Kenya Imagine

Draft Constitution from PSC on Constitution Review

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 11:27:00 +0000

Published here is the actual proposed constitution for Kenya that came out of the Naivasha conference of the Parliamentary Select Committee on Constitutional Review. The document has been forwarded to the Committee of Experts appointed to collect views and put them together in a form that could be presented to the Kenyan people for their approval.

PSC report on the Draft Constitution

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 11:24:00 +0000

Published HERE is a report from the Parliamentary Select Committee on Constitutional Review.

Death by Dominoes

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 11:18:00 +0000

When the assassins come they kill everyone. That is what you must understand. Death is coming. It's at the door. Though uttered weeks earlier, on a different cellblock, I still recall leaning forward in concentration, struggling to hear the words, striving to discern the meaning, if any, conveyed by Wannamaker's frog-like voice.

The old man didn't speak his words so much as he breathed them out, in a guttural rasp, as weak as a politician's promise, like a man talking reluctantly through a mouthful of marbles. Weeks later, perched on an overturned mop bucket wedged in the open doorway of my single-man cell, Wannamaker's enigmatic words were still gnawing along the margins of my mind. Those whispered words...How was I to know they'd be so prescient?

From Imperial President to King: a people betrayed

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 00:32:00 +0000

Members of Parliament have betrayed the people of Kenya, particularly the majority poor and exploited and the struggle for a new progressive national constitution.

No wonder the majority of the MPs that are tampering with the constitution in Naivasha have never been involved in the struggle for democracy in the country. They were part of the dictatorship that was opposed to democratic reforms.

While patriots and progressive Kenyans were being persecuted by the Moi and Kenyatta regimes for struggling for liberation from dictatorship, those who are now purporting to decide about the constitution for Kenya were accumulating wealth through corrupt deals. The few of the MPs at Naivasha that were reformers yesterday have now turned into opportunists and traitors and are either silent or collude with those who are manufacturing the constitution which Kenyans should reject.

Social Democratic Party chair Mwandawiro Mghanga weighs in on the Naivasha Consensus.

Drunken Policeman Ruined my Christmas Holiday

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 11:35:00 +0000

Dennis Langat shares his Christmas holiday misadventure.

According to the police officers, my traffic offense was traffic obstruction. In my defence my movement was restricted as there was a matatu parked right in front of me. I later learned that this was a tactic used by the traffic police to solicit bribes from already poor wananchi. The proper action for me to take would be to toa kila kitu, people told me. I wondered how non-Kenyans driving through Kenya would understand this sub-culture, and how bribing by traffic policemen had become an acceptable culture. What happened next can only be described as surreal.

Read more.

Citizenship Doesn't Stop at the Border

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 22:41:00 +0000

Daniel Waweru challenges Stephanie Migot's position on the creation of a new seat: Diaspora MP.

The issue here is representation -- not merely the right to agitate for reform. The argument, as given, is that by going abroad, and placing oneself at a remove from the democratic process one has given up the right to political representation. That's because it's not entirely clear how the other reasons are supposed to work. Paying taxes can't be a necessary condition of political representation, since tax-evaders; all those whose earnings fall below the minimum taxable amount; the churches and charities which take direct tax exemptions; members of religious orders who take vows of poverty and the MPs who so famously managed to protect their incomes from the taxman, all retain their right to participate and representation. Presence in the country for voting purposes simply folds into the first point about living abroad, since what matters here is the effect of location on one's right to political representation.

Read the rest of his argument here.

Against an MP with Air Miles

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 22:33:00 +0000

An article published in the Daily Nation brought one John Maina to national attention when he mooted the idea of Kenyans living abroad – the diaspora – having their own representative in government. According to the article, the Kenya Community Abroad (KCA), a US-based Kenyan advocacy group, is lobbying the Committee of Experts to create an “Abroad Constituency” who would then have an MP to represent the interests of Kenyans living abroad.

My instant reaction, as I posted to my Twitter account, was a resounding “Hell to the no!”

Stephanie Migot explains her position.

The Hoax that is the Naivasha Deal

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Sun, 31 Jan 2010 22:30:00 +0000

The Parliamentary Select Committee is finally showing its true colors. It has shown that it can bastardize the people’s document to suit the narrow whims of just a handful of people in Parliament. The deal reached by 26 MPs in Naivasha is a hoax that Kenyans must reject even at the risk of not having a new constitution.

Jerry Okungu is not happy by the PSC's recommended draft constitution. Read on.

What We Are Reading: Haiti

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 22:49:00 +0000

The tragic events earlier this month has left Haiti more desolate than ever. It is amazing, this Haitian spirit, that despite all odds keeps surviving tragedy. As Haiti continues to be in the global spotlight, now would be a good time to learn about its history, people and relief efforts beyond media soundbites.

We will share here articles with excerpts that continue to define the Haitian situation, and welcome you to include your favorite articles in the comments below.

