Dear Siri, this is not a secret, we must rid ourselves of fear

Dear Siri,

You are not happy at all, Siri.  And you know I wish that you were. Not so long ago you told me about your frustrations with the slow pace of developments in Kenya. I remember sighing a lot when you mentioned tribalism. You were skyping with me from a far country where you live and work for now. You told me that we had to do something. I promised to write you a letter. Skype was not enough even though we could talk for long, see each others' expressions and even take tea in between. You liked my black mug. It was written in white. NO to Racism! From such things, I drink Siri.

You know your name fascinates me.Siri. In Kiswahili it means a secret and you seem to have none. In Norwegian it is a girl's name. And it is not in the dictionary Norsk-engelsk dictionary by Aschehough and Gyldendal that I have here. But we have the internet. And I have found it in a site called My birthvillage.com! Its meanings are given there in Kiswahili and Swedish. " The baby girl name Siri comes from the Indian word which means 'Godess Lakshmi, wealth'. 'God's gift of love'. In Sandinavian countries it means "Beautiful & victorious, fair victory!"

I really wish for us in Kenya, Siri that we become like you. Have a fair victory. Can we make it? How shall we make it to live with that wealth that is love? You know Siri, a lot is said about our peoples taking to tribalism because of lack of knowledge. I disagree. You see Siri, very often we take it for granted that things cannot be examined and questioned and that this makes us grow. Look, I know that many people in Kenya quoted to me the Bible, in the book of Isaiah often during elections.

They told me.. "My people perish for lack of knowledge!" Not always so. We know much about one another. Of course we can always learn more but we lie to ourselves if we say that people discriminate for lack of knowledge of the other. No one knows a human being completely. No one can actually master even one culture and why it ticks. Our business is not to master one another. It is to be open to one another. I do not know all your customs in your area but to love and not want to cut you down including with a panga does not come from knowing your customs. I know it just by being human. I do not want anyone to cut up my children or me, and so it simply follows that I do not wish it on any human being.

I saw that a dean at the University of Nairobi was very excited that on one radio there is education about our many ethnic groups. I understand. But let me say that it is actually injustice that makes people angry, not lack of knowledge. It is when people are left out and feel they are hanging precariously on the whims of those in power and not institutions.

Tribalism which is worrying you and is uppermost on our minds for a long, long time and moreso since 2007 has a direct correlation with poor governance. I mean that if Kibaki had led in a different way, it would not be an uppermost concern. It grows proportionately with cronyism, nepotism and corruption. There is some kind of touting of what one has and can do for individuals one chooses that goes with it. It grows more when institutions are not respected.

You have seen the Judiciary in Kenya is trying to make a significant mark. The fact is that Justice Mumbi Ngugi ruled that the president cannot appoint as Kibaki had done 47 county chiefs without regarding of gender and unilaterally was great. In the judicial reforms and appointment we were and are breaking world records with the vetting of judges. Why should anyone then over look an instutition and be so retrogressive, so against the steps we have already taken forward. This kind of action as the county bosses were not reflecting any gender or even regional balance bring tribalism head on to the people. It really does not take too much to see that.

Just rulings, will include the risk of choosing democracy. It is a risk in that it allows power to the people and the people can do a lot with power, but it is a happy risk. Much better than not having it and choosing dictatorships. You will see, Siri that if judgements continute to uphold the rule of law and human rights, there will be less tribalism.

I know there are so many other issues to speak about but I must do that another time. However, I want to let you know how much I enjoyed meeting or seeing Aung San Syu Kyi in Oslo. It was on 16.06.2012. She was so peaceful land so calm inspite of the very many years of oppression. She gave a marvellous speech in which her reference to refugees and those who are not at home was so moving because she knows what it means for one to be shut off from the people one loves. I was very near where she passed and there was something that many people did not see but which I saw. A woman from Burma covered her head with a cloth as she left the hall on the isle. I was watching how she bent her head so humbly and the cloth was put on her. I have a photo which is not so clear but which I will post to you with time. Today am writing very late and I have an early morning flight to catch. And I cannot find the page i wanted to quote in this book but will.

But Siri, the more I read about Burma where my Uncle and so many other Kenyan men were taken to fight by the British, the more I see that we have here a model both for Kenya and for us. What do I mean?  I will eleborate and draw parallels. I will not do it all in this letter as I will write again. For today, let me just say that when I read about dosa bhaya or corruption that is indulged in because of fear. I read about in Freedom from Fear by Aung San Syu Kyi. I had two ideas.

First was of course Bhaya... so close to mbaya which we depending on the class of the noun we are discussing in Kiswahili also turn it to baya means bad. Now this is deep. Aung San Syu Kyi describes four types of corruption. Dosa bhaya is an injustice one does because they are afraid to disappoint. They connive in cheating or giving another public resources because that other is a clansman or woman, of the same tribe or family and there is fear to say no because love might be affected. I have never seen corruption split into these sections and I wish so much to share more with you if you would like it. For you see, where there is fear we cannot look one another in the eye and say, we are going to sort out the problems of our country. We have faith in the people, in one another and this is something we must do.

