Democracy Rarely Produces Leaders
The reason I
was hesitant above to say we elect leaders, is because we rarely do. A leader
is a person who provides guidance and direction. In order to do this, he has to
know that direction. Most of the politicians we put in office do not know of
the direction in which they wish to take us. They are therefore not leaders and
have no hope of being. The Kenyan political scene is littered with people in
power who cannot recall a single paragraph in the voluminous manifestos that
they launched in all pomp and glory when they were campaigning.
A lot of
people who fought for pluralism are still there on the political scene. They
convinced us that they were fighting for us to get democracy. What they didn’t
tell us was that democracy should only be a means to an end and not an end in
itself. They didn’t tell us that it was possible to democratically elect a
moron or that, on the flipside; it was possible to have a dictator who has the
best interests of his people at heart. They led us to believe that democracy
was going to solve all our problems, be they social or economic. In true
democratic spirit, we took their word for it.
Changing the Law
We changed
the entire Kenyan constitution and international commentators commended us for
coming up with one of the best constitutions in the world; at least on paper.
We as the people had the power. We could adjust the law to make it better for
us anytime we wanted. All we needed were the numbers. Even as we speak, the
opposition is busy herding us together so that we can have a referendum and
change the law, again. The beauty with democracy is that you don’t have to give
something time to show that it doesn’t work. All you have to do is show that
the new thing you are bringing in is better than what you have. If democracy
works, then we expect to be called upon very soon to give ourselves new laws
that are the best ever.
Tribalism
Whoever
designed democracy could not possibly have heard of an animal called tribalism.
He probably envisioned a concept where people could make a choice of those to
rule over them based on character and principles. In his mind, this was the
only way an aspirant could mobilise enough votes. In Africa in general, and
Kenya in particular, tribe takes precedence over principle. If elections were
repeated in Kenya today, the same people would win unless there was a genocide
which significantly shifted the numbers of certain dominant tribes. Here we
say; Tribe first and Tribe only!
Population Growth
Influential
politicians have been heard encouraging their people to shun family planning.
They see them as mere votes and the more, the merrier. These are the same
people who are so uninformed and disempowered that they would not know how to
keep the ruling politicians on their toes when they err. We don’t have deep
founded democratic principles. We are only interested in numbers.
Democratisation of Corruption
Corruption
is no longer evil and a crime in Kenya. It is just a simple misdemeanour and slight
inconvenience. Corrupt people in this country are considered heroes. The
majority of Kenyans do not think corruption is a serious problem and many are
willing to engage in corruption whenever they get the opportunity. By
mobilising the numbers in support of corruption, we have just democratised it.
The majority will have their way and the few of us who are disgusted are having
our say in our small inconsequential blogs away from the public eye. That’s
democracy for you!
P.S. Democracy is Power of the People by the People for the People.
Six being the number of man that is one less than seven which is the number of
God; it means that democracy is 666 meaning it may be the beast in the bible
after all.
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