But let us first examine this thing we call PEV, the Post Election Violence. ODM (for the most part), believes or portends to believe that it was as a direct reaction to the rigging of elections and as such the primary culprit should be Mwai Kibaki and anyone who engaged in the alleged electoral fraud.
The problem with this argument is that the International Court of Justice is not concerned with prosecuting electoral malpractice but crimes against humanity. So whatever the motivation of the perpetrators was, that is immaterial to the court. Furthermore, just because those who participated in the violence feel that their actions were justified, that alone should not be a reason for them to object to a trial...after all, the court is the proper venue for them to come up with a defence and if it is as compelling as they seem to believe, then they should have nothing to worry about.
The second problem with this argument is the arbiralliness of it. Let us assume that some people did in fact commit acts of violence as a reaction to stolen elections. That would mean that during the PEV period, there would have to have been two kinds of crimes: the justifiable (as a reaction to rigged polls) and the regular crime which would have happened whether elections were stolen or not, since crime occurs all the time.
Now, let us say that one rape case which took place at a shopping center in Molo was committed by a mob protesting the stolen election and another one which took place in Naivasha was as a result of a regular pervert doing what he does. Who is to determine that one of the two crimes was a justifiable political statement and the other a random act of lawlessness? Doesn't that also mean that we free anyone arrested of committing a violent crime between December 29th, 2007 and March 1st, 2008 (or thereabout)?
The third problem: justice, in a case where there is a clear victim, is never about the accused but the victim. What the courts are going to concern themselves with is the actual people who lost their lives. So if ODM is arguing that their goons were motivated by the rigging of elections, they better be ready to prove that that peasant woman burned at a church in Kiambaa participated in the rigging. Likewise, if Uhuru or any other Central Province politician participated in retaliatory attacks and retaliation happens to be their defense, they better be prepared to show that the innocent people murdered in Naivasha had directly participated in the killings in Rift Valley.
Which leads us to this question: shouldn't the first person to be summoned by whichever court takes this matter be Raila Odinaga? Here's the rationale and please stick with me; a hit-and-run accident occurs, there is a dead body lying across the street and all but one witnesses give their varying accounts of what happened. One witness, witness R, however, claims that no accident took place at all...not wait, if any accident took place, the dead person must have brought it to himself because he is a relative of a known car thief. Now, whether or not witness R has anything to do with the crime, wouldn't you as a prosecutor want to have a few more words with him about the incident?
That is the position which Raila Odinga is in. The whole world but himself and the hacks, acknowledges that crimes against humanity were committed in Kenya. Why should he not be the first one to the Hague so that he can shed a little more light on his seemingly untenable position?
Elections were muddled up and that is regrettable, elections might have even been rigged and that is unforgivable but a worse affront against our country took place after the election controversy which made any theft of votes look like pick-pocketing. When the country exploded, only one person had the power to come close to ameliorating the situation, that person was Raila Odinga. He had the power to directly address those who were killing in his name and tell them that their true enemy was not their neighbors but the occupant of the state house and his cronies-in-thievery. The violence would have subsided, Raila would have earned international repute and approached the iconic status of Mandela.
But he chose to tacitly and sometimes implicitly support what was going on. And for that reason, even when Barack Obama mentions the heroes of the PEV tragedy, Raila is not among them and neither is any of those who believed that they were opposing the rigging of elections. The only people he reserved compliments for were those ordinary people who opposed the violence which Raila still believes was justified.
15 comments:
FIGHT ON RAILA TELLS KISUMU RESIDENTS
The Kisii are our people. We must not touch them.
The East African Standard (Nairobi)
22 January 2008
Posted to the web 22 January 2008
http://chamachamwananchi.wordpress.com/2008/01/22/fight-on-raila-tells-kisumu-residents/
Exactly.
"...Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and others have greatness thrust upon them..." said the bard from Stratford-upon-Avon but had he lived to witness Raila squander his potential moment of greatness, he would have added, "and some see greatness and look the other way."
