we never thought it would happen here..
we are all in despair over the current situation in kenya. I visited the prosperous beautiful country in may last year. here I got to learn about some of the frustrations over (the lack of) access to land and political influence, and how the government politics have played on the cleavages between "us and them". the situation in the north was hectic, many people internally displaced, in an endless search for a safe life and access to land for themselves and their animals.
after the elections on 27th december, as we all know, the situation has worsened considerably. frustration, oppression, exclusion and power struggle has been manifested in widespread violence and atrocities in a country experiencing its most serious tensions since its independence in 1963.
this commentary gives us a moral story providing some perspective to the violence and the inflamed political situation. it pinpoints the complexity of conflict, and reminds us to see beyond the ethnic rhetoric, or rather to try to understand why such cleavages are reinforced when access to power is disputed...
after the elections on 27th december, as we all know, the situation has worsened considerably. frustration, oppression, exclusion and power struggle has been manifested in widespread violence and atrocities in a country experiencing its most serious tensions since its independence in 1963.
this commentary gives us a moral story providing some perspective to the violence and the inflamed political situation. it pinpoints the complexity of conflict, and reminds us to see beyond the ethnic rhetoric, or rather to try to understand why such cleavages are reinforced when access to power is disputed...
I encourage all of you to spend 5 minutes reading it.
Kenya: The truth about violence is in the bigger picture
Daily Nation (Kenya), by Eunice Kamaraa - January 30, 2008.
Nearly all my first lessons to my students at whatever level begin with the famous story of the elephant and the six blind men.
The story is so simple that my postgraduate students often wonder at my simple thinking. But for me, the story best prepares the student, very much like a soldier prepares himself for war, not just for the academic life, but also for real life. The story goes: Some six blind men had an encounter with an elephant. The first man felt the tail of the animal, the second one the leg, the third the sides, the fourth the ear, the fifth touched the tusks and the last one touched the ?..Then the blind men began a discussion on how the elephant looks like.
The first mand said that the elephant is like a branch of a tree but the second one said it is not like a branch of tree but actually like a tree trunk. The third man laughed at the first and the second and said that the elephant is neither like a branch of a tree nor like trunk for it is like a flat rough wall. But the fourth man interjected dismissing all others as wrong, saying that the elephant is like a winnowing basket. Then the fifth man laughed out loudly saying that his colleagues had not properly felt the elephant as the animal is like two big carved horns, but even before he finished describing, the sixth man interrupted to disagree with everyone else and say that the elephant is like a long trumpet.
The moral of the story is that there are many perspectives to reality. It all depends on where you are standing. All the blind men were right in their perspectives because each was accurately describing the elephant from what he felt. However, all of them were wrong because the elephant has all these perspectives. To get to the truth, it is necessary to get as many perspectives as possible in order to see the whole picture. Nothing could be truer than this in explaining the current situation of violence in Kenya.
Many would want to argue that the suspected rigging of presidential vote is the cause of the violence. But this is only one aspect of reality. The presidential vote only sparked off the violence. The truth is that there are deep seated issues related to historical injustices such as of land distribution. But these issues of historical injustices are not the only issues. There are also issues of selfish political leaders, who seek to get or retain power at all costs, even at the cost of their supporters’ lives.
One wonders how they succeed to throw a whole country into such chaos and the answer lies in another perspective: there are many unemployed, poor, hopeless, and frustrated youths for whom an opportunity of violence is a win situation for them because they have nothing to lose, but everything to gain. They can loot, they can release their frustrations even when it is misdirected at their fellow poor youth, or to the police, and they can entertain themselves by harassing the rich, who they are jealous of and sometimes attribute their situation to their riches.
But of course there is also a good number of youth who are not necessarily frustrated or hopeless, but are simply ignorant and therefore easily misused by political leaders. And we cannot leave out the question of tribalism. The dichotomy between ‘them’ and ‘us’ is clear in Kenya today though the lines are not so clear as they naturally keep expanding.
