Never in my life did I think I would have anything in common with one said William Samoei arap Ruto, one of Kenya's prophets of doom and war who gave his life to the Lord Jesus last Sunday. Last week, Ruto advised Muslims to vote against the draft if they did not want to be visited by violence at the hands of Christians, and repeatedly informed us that a document called a constitution (not leaders like him) would divide Kenya on religious lines. Like Ruto, I also had a foreboding that violence would visit Kenya. The only difference between him and me was the rationale we gave for our prophesies.
But before going into the details of my newfound spiritual profession, I would like to express my sympathy for the bereaved and the wounded of Sunday's Uhuru Park attack. May God heal them and may the ancestors avenge this unfortunate attack. And may the police find the culprits. No one deserves to die for what they believe or for the faith they put in the leaders who promised them a religious crusade. With this blast, one can't help remembering the Civil Rights movement during which people unsuccessfully fought the tide of democracy and history using bombs.
Unlike Ruto who attributed the possible violence to the constitution, I attributed it to the irrational passion with which some church leaders were opposing the document. In my last post, I said that the anti-constitution church leaders were worrying, for "people whose beliefs run contrary to reality are dangerous because they can resort to violence in order to force reality to coincide with their beliefs." In response to a reader's comment, I reiterated that the church leaders' reasoning was dangerous because "it refuses to respond to the reasoning of others, ignores reality and still insists that it is right, and then threatens those who do not agree with their numerical strength or spiritual blackmail."
I take no delight in saying that my words have unfortunately come to pass.
I have stated in my last two posts, and will say once again, that the speeches surrounding the upcoming referendum are fueled by supremacist rhetoric, despite being spoken by a religion that claims love as its foundation. The reason why the Church leaders' rhetoric in particular is often compared to white supremacy is because the current world order is dominated by the trinity of white race, Christianity and capitalism, so that anywhere in the world, one is deemed superior if they embody qualities that appear to mirror this trinity. Since superior, by its very definition demands a comparison to an inferior, this supremacist order incites fear and hatred, and organizes violent sideshows in order to impose binaries in which one side seeks to eliminate or subjugate the inferior, non white-Christian-capitalist Other. When the individuals are not white, we are not talking about white supremacy but a mutation of it.
Here are four pillars of this supremacist dispensation in Kenya:
(a) Religious supremacy
This supremacist myth divides Kenya into Christians vs. Muslims, although upon closer examination, the anti-constitutional section of the church uses the term "Islam" as a synonym for all that challenges Christian hegemony. Muslims have been made the scapegoat of Christian insecurity by virtue of their status as the largest visible religious minority and because of the anti-Muslim crusade since Bush invaded Iraq.
The crusaders against the constitution claim that they are against the entrenchment of Kadhi courts in the constitution out of a principled commitment to a secular state, but scratching the surface of their argument reveals that what they mean by "secular" is the normalization of Christianity as the unofficial state religion of Kenya. Otherwise their campaign for secularism would include the withdrawal of State support for church-sponsored schools and hospitals, for the chaplains in the disciplined forces, teachers, doctors and nurses and chaplains in Church institutions who are on the government payroll, and for the teaching of Christian Religious Education in schools.
It is possible that not all those termed as "Christian" actually subscribe to the Christian faith but to African traditional religions. The fact that African religions are counted as part of the 80% Christians shows how little respect we have for African traditions. We have Christian and Muslim public holidays but no African traditional one. Therefore, African traditions are seen as having no integrity and purpose other than to lay the foundation for evangelization of Africa.
(b) Gender supremacy
Let's be honest: the furor against the window provided in the proposed constitution for saving the lives of pregnant women is really not about the sanctity of life but about hatred for women. It's misogyny; not sexism. It is based on the idea that men alone should determine who lives and who doesn't. It is based on the patriarchal frustration with male helplessness during the gestation period and the feeling that women should not have any power at all. Yet the truth is that pregnancy, despite being housed in the woman's body, remains a mystery. Nobody can determine why some pregnancies survive and others don't, or how women's bodies will react to, and how women will live through, pregnancy and childbirth.
The idea that life begins at conception is a heresy which was included in the proposed constitution to accommodate the church. So it is a lie that the views of the Church leaders were disregarded by the Committee of Experts who drafted the document. But as one can see from the opposition to Kadhi courts, the anti-reform church leaders are not satisfied because they think it is their way or the highway for Kenya.
It is ironical that the same Christians who condemn science as anti-religious and idolatrous resort to a bio-chemical process to define the beginning of life. Even more ironical is that the medical experts who should be the crusaders for this heresy state that they are unable to tell where life begins.
Life begins in God who breathed life into a being molded from soil. Life begins in God who stretched a cowhide from the sky, or who placed a man and woman at a fig tree and gave them daughters. The reason that such myths of origins exist is because when human beings reduce the infinite nature of life to the finite, the ultimate result is the desecration of life. It is no wonder that the Western world which began this heresy perfected it through slavery, racism and genocide which it sugar-coated with Christianity in order to designate some human beings as inferior by the will of God.
There was no "conception" before these human beings came into the world. Surely, Christ's life did not begin at conception. Therefore Mary cannot be given as justification for the rabidly anti-women stand. God values women's lives. Women are just as human and made in the image of God as men. Their lives matter.
