ at the White House. We were embarrassed beyond. We looked disparate and jilted. We forgot. Now Mr Odinga has revived the memory. His desperate attempt to meet President Obama was pathetic.

First they removed his name from a list of guests invited to a luncheon at the White House. He was not embarrassed. The brother persisted. Next, I believe he ‘‘cornered’’ cousin Obama on some corridor at another luncheon. They exchanged niceties, took a photo and that was all. Now his media spin doctors are telling us that they held “discussions” over Justice Ringera and sundry. I do not believe them. The Prime Minister is being cheap.

No dignity, no pride, no shame. And if this is true, allow me to make my point. When you lose your self respect as a nation, you will be treated like dirt. But there is also a lesson for the ambassador from his boss. When it comes to our leaders, the ambassador uses “cowboy diplomacy”. He is tough; he is rough. What President Obama used on Mr Odinga is “lollipop diplomacy”. It is superior; it is soft power. He made Mr Odinga feel important, not threatened.

Yet all he did at the “corridor meeting” and the photo shoot was to give the Prime Minister a “lollipop”. And this art of “political seduction” is what the ambassador should learn from his boss. Instead of “cowboy diplomacy”, he should try “lollipops”!

Allow me now to give my third thought. Generally, our leaders are charlatans and the world is laughing at us. What is more: they are confused. The Prime Minister told us that the US has a right to ban Kenyan leaders. I was shocked. Maybe the “corridor meeting” with President Obama mesmerised him. Now President Kibaki disagrees.

He has taken issues with the US for threatening our leaders. However, the disrespect we face and the “cheapness” of our leaders begs for a new vision. And this is my third thought. Across the entire nation, small groups are gathering to craft a vision and groom a leader, maybe a presidential candidate. To determine whether the emerging leaders are fake or not, I suggest we use the Nine Tests of Confucius.

According to this thinker, this is how we will know a servant leader: “… send him to a distant mission to test his loyalty. Employ him nearby to observe his manners. Then give him a lot to do in order to judge his ability.

Suddenly put a question to him to test his knowledge. Make a commitment with him in difficult times to test his ability to live up to his own word. Trust him with money to test his heart, and announce the coming of a crisis to test his integrity.

Make him drunk to see the other side of his character and put him in female company to see his attitude towards women. Submitted to these nine tests, a fool will always reveal himself!”

mutahi@myself.com

Are we having a constitutional crisis? Absolutely not! Only a weak brother, like Mr Kalonzo Musyoka, would panic. Allow me to encourage him. In Chinese, the word “crisis” has a dual meaning: danger and opportunity.

If you focus on the danger, you will panic like the weak. If you focus on the opportunity, you will innovate. What I see in the “Ringera saga” is political innovation. Like in power sharing, we have become “makers of things”. We are making politics; building democracy projects.

And for this, I am proud to be Kenyan. Not because we rejected Mr Ringera. No. This Ringera man is a disaster. No political manners, no patriotism. Unlike his assistant who resigned, Mr Ringera is a bulking toad. And as scientists have shown, you cannot put a bulking toad in hot water.

It will jump out in fright. But put it in cold water and then warm it slowly, the toad will get complacent and comfortable. In fact, it becomes more and more groggy, less and less conscious as the water gets to boiling point.

Eventually, it succumbs; literary boiled to its end. Then it dies. This is what will happen to Mr Ringera. The country has rejected him, but he is stubborn. Like the toad, we should “boil” him slowly to his professional death. Or what do you think?

As for his assistant, Dr Smokin Wanjala, we must be proud. Whatever his motive, he said no to the millions. And as one thinker noted: “. . . it takes men of goodwill to do nothing for evil to prevail”. We must therefore record Dr Wanjala’s actions as patriotic.

In fact, we should organise to give him a medal. But not so fast! Allow me to explain through a story. A blind man got late at the house of a friend. As he was leaving, he asked his friend to lend him a kerosene lamp. “Why carry a lamp” his friend asked. “You will not see any better with it”.