Kibaki was a lame duck hiding in at the State House, Raila was the only one whom the enraged masses would have listened to. Perhaps as consenquence he wouldn't have ended up becoming a PM because Kibaki wouldn't have felt as much pressure as he did with a thousand dead bodies and counting on his watch - but lives would have been saved...Raila would have undoubtedly been the bigger man - a hero! Obama would have proudly made Kenya his first stop and not Ghana.
"Kibaki was a lame duck hiding in at the State House,"
Inaccurate. As the executive, bwana hapanaa! authorized the police (who were eventually overwhelmed)to go out and protect lives and property.
Oh yes, he was a lame duck! Authorizing the police to go out and cobble street demonstrators (who in my opinion were the least of the problem) is not exercising authority. Kibaki was holed in the state house for some time while Odinga seemed able to travel freely. The police only seem to have been unleashed in Luo land and for the most part the only exacarcebated the situation by wantonly executing demonstrators.
One ominous incident that demonstrates Kibaki's impotence during that period was when he went to address victims somewhere in Eldoret at the height of the violence. I saw it on TV...while the president was on the dais urging people not to fear and return to their homes, a few yards away houses started going up in flames. You should have seen the terror on the faces of the wananchi desperately hoping for some reassurance, some show of power from the president. Nothing was said of the incident...when the presidential motorcade left, the ravaging mob began advancing...towards the victims.
You have addressed this matter very well. I like that herein lies no mention of tribes. That is a positive dimension because at different forums authors have attempted to blame tribalism as the factor behind the chaos. If our leaders could drop their selfish interest, we as a country would prevail!
Thanks anon 1:28.
It is not necessary to invoke tribes because it is a matter of what is right and what is wrong.
Needless to say, the PEV did have a tribal dimension but we are now at a point where individuals need to face the consenquences of their actions. Of course the guilty will attempt to shelter behind their tribes but it has to be made clear that tribes are not on trial but individuals who committed acts of atrocity.
The police were also unleashed in Nairobi. It would help if you thought a little harder and stopped advancing misconceptions. And I will help you. Kibaki appeared more concerned with protecting what one could term as the primary economic actors: the business interest and folks from the middle to upper classes. This is substantively not too different with the happenings of hurricane Katrina though in the latter case class and race interfaced. The deployment of the enforcement machinery, without resistance from the same, is an exercise of authority; and a successful one too.
Unlike you, I find it hard to celebrate nay glorify Odinga's power to "freely roam the country" at the time for very obvious reasons, including the fact that that power was derived from hatred and anti-Kikuyuism that he had so skillfully entrenched since before the 2005 referendum. I didnt hear though of Odinga roaming around Naivasha.
I saw the incident you speak of. I however did not see the ravaging mobs advancing.....towards the victims. I saw the plumes of smoke though as Kibaki gave his speech. Those plumes of smoke have no bearing on the president's power. Sort of reminds of the time when Kenyatta was pelted with rotten eggs in Kisumu.....
It is common knowledge that ethnic cleansing in Rift valley was planned and paid for before the first vote was cast. There is also enough evidence of hatred campaign by Raila and his tribal chiefs with words like Kabila adui, sangari, lesotho...featuring in their speaches. There is also clear evidence of rigging in ODM strongholds eg Kajwang's Mbita constituency where Raila got 150% votes cast in his favour. WE have not heard ODM complain of that rigging or kill those responsible since they benefited from the sleaze. However that said, Kibaki should have done more to protect citizens, Raila should not have incited his supporters and the criminals who killed, raped, maimed and looted should face the law.
my tribute goes to the displined forces who meted full force on the killers. those complaining of use of force should make me understand how a policeman was to arrest arrow and panga wielding gangs. sometimes you have to choose between innocent life and scams life. am glad the police made the right choice.
the usula big mouthed Kenyan NGO's should see how americans are executing suspects in pakistan and other arab countries using bombs that also kill innocent women and children.