All people who have a public post, all people who can write and do, must help us cut deep into our consciousness and from there arise with better thoughts and deeds. Arise without fear of saying this is where things have gone wrong and this, is what we can do about them...

I will write more when you reply. Remember to suffer in your heart for Uganda hit by Ebola a second time. We do not need more of these diseases that are so mysterious. Siri, all human being are learning and all of them are behind. Do not think as many do that all is well in advanced nations. I am sure you have heard that in a Baptist church in the USA a pastor refused to preside over the marriage ceremony of a couple simply because they are black. I guess this pastor who apologised later has never understood anything around him, never really seen these people. But he knew for sure that they worshipped in his church. He saw for sure, black people all over that land built upon slavery but he never saw. He learned but had no knowledge because he never wanted, did not have the will to open up to people of a dark skin. I am just concluding by telling you that we do not want the knowledge we have. We have to learn to will to know and to do.
We have to stand up without fear. We have to...


So long Siri,
Ni mimi
Philo

We no longer ask who assassinated Tom Mboya on 5th July 1969

Tom Mboya 

We no longer ask who assassinated  Joseph Thomas Mboya, on July 5 1969 and Josiah Kariuki Mwangi, on 2 March 1975. We know. We must now acknowledge these deaths as the Government of Kenya. 

And yet.... WHO ASSASSINATED these politicians, who?

The Government of the day must rise and serve justice, and tell the people…how to make sense of their history and nation. An apology is not enough. We have elected governments that have continued to operate as if these were not matters of urgency.

Writers and intellectuals have been relentless in this cause. Politicians have given up. The last voice I heard on Robert Ouko was James Orengo's and then it petered out. We cannot leave everything to a Truth Justice and Reconciliation Committee that has been dwarfed by controversy.  We have great hope in the Judiciary today. If only reforms will be real after the new constitution. We  have hope in committed people. Dr. Willy Mutunga, Kenya's Chief Justice is one of those who might make a big difference to Kenya's capacity to know herself as a nation, to believe in herself. And the citizens of course. 

We know our responsibility in communicating culture, history and peace. Tom Mboya, J.M Kariuki, Robert Ouko and Gama Pinto, no matter their weaknesses, are personalities that represented so much for Kenya that many people have died as a result of the deaths of these voices.

Chief Justice of Kenya, Dr. Willy Mutunga

We have to learn from history. Nations are still apologizing for the deportation of the Jews. Jens Stoltenberg the Prime Minister of Norway did so this year, January 2012. Recognition of such inhumanity, horror is important. It is vital.   

Joseph Thomas Mboya was assassinated on Saturday of July 5^th 1969 in Nairobi Kenya at about 11am. The city of Nairobi and the entire country was plunged into darkness. We were paralysed. I was in Kiambu and shock spread everywhere so tangibly that children could touch it. We only asked the adults in hushed tones… “What is it?” As we crowded round radios.. Later a song was released. Tom Mboya, ndiye baba yetu… Afirika twasitikika!.... “Tom Mboya is our father and we in Afrika are distraught!” 

It was a dark day beyond every border. It was terrible in Nyanza and Kisumu the capital. At his ceremony there was a stampede. My aunt told me that Mama Ngina’s shoes came off there.  In Kisumu people were later shot the day when Kenyatta visited Kisumu to  open what was called the Russian hospital. Poet Macgoye was there. She wrote a poem about the children who were killed.

The darkness continues since Mboya’s death. No justice was served.  Writers and human rights activists continue to speak out and to ask questions.

This is Tom, the man Kenya lost.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W0B60s5NiJw

Writers

David Goldsworthy wrote: Tom Mboya, the man Kenya wanted to forget. There are other books.

Marjorie Oludhe Macgoye has written about Mboya in her fiction. In Coming to Birth. Mboya was a brilliant leader.

In her fiction, Macgoye describes Tom Mboya after one of his meetings in Kenya. She writes,

"Martin was present at that Adult Education rally at Bahati where Tom finished his speech, debonair and controlled as ever and then rushed into the meeting which had been organised to exclude him."

On reading this, we realize that had the author captured Tom in a lively manner, Tom's image in action, this might have vivified this work tremendously. After all, Mboya's life had  marked effect on the major characters, Paulina and Martin. This minister was Martin's hero and when he died Martin's life was deeply influenced. It is then that Martin, and the author questioned the real meaning of freedom.

There is so much pain. There are no words. The characters speak…in sorrow…

Martin says in Dholuo.., "wawuok mondi" let us go… "woud min, nyathiwa" which means `child of my mother'. Macgoye further describes the situation in her poetry.

She wrote this poem For Tom only partly quoted here.

There's danger.