“No,” said the blind one, “perhaps not. But others will see me better, and not bump into me”. And so, he set out on his journey. He had not gone very far when somebody bumped into him. This made him very angry. “Why don’t you look where you are going,” he shouted.

“Don’t you see I have a lamp?” The other traveller shouted back: “If you had put on your lamp, I would not have bumped into you!” The blind man got the lamp alright, but he forgot to light it up. Like the blind man, Dr Wanjala has good intentions.

Unlike Mr Ringera, he is carrying a kerosene lamp because he is interested in the “light”. His fellow assistant director, Fatuma Sichale, is also interested in the ‘‘light’’; maybe. He should give her leadership. However, and like the blind man, he should not forget to put on his lamp!

He is a prisoner of conscience and the road ahead is long. If he keeps to the faith in transparency, Parliament might just re-appoint him! Madam Sichale should consider this legitimate route as well. And speaking of Parliament, I will now go to the political innovations.

The fight between parliament and the executive must be celebrated. But as we do so, we must remember that the Ringera “ruling” is nothing. In law, the President is not bound to fire Mr Ringera. The lesson for parliament, therefore, is simple: “… a covenant without swords is but mere words”.

In sum, parliament is a ‘‘toothless grandmother’’. No teeth, just gum – pink and delicate gum! This is why on the Ringera matter, all they can do is push for a moral argument. And even then, the President is allowed by the letter of the law to ignore them. However, and if they are serious, they can up their game. Parliament can re-introduce debate around its independence from the executive.

They can revive the so-called ‘Keter Bill’ that sought to review Sections 58 and 59 of the constitution. This can be done alongside the “Imanyara Bill” that seeks to remove presidential immunity from prosecution. If these constitutional amendments happen, then the independence of Parliament will be established.

The House can pass a “vote-of-no-confidence” in the President and send him home without disbanding itself. And after the “Ringera ruling”, this should be their next step. It gives them an ability to brandish force on the executive; the “sword”.

Unless they have this ability, the executive will not respect their decisions. And this is why, in spite of their ruling, Mr Ringera is likely to continue. Where am I going with this? Instead of a constitutional crisis, what we have is a constitutional moment; an opportunity for constitutional innovation.

The constitutional moment is not about the executive and parliament only. It involves the public as well. And the ‘‘moment’’ happens if the public loses faith in its leaders. And nothing illustrates this better than something I witnessed this week. On my way to the office in the morning, a bigoted minister tried to overlap in jam.

His security people forced all motorists into the pavements and ditches. But one young guy, driving a jalopy Toyota, refused to move. In fact he deliberately blocked the minister. When I saw this, I followed suit. I reasoned that the minister was in a rush to parliament to sell Mau for Ringera anyway. I felt violent.

And as I blocked, others followed. Then I realised how disrespectful I had become. But surprisingly, I had no guilt. At this moment I knew that my loss of faith in these “minister people” is a cry for a new contract between the state and the family; a new constitution. I realised I was in a constitutional moment! But this constitution cannot be written. Not yet. Not so fast. The dramas must settle first. Or what do you think?

Mutahi Ngunyi is a political scientist with the Consulting House, a policy and security think-tank for the Great Lakes region and West Africa. mutahi@myself.com

Mark Twain once retorted: “…When I was a boy of 14, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished at how much the old man had learnt in seven years”.

As a country, we are like a 14-year-old boy. Our “… hormones are pumping like a disco” and our ‘‘cleverness’’ is shinning galore.

AND, BECAUSE OF THIS, WE do not see things as they are; we see things as we are. If we understand this, then we will understand why the lawyers are exchanging ignorance on the Ringera matter. They do not see the law as it is; they see it as they are. This should also explain why Mr Mutula Kilonzo is swinging like a pendulum. His status has changed, and so has his sight.