(c) Ethnic supremacy
Some of the staunchest opposition to the proposed constitution is ironically found among clergy, politicians and the bourgeoisie from the Kalenjin and Kikuyu communities. You would think that given the conflict over land, personalities from these communities would be the most in favor of the new constitution.
There are a number of rationales given for this paradox. For one, politicians like Koigi wa Wamwere fear that counties will be turned into ethnic "jimbos," but what he leaves unsaid is his fear that the counties outside Central will discriminate against the Kikuyu in particular. According to this same reasoning, Kikuyus are appointed to positions because they are qualified, while non-Kikuyus are appointed because of their tribe. It does not occur to them that people from other tribes are appointed because they too are qualified, nor do they consider the possibility that some Kikuyus also win appointments simply because of their tribe. In my conversation with some very educated people, I have discovered that behind this logic is the conviction among some that Kikuyus are the most qualified and the hardest working individuals in Kenya. This myth was famously voiced, to the shock of Kenyan viewers, on Louis Otieno's show on the road when it was hosted in Nyeri in 2008. As if in complete oblivion to the ideologies and hostilities that fueled the post-election violence, the participants said that Kenyans are jealous of Kikuyus because the latter work hard and are "successful."
The Rift Valley politicians against the constitution, like the two Rutos, Isaac and William, basically share this supremacist ideology; their dispute is that it is Kalenjins who should be superior. Hence the obsessive war against the Kikuyu under the slogan of "41 against 1." But the truth is that this war for political and economic supremacy is basically an in-house tug of war between the heirs of Kenyatta and Moi, and that is why they now find camaraderie in their opposition to the constitution, despite their enmity before and after the 2007 elections. So if anything, Kenya is being subjected to a war between politicians who seem to think that leadership of our country is an ethnic birthright, and are holding the entire country hostage to the war of "40 against 2." The greatest number of casualties during the post-election violence was from the conflict between these two tribes that held the country hostage. And as if that is not bad enough, the wavering Kalonzo Musyoka now wants his tribe to join the bandwagon, hence the creation of the KKK political alliance. The very acronym of the alliance is morbidly telling.
Many ethnic groups in Kenya are cocooned in their own brand of supremacy crafted by politicians for the purpose of getting into political office. It is for this reason that a new kind of presidency other than the one we have now becomes all the more urgent.
(d) Ideological supremacy
The definition of "success" based on material possession and employment is spiritualized by the prosperity gospel and its new age allies who believe that one's success entirely depends on his own initiative, belief, hard work and personal relationship with God.
That ideology conveniently forgets that even Kenya's richest man cannot afford to build the national infrastructure that facilitated the production of this wealth. He cannot afford to pay the police to protect him, to pay for the roads and airports on which he transports his produce, for the schools his children attend or for the education, from primary school to the university, of the teachers who teach his children. My friends who criticize what they call employment on the basis of ethnicity, rather than "qualifications" or "merit" which they consider themselves to have, were educated in schools funded by taxpayers. But in true capitalist fashion, they socialize resources but privatize wealth.
A nation cannot survive on the idea that what I earn is mine but others should pay for the facilities that facilitate my earnings. In fact, that ideology is very un-African. Those of us who support the proposed constitution seek to entrench in Kenyan society a social consciousness which is informed by African philosophies. We believe that poverty somewhere is poverty everywhere, and that each of us has a duty to ensure that every Kenyan has access to food, housing, education and work. We want to see a Kenyan society where success is more than just being wealthy, more schooled or well employed. Wealth must also be seen in terms of love for a fellow Kenyan and one's contribution to the public good in each corner of our beloved nation.
By contrast, those against the adoption of the proposed constitution simply scream slogans about right to life and secular state, with little or disdainful regard for flesh and blood Kenyans who struggle with difficult moral dilemmas and physical challenges, and who have struggled long and hard to arrive at the threshold of change we witness today. For them, man is made for Sabbath and not Sabbath for man. In their view, a constitution is for Kenyans to obey rather than for serving Kenyans.
But this capitalist ideology leads to the second factor influencing the campaign against the constitution: Railaphobia. There is a mystical fear, created and fueled by the press, of Raila taking advantage of the approved constitution to become president. This fear is irrational and most likely tribalist. It is partly driven by fear that Raila would dismantle capitalism through socialist policies that would whittle away at the actual and perceived wealth of Central province and at the huge tracts of land owned in the Rift Valley, and partly by the general anti-Luo sentiments in a considerable section of the population.
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In light of these insidious ideologies, it becomes evident why we need a new constitution: Kenyans need to be redeemed from the insecurities caused by the current flawed constitution, and the toxic political order that makes us find false security in tribal or religious insularity and in antagonism to "outsiders." We need to be confident and to trust each other; to trust that Kenyan Muslims are not Islamic terrorists, that Kenyan women are not abortion-happy fanatics, that Kenyans genuinely want to embrace brotherhood and sisterhood amongst people of different languages and faiths, or that Raila as the next president will not spell doom for Kenya but might promise better things to come. A vote for the constitution is an expression of confidence in one's self and of faith in fellow Kenyans, both of which can stem the fear that William Ruto loves to propagate or the cowardice displayed at Uhuru Park this week.
