Wednesday, November 25, 2009

A NEW CONSTITUTION AND REFORM.

Nothing will bring us change, not the law, not the international community, not even The Hague, but ourselves. For that reason I do not expect any change in ourselves as individuals making up a nation to arise due to the enactment of any law or set of laws because we are a corrupt people. Therefore expecting a new constitution to magically transform this whole nation by creating a whole new political platform and eventually making our intricate problems or challenges a little solvable is absolutely dreamy. As much as the current constitution may have erroneous laws, or laws that are unjust, we should ask ourselves about the remaining ‘sound’ part of the current constitution, does it serve us any good, equally without discrimination, does it protect us and preserve our rights? On paper it does, but it is us who contaminate it with corruption and greed. A new constitution may be a good thing for this country, but it won’t bring any more change than itself- a new constitution, if we don’t change as well.

Some Kenyans consider a new constitution as the starting point, the first step to change or reform but it shouldn’t be. Having this notion evokes the feeling that if we as a nation fail to acquire a new constitution this time round then we wouldn’t be able to move on. Not to undermine the importance of the constitution, but it is just a document written by individuals to depict how power is going to be shared and how the country will be governed, period. Whether or not it works for us does not entirely depend on the document itself but also on us. We decide. So in the end, change comes from within us.

At the core of all our troubles lies tribalism. Some assert that it can never ever be solved. But we owe it to ourselves and to prove to the rest of the world that we can be big enough to solve a problem of this enormity and not just kick it by the side to avoid facing it. Intermarriages could serve a great purpose to that effect but it may not be the best option because it MAY mean dissolution of the tribes, which is something we don’t desire and it also it would constitute kicking the problem by the side so we won’t have to actually resolve it. The cause of tribalism is not the tribes themselves but the people of the respective tribes. Tribalism can be eliminated, it can be done faster and sooner than we’d like to think, it can be done tomorrow! There is no reason to wait a another decade or century. Only we can bring change, and it begins right when we start seeing each other as partners, from there greater positive change will come.

There’s not a doubt about how tribalism can be dealt with, tribalism is as a result of ignorance and ignorance can be reversed by only one thing- education. Not education as we Kenyans have been made to believe it is, as to having our heads cramped with so much information in our memories which we may not fully understand, but education as being liberal and independent in our thoughts and being able to form an opinion based on the facts and having the ability to dissociate our personal interests and emotions in our final judgment for the greater good of the nation or even in our personal lives. This education can happen both inside and outside classrooms. It is doable.

When we have a population educated in the sense described in the previous paragraph, change becomes inevitable. Everything would fall in its rightful place, because then we would give more consideration to the unborn children in making decisions of national interest. When it comes such a time when we can rise to reach the level selflessness in order to attain greater good for the nation, at that time there would be nothing to stop us. As it is now, we are our own worst enemy.

Revisiting the issue of new constitution, the draft constitution has renamed and scrapped off some national days. In my opinion this to some extent erodes that Kenyan sense of pride, because it seems like whoever changed it saw something wrong with the initial name, and therefore we may have been celebrating a lie all this time. The same can be said of holidays cancelled from the calendar as national days. It’s like renaming Christmas!

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