What about the rest of us? Like Mark Twain at 14, most Kenyans cannot stand President Kibaki. We think he is ‘‘ignorant’’. And his ‘‘ignorance’’ has inspired all of us into wanting his job. In fact, most men, even the most useless ones, will tell their woman: “… I can do this job better than Kibaki”.

But come 2011, we will be surprised at how much the ‘‘old man’’ will have learnt in two years. Like Mark Twain, we will be the foolish ones. If this is true, then we must swop positions in our minds. We must accept the following: he is the clever one, we are the ignorant ones. And to liberate ourselves from cleverness, is to regain our sight.

This way, we will understand that the President is a long distance runner. Unfortunately, we are sprinters. On controversial issues, we fight him vigorously and with drama. Then we get tired. In the end, he wins and has his way.

SIMILARLY, IF WE ACCEPT we are ignorant, we will see the following: with the President, what matters is not what he does. The crunch is in what he fails to do. For instance, he fired General Hussein Ali as demanded by the ‘‘international sisters’’. But does the appointment of the new commissioner consist in reforms? I doubt it.

I have another question: between firing General Ali and appointing Mr Aaron Ringera, which was important? Some people say that the firing of General Ali was a diversion. Wrong! That was the real game. The diversion was, in fact, the illegal hiring of Justice Ringera. It was a smoke screen created to allow reforms in the security sector.

In sum, anti-corruption is a sissy concern. Not important. In fact, maybe the President does not even care about Judge Ringera.

In his scheme of things, there is the main plot and then the side shows. Judge Ringera and sundry are nothing but side shows. The main show is complex and all we can read for now is an emerging pattern. And since I am unable to interpret the pattern, allow me to ask some questions. Besides, sometimes questions tell us more than answers do.

One, we have a coalition government – at least on paper. If this is true, why is it that almost all security apparatus are controlled by GEMA? These include the Provincial Administration, NSIS, CID, Administration Police (AP) and now the Regular Police. Why is this important to the regime? And what will happen to the armed forces, given that the Chief of General Staff is retiring soon?

When you look at the hierarchy, chances of GEMA’s control of the forces are high. But will it happen? If it does, is it wise? Or is there a non-civilian scheme in the offing here?

TWO, ANYTHING THAT CAN GO wrong, will go wrong in 2011. As I have indicated in the past, this is the crunch year. The Hague will happen in earnest this year. And, as they arrest the war lords, the Mau Secretariat will be finalising its evictions. The Mau wounds will be fresh as the warlords get charged. In the same year, we will do a constitutional referendum.

If we like the constitution, then we will have a bigger crisis: The coalition government will stand dissolved. This means a snap election. But we will have a further hitch: There will be no electoral commission. The current commission will be disbanded by law on December 28, 2010. The question therefore is: who will conduct the election?

Maybe, a ‘‘greenhorn’’ and incompetent commission. And maybe some people like it that way. And in the thick of all this, the census results will be released. They will show the dominance of some ‘‘tribes’’ over the dominated minority. In sum, 2011 is a jinxed year ab initio.

Now I ask the question: Is there a deliberate attempt to precipitate a crisis in 2011? I have no idea. But we must read the possibilities against a set of other patterns. Apart from a GEMA take-over of the security forces, there is the media law.

It allows the government to raid and close down any media in the event of civil unrest. This law was made for the 2011 ‘‘explosion’’. The other is the unexplained expansion of the Administration Police and the creation of ‘‘ghost provinces’’. Are they also for 2011? No idea!

MY LAST QUESTION IS FOR THE Prime Minister, Mr Raila Odinga. If indeed the President is retiring in 2012, why is he doing all these? What is he up to? My hunch is that Mr Odinga is not consulted on these matters. In fact, he has given up. But in public, he must give the impression that he is consulted. This way, he saves face and dignity.

But in my view, this is defeatist. Mr Odinga is currently trapped, and we can see it. Like a shark, he must not stop. He stops to swim, he dies! This is why he must soldier on. Maybe he will save the country come 2011. Or what do you think?

mutahi@myself.com