Anon 8:12:
Incidentally, the president's duty is to defend ALL and not just the so called primary economic actors.
The fundamental failure in Kibaki's handling of PEV is actually not how he reacted to it(a reactive response always implies that you have already taken the first jab)but the fact that he did not anticipate the violence and if he did, he did not put in place any contintency measures.
Courtesy of the ODM, in the run up to the elections, it was clear that the only way violence was going to be avoided was if ODM had won. In fact, when early count showed Odinga with a lead, part of me took solace in the fact that there was not going to be bloodshed.
The who stole the elections versus who did not/ who stole more than who debate, irritates me because ultimately the casulty was the regular, struggling folk who would never have been let close to the gates of State House, let alone let in on a rigging plot.
What I gather from crazy statistics showing up on both the ODM and PNU side (the 100%+ turnouts), is that democracy was messed with and mwananchi paid for it with blood. Should I excuse the inconsistencies on the PNU side just because ODM had a share of theirs?
(Digressing) I am not even suggesting that I have conclusive evidence that Kibaki rigged but sometimes all you need to get an idea of the truth, is to make a rough inference from what you can observe.
Observation 1: both parties posted unrealistic ballot turn outs in some consituencies.
Observation 2: Only ODM (albeit without explaining away their own inconsistencies) protested the irregularity; PNU, despite ODM posting numbers such as the ones you pointed out for MBita, never openly protested that ODM stole the elections (at least in Mbita). Why would PNU not make a stink about these apparent irregularities and indeed launch a formal complaint? Does the fact that ODM lost make irrelevant the rigging?
Inference: both ODM and PNU most likely rigged the elections. Whether or not PNU won as a result of rigging, I cannot tell.
As far as me glorifying Raila, you must have misread the tenor of my post. I am faulting him, nay, holding him responsible for being complacent and even actively funneling the violence when his influence could have easily saved lives. Had he gone around the troubled areas calming his supporters "we have lost the election but let us not lose our conscience," lives would have been saved. It is true that his actions during the campaign had precipitated the violence but had he stamped out the fires he stoked, the world would have easily forgotten that he is the one who struck the match in the first place. He might not have become the PM but his respectability today would have been bounds and leaps ahead of any Kenyan politician's.
As to comparing the Helldoret incident to the Kisumu eggers, I hope you are familiar with what Kenyatta's response to that provocation was. That is exactly how Kibaki should have reacted on that day. Don't you see patent impotency in a president trying to urge a family to go back to their homes which are being set on fire right in front of his eyes as he speaks?
Kibaki failed miserably in his handling of PEV.
"Don't you see patent impotency in a president trying to urge a family to go back to their homes which are being set on fire right in front of his eyes as he speaks?"
Actually I dont for one simple reason. By the time Kibaki was urging people to return home, Saitoti had established a good number of well-manned police posts. Here is how Kibaki assumes greater sophistication than the late Jomo. I knew you'd take the obvious way out.
But there's one thing I would fault Emilio over. He only paid lip service to reconcialiation and peace building. No amount of executive power can substitute goodwill and tolerance among the citizenry, at least not in an aspiring democracy.
"Incidentally, the president's duty is to defend ALL and not just the so called primary economic actors."
I cannot dispute this easy proposition. But it happens to not be the empirical outcome, even in mature democracies, yet they struggle to uphold it.
Anon 2:56:
Fastfowarding to the present: are you satisfied with the way Kibaki is handling the issue of bringing perpetrators of PEV to justice? Does he appear to you like a man bent on getting those who committed those crimes by hook or by crook, or someone who only reluctantly acts when under pressure?
Ps: Contintenty @ 10:22 = contingency
Yes, very much. Yes.
And you?
No, I am not. He would have been happier if the whole thing were to blow away and we pretended that nothing happened. Kibaki and Raila know that some of their top lieutenants, if not the principals themselves, might have been implicated in the violence and as such would not like to see the issue of violence 2007/8 revisited.
Is this blog dead?
it is dead. yes.
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