                            The grass is trampled.

                            Only vultures overhead

                            swoop, rend and darken.

                            All sheep is down,

                            The buffalo is down,

                            The elephant fallen,

                            Lion torn and unmanned.

                            ......................

                            Lie low for safety

                            The highest is gone.

"The hunters go unchecked; we see

                  Nothing to salvage from their prey. 

                  The carcase snatched from jackals,

                  lay encased, the spirit wandered free".

In a second poem,("For Tom another mode)", Macgoye asks     perti­nent questions about the death of Tom which led to so much distress in the land. She asks a question for freedom, for "the hunters go unchecked" after they have taken away the freedom to live, think and act from a leader who promised to be extremely helpful to the poor who needed him most and to the nation.

                   "Who calls him rich in worldly things? 

                  We knew him rich in peasant tongue, 

                   Thought in each language newly sprung

                   and courtesy, the grace of kings."

“In 1965, Pio Gama Pinto, formerly an activist for independence in 1950, was assassinated for political reasons. When in 1975, Josiah M. Kariuki, Member of Parliament disappeared and his dismembered body was found in Ngong Hills, the people of Kenya were deeply shocked. Macgoye, narrates in Coming to Birth how the people never stopped to miss their elected but killed leaders.  They mourned and commemorated them. The impact of J.M's death was strong: "J.M. burst upon the scene as a martyr and a paroxysm of grief ran through the city. The skies were leaden that April and it grew colder and colder." And pop music makers of the day, Kamaru and others did not fear so ask Kenyatta in songs in his mother tongue which they spoke what happened to Kariuki. The song went... People of our mother since Kariuki has died... and he has not stolen or killed anybody He has died for being good... and you ask yourself what you will die for... a song I heard and which moves me still. "Andu a maitu tondu Kariuki ni akua.. na tikuiya kana kuragana.. tundo arakua arakwire wega wake.eee na inyui mwiyuragiee mugakua kiii_ oiii oiii ooiii ye.. J M Kariuki mwendwo ni iri...." Kenyatta banned the song.

JM Kariuki

A bomb blast at a Nairobi bus station in 1975 preceded J.M. Kariuki's death. Some ordinary Kenyans were killed in that mysterious incident. Macgoye shows the negative impact of these mysterious deaths of leaders on the people and on the country as a whole. In so doing, Macgoye is questioning the fact that some individual's political careers and therefore freedom, were so thwarted. “ (Philo Ikonya MA thesis)

Charles Mugane Njonjo  is testifying today, 5^th July 2012,  in the Kirima case in Nairobi was interviewed by Citizen TV and a series run in 2008 &2009 on the assassination of JM Kariuki on March 1975. It is still about questions, not answers but it gets very close. Leaves it in Government. Now we want acknowledgement.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Njonjo

Charles Mugane Njonjo

Former legislator, Martin Shikuku who is unwell today told me in 2008 and that is also recorded in the Hansard (Kenya Parliament official documentation) how he spoke to JM Kariuki when Mboya was killed urging him to support him when he asked the question in Kenyatta’s Bunge. Everyone was a afraid. JM Kariuki was Kenyatta’s secretary. Shikuku asked the question in Kenyatta’s  Parliament, Who killed Tom Mboya? He was supported by Deputy Speaker, Seroney. J.M. Kariuki did not manage. Martin and Seroney were detained. But a five years and a few months later, J.M. Kariuki was assassinated too. Now Shikuku still went to Parliament and still asks from his sick bed am sure….”Who killed Joseph Thomas Mboya? Who killed Josiah Mwangi Kariuki? We ask because it is good when governments acknowledge their big errors even if time has passed. Norway only apoligized to the Jews this year. We ask. But we know even when we ask. We know. It is better that you, governments of today, come clean and speak to us. There is something about healing in agreeing on what happened if we are one! These issues have never been focused on in a way that can unite us and now we are often torn and in tribal shreds. Some of the politicians today were still in Parliament then, many have died without telling us what they knew or felt, registering their grief beyond tribal and family cocoon, bar talk. 


We do not need whispers anymore. We need crystal clear voices of justice on what went wrong, symbolic ceremonies, justice for the families, shrines and museums where we make reparation for their bodies so violently taken, all of them...all the heroes of Kenya recognized and their role, and more books and poems. Songs. Songs in all languages of Kenya but songs of unity in our struggles. Songs for heroes. Not songs of the hatred that injustice has borne among us and tribalism, the child of political machinations. We need hope in the likes of Shikuku, Seroney, Ouko, Kariuki and Mboya who spoke the mother tongue of justice without worrying about clans and ethnicity they came from. All these and more love protests, so that history is forever alive!

Robert Ouko, left Minister for Foreign Affairs, Jimmy Carter and  Daniel Toroitich Arap Moi on the last tour they  made A few weeks after their return, Robert Ouko was assassinated. 

Eh Mungu nguvu yetu!