The truth is that once we start discriminating against people on the basis of identity, there is no end to it. We can go down to discriminating on the basis of clans and deeper into families and eventually into individuals. In short, the reason the truth seems blurred in Kenya today and everyone is blaming everyone else, is that we have six blind men: Kibaki (and all around him), Raila (and all around him), the media, the international community, the religious leaders, and therefore the led (the people), are describing the situation from where they stand.
The truth is that we are all part of the problem and therefore part of the solution. For as long as we remain imprisoned by our selfish interests, egoistic ethnic, political and religious identities, we will never see the truth and we will never be free. For the truth is in the whole picture!
*Eunice Kamaara is a professor of Religious Studies at Moi University, Eldoret.
lets all hope for better times...
Daily Nation (Kenya), by Eunice Kamaraa - January 30, 2008.
Nearly all my first lessons to my students at whatever level begin with the famous story of the elephant and the six blind men.
The story is so simple that my postgraduate students often wonder at my simple thinking. But for me, the story best prepares the student, very much like a soldier prepares himself for war, not just for the academic life, but also for real life. The story goes: Some six blind men had an encounter with an elephant. The first man felt the tail of the animal, the second one the leg, the third the sides, the fourth the ear, the fifth touched the tusks and the last one touched the ?..Then the blind men began a discussion on how the elephant looks like.
The first mand said that the elephant is like a branch of a tree but the second one said it is not like a branch of tree but actually like a tree trunk. The third man laughed at the first and the second and said that the elephant is neither like a branch of a tree nor like trunk for it is like a flat rough wall. But the fourth man interjected dismissing all others as wrong, saying that the elephant is like a winnowing basket. Then the fifth man laughed out loudly saying that his colleagues had not properly felt the elephant as the animal is like two big carved horns, but even before he finished describing, the sixth man interrupted to disagree with everyone else and say that the elephant is like a long trumpet.
The moral of the story is that there are many perspectives to reality. It all depends on where you are standing. All the blind men were right in their perspectives because each was accurately describing the elephant from what he felt. However, all of them were wrong because the elephant has all these perspectives. To get to the truth, it is necessary to get as many perspectives as possible in order to see the whole picture. Nothing could be truer than this in explaining the current situation of violence in Kenya.
Many would want to argue that the suspected rigging of presidential vote is the cause of the violence. But this is only one aspect of reality. The presidential vote only sparked off the violence. The truth is that there are deep seated issues related to historical injustices such as of land distribution. But these issues of historical injustices are not the only issues. There are also issues of selfish political leaders, who seek to get or retain power at all costs, even at the cost of their supporters’ lives.
One wonders how they succeed to throw a whole country into such chaos and the answer lies in another perspective: there are many unemployed, poor, hopeless, and frustrated youths for whom an opportunity of violence is a win situation for them because they have nothing to lose, but everything to gain. They can loot, they can release their frustrations even when it is misdirected at their fellow poor youth, or to the police, and they can entertain themselves by harassing the rich, who they are jealous of and sometimes attribute their situation to their riches.
But of course there is also a good number of youth who are not necessarily frustrated or hopeless, but are simply ignorant and therefore easily misused by political leaders. And we cannot leave out the question of tribalism. The dichotomy between ‘them’ and ‘us’ is clear in Kenya today though the lines are not so clear as they naturally keep expanding.
The truth is that once we start discriminating against people on the basis of identity, there is no end to it. We can go down to discriminating on the basis of clans and deeper into families and eventually into individuals. In short, the reason the truth seems blurred in Kenya today and everyone is blaming everyone else, is that we have six blind men: Kibaki (and all around him), Raila (and all around him), the media, the international community, the religious leaders, and therefore the led (the people), are describing the situation from where they stand.
The truth is that we are all part of the problem and therefore part of the solution. For as long as we remain imprisoned by our selfish interests, egoistic ethnic, political and religious identities, we will never see the truth and we will never be free. For the truth is in the whole picture!
*Eunice Kamaara is a professor of Religious Studies at Moi University, Eldoret.
lets all hope for better times...
