There was a time when leaders agreed to disagree. Today we have two alpha bullies, a Parliament of sycophants and a country of cowards, writes Denis Galava.
This week’s rowdy physical clash in the National Assembly demonstrates just how fast and low governance ethos in the country is falling. Disguised as competition over Minority leadership in the House, it was an extension of the ugly politics between President William Ruto and his nemesis Raila Odinga , with Members of Parliament as their proxies.
Looked at together with the visceral diatribe on the Finance Bill (2023), the violent disorder in Parliament speaks to festering intolerance and a return to a past autocratic age.
Kenya is rolling back the wheel of history, to restore control of civic affairs by overbearing individuals.
The only difference is that there is more than one centre of this authoritarian power. The creeping despotism needs to be arrested before it bursts the banks.
The levels of concern get to a new high when we remind ourselves of the chaotic struggles that took place at the Bomas of Kenya on August 15, last year, ahead of the official declaration of the presidential election results. The indecorous disregard for the norms of orderly governance lives on.
When a forum that is supposed to be the ultimate emblem of law and order falls into the disorder of common hooliganism and street pandemonium, the country has cause to be afraid, very afraid indeed. Times were when politicians disagreed with decency. Fierce debates were previously held in this House. The only assets that the leaders brought in were facts and celerity of the mind. Older Kenyans must get nostalgic with a memory of the assertive Legislature of the past when men and women with laser-sharp intellects locked mental horns on the floor of Parliament.
Tom Mboya, Paul Ngei, Martin Shikuku, Jean Marie Seroney, Chief Gitonga, JM Kariuki, George Anyona, Moses Mudavadi, and Chelagat Mutai must turn in their graves at the dismal performance of the latter-day legislature.
What’s more, the scenario repeatedly replays itself in county assemblies across the country. These assemblies have become theatres of shameful bedlam, with their regular war cries of impeachment and disgraceful physical fights.
Looked at together with the visceral diatribe on the Finance Bill (2023), the violent disorder in Parliament speaks to festering intolerance and a return to a past autocratic age.
Photo credit: File | Nation Media Group
People who seem to have reached the end of their short fuses and limited intellect are habitually throwing up tantrums that swiftly degenerate into rumpuses and affrays. Men and women alike, they throw at one another just about any object that they can lay their hands upon.
After that, they dust themselves up, walk out and drive home and to other places, to introduce themselves as ‘honourable somebodies.’ It is disgusting.
We are reminded that this is not an isolated occurrence in Parliament. Invective is often thrown at the two Speakers in the Senate and National Assembly alike. Daunting deficiency of emotional intelligence and poor self-management has seen certain pejoratively predictable members being regularly thrown out of the House. They return a few days later, to engage in the same turpitude.
What happened to the decorum and common decency in Parliament and leadership generally? Parliament is the ultimate symbol of civility in contexts of divergent opinions.
Institutions like Parliament are constituted, basically, to process divergent and even conflicting opinions. They diligently and intelligently coax the opinions into common and binding conclusions.
President William Ruto and Azimio leader Raila Odinga at Kipkeino Classic at Moi Sports Center Kasarani on May 13, 2023.
Photo credit: Pool
The very existence of the legislature recognises that we cannot be of one mind on any one thing at any one time. Our different minds must, accordingly, be given the chance to meet and compete in a common lawful crucible. The regulated heat of the mental crucible melts the diverse mind into a common bind, as a factor of process and debate.
Parliaments are, therefore, not hoodlum and gangster clubs, or assemblies of mighty hooligan formations. The only might in the House and leadership generally is brainpower and common decency.
Regrettably, there is now an indecorous invasion of Parliament by an overbearing Executive and restless Opposition chief alike. President William Ruto and Opposition leader Raila Odinga are birds of a feather.
They have now put Parliament on notice over the controversial Finance Bill (2023). MPs must vote the way each of the two political top dogs wants, or face the music.
President William Ruto during the Kenya Kwanza Parliamentary Group Meeting at State House, Nairobi on May 23, 2023.
Photo credit: PCS
Political brinkmanship and intolerance in Kenya is getting out of hand. It is certainly defining the early days of the Ruto regime. Whether he knows it or not, this could mature into his enduring legacy.
‘We are watching you,’ Ruto and Odinga have separately told their MPs. They frightfully echo the sinister Orwellian ‘Big Brother is watching you’ dictum.
Kenya must not be allowed to sink into the regression of social and political reverse gears. It is tragic that MPs should be expected to vote on the Finance Bill out of fear of repercussions from their bosses, rather than out of considered opinion and conscience after reasoned debate. The logic that when the top dog barks, the rest should echo the master’s voice, is dangerous and anachronistic. History has demonstrated that when Parliament gets cowed, society follows suit. The despotic tentacles soon spread out to emasculate the rest of the nation. Soon enough, nobody will be free.
And, of course, power goes beyond those in the Executive for the time being. It extends to those in the Opposition too. Indeed, it extends to everyone who is able to induce fear just with the words, ‘I am watching you.’ These are some of the most unfortunate utterances from high places in the country, for a long time. They come with chilling reminders of the excesses of the rule of presidents Jomo Kenya and Daniel arap Moi.
Kenyans are agreed that the 40 years of the Kanu regime were in the main a long night of bad leadership. Jomo Kenyatta often bawled at dissenters in indignant idiom, ‘I will crush you like rats.’ And they were often crushed. Nominated MP Pio Gama Pinto was a thorn in the Kanu flesh, even as he belonged to the party. He was slain in February 1965.
Azimio leaders led by National Assembly Minority leader Opiyo Wandayi during a press conference at Parliament Buildings on Thursday, June 8, 2023.
Photo credit: Dennis Onsongo | Nation Media Group
Tom Mboya, the chief architect of political mischief in Kanu and the de facto one-party State, fell to what is believed to have been a State-sponsored assassin in July 1969. J.M. Kariuki’s mutilated body was found in Ngong Forest in March 1975, because of his fiery political barbs against the order of the day. In between, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga and his train in the KPU Party were detained without trial in October 1969.
President Moi ascended to office in 1978 with the mantra of ‘Fwata Nyayo.’ The message was clear, ‘Walk in my footsteps.’ More aptly put, ‘Follow what I say, and do my will.’ Sycophants styled Moi as Kenya’s everything number one. He was the nation’s foremost thinker and teacher. When he coughed, everyone caught the cold. Those who did not have it rough. Detention, murder, and mayhem significantly defined the Nyayo years.
Kenya’s second president often reminded the political class how he had ‘danced to the tune of the Kenyatta drum’. He reminded everyone that he was now in charge. They would either toe his line or perish politically. Today, President Ruto and Mr Odinga have invaded the legislature. Soon they will be everywhere else. Together with the kowtowing legislators, they must be told no, or we forever lose our freedoms.
