Shattered

Kenya shatters herself in Somalia

 By Philo Ikonya

The eardrums of Salagle Town of Lower Juba in Somalia are shattered

Kenya kills her neighbour reducing 20 years of help to death

Abdi Kadir Ali has left for safety. Warplanes are the new sky

Kenya has moved into Somalia. Husbands are missing. Women

have had it with the weapon of rape unfailing in all wars.

Children die alone, weak and helpless, starved:

Africa's flag in the world.

Kismayo island.

Mekatilili wa Menza was imprisoned there as was Harry

Thuku and many others. We owe ourselves a dialogue not shells

and skulls  of children taken from the mouth of drought killing cattle

and women and men and shot through again and again and again for

A crime encrusted in Shabaabs. 

Thirsts break my soul.

When Kimaathi and Mau Mau fought the British and won

They did not go to England to kill. They had no planes

They walked forests that are villages now. They spoke to rivers

mists, sands and soils and heard the secrets of nature.

And beheld mountains and seas – Learn to focus.

The enemy is within your clothes. 

You shoot yourselves.

Kenya: We do not need the death of Somalis to make peace!

About Somalia and Kenya


For circulation and open posting on all media platforms

STATE KENYAN WRITERS AND PUBLIC INTELLECTUALS
We, the undersigned, register, in the strongest terms, our opposition
to Kenya’s military incursion into Somalia.

We note that several months at minimum is required to plan a military
operation that involves crossing borders. Therefore the reasons put
forward by the Kenyan government for this operation are demonstrably
false.

Statements from the French Government (see link below) and Medicins
Sans Frontieres contradict the Kenyan Government’s allegation that Al-
Shabaab is responsible for the kidnapping of Marie Dedieu and two
other foreigners.

We will kill Somalis and call them Al-Shabaab. We will all feel very
Kenyan indeed.

They die, so we can create a national amnesia about 350,000 internally
displaced Kenyans, missing World Bank  monies, missing Education
Ministry funds, the ICC-Kenya trials, 2012 elections, the
implementation of our new constitution.

The army will claim, as invading armies always do, that they have
courageously engaged the enemy, when they have really killed innocent
civilians.

All Kenyans paying already for this bout of blood-thirst. We will go
on paying, for many years to come. We will pay with our taxes, our un-
built schools and hospitals, our unpaid teachers, our still-jobless
youth, our rapidly deteriorating security situation, our shattered
relationship with our neighbours.

We do not require the death of Somalis to know who and where we are.

SIGNED: (in alphabetical order)

Nguru Karugu
Keguro Macharia
Paul Mwangi Maina
Tom Maliti
Dr. Firoze Manji
Abdulrahman Mirimo
Dr. Wambui Mwangi
Kenne Mwikya
Benjamin Wambua Ndolo
Onyango Oloo
Odhiambo Oyoko
Shailja Patel
Philo Ikonya