Part II: PSC Scores a Victory for a Rational and Progressive Kenyan Future

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 14:04:00 +0000

The reformation of our culture of politics, explained in Part 1 of this essay to be as important as the reform of our political institutions entails an analysis of how each of our other choices for institutional organization would work to curb the vices and weaknesses of our present political culture.

In this spirit, if we take a look at the particular form of hybrid government that has been proposed by the Committee of Experts, can it be in doubt that it does little to reform our political culture?

Continue reading.

Part I: PSC Scores a Victory for a Rational and Progressive Kenyan Future

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 13:20:00 +0000

The decision of the Parliamentary Select Committee on the Constitution to adopt a purely presidential form of government for the revised draft constitution, while certainly coming as a surprise to most, must nonetheless be heralded as a very important step towards achieving transformational change in our political organization as a nation.

Continue... .

Simama, Eugene Wamalwa and the rights of free speech and association

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 12:53:00 +0000

A large public meeting has been called in Bungoma this Sunday, the 31st of January. The rally has been called by Saboti MP Eugene Wamalwa and his confederates in the Simama Kenya political action group. It is not clear that the event will go ahead, following threats, made in public by local politicians, to stop the rally taking place.

These threats are the sort of, 'come if you dare' challenges that history promises will deliver great bloodshed and destruction of property. It is a naked effort at political incitement and intimidation, an attempt at corralling sections of the country off of what are deemed ‘external influences,' an effort at the kind of ethnic balkanisation that has led to the exclusion of certain ethnicities from national political groupings and led to the exclusion and resentments that bore the pre and post-election violence in 2008.

Ethics in a World of Strangers

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 07:47:00 +0000

In considering the reactions from the Kenyan public to the tragedy in Haiti, to Jamaican preacher Abdullah Al-Faisal, to those that took to the street in demonstrating for his freedom and to the crackdown on Somali immigrants in Nairobi's Eastleigh district, we provide here a link to a Kwame Appiah lecture, Ethics in a World of Strangers.

In it he proposes that cosmopolitanism is not a solution, but a great challenge. He suggests that modern society has exaggerated the power of difference while neglecting the power of commonality.

What it is our collective responsibility towards those different from us, to immigrants?

How our folly aids extremism

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 07:43:00 +0000

Nothing is more pleasing to extremist leaderships than the confirmation, whether in fact or perception, of the causes by which they recruit followers to their violent banners. The state, media and public reactions to the Al-Faisal fiasco may very well have acted to harm our interests -peace and religious harmony in Kenya- and promoted instead the perception of intolerant incompatibility that extremism teaches.

Thoughts? Click here.

Egypt vs Ghana 4-0

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 07:35:00 +0000

Admittedly, this is more a wish for the Nations Cup Final than a rational guess. Ghana's defence against Nigeria today did give a good account of itself, and for a team as decimated of its top talents as The youthful Black Stars, getting this far is in itself no small feat.

Read more here. And we are accepting sports commentary. Email us: editor [at] kenyaimagine [dot] com

Ethics in a world of strangers

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 02:32:00 +0000

My Coming Out

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 02:29:00 +0000

It hasn't always been this easy. It always made me nervous and uncomfortable. As though there was something wrong with me loving this way. When I look back I am not really sure how and when I accepted my fate and let it be. All I remember is that at some point in my life I was ashamed and scared to love a woman. As far as I can remember, I did not have much of a coming out experience for I was outed. I am not even sure what I was scared of. Moreover, allowing myself to live openly and honestly, only opened doors for me to live a fulfilled life. At least the pretense and self-denial is over. I share the part of my life I find sacred. I share what makes me, me. I share with you my experience as an out Kenyan Lesbian living far away from home. If my story does nothing else, I hope it allows you to see a glimpse of what life for some Africans in the LGBT community is like.

Keep reading.

What if it happened here?

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 10:56:00 +0000

The 7.0 magnitude quake that has flattened the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince, should give East Africans pause for thought. What if a similar quake hit here? How prepared are we? As it turns out, not very. And such an event is not as rare around these parts as some would like to think. According to Professor Chris Hartnady, a former Associate Professor in the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Cape Town, “Large areas of the African continent are in an unstable, tectonically active, state and, especially in the mountain regions, substantial danger is posed to growing populations.” Between 1980 and April 2002, the continent was hit by over 50 serious earthquakes, resulting in over 23,000 deaths and injuries.

Patrick Gathara lays it all out, and has some suggestions on how we can best protect ourselves-- without spending too much.

Filing VAT Returns

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:14:00 +0000

It's a silly process, it's unnecessary but it is also something you have to endure. I woke early to make sure I was in the queue, at Times Tower. The first queue's the one you stand in to get your form, then you fill it in to say you've nothing to submit to the Revenue Authority.

Angela Wairimu on the challenges of filing for taxes in Kenya. Afrifail? What has your experience been?

Cartoonists of the Year awards

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:11:00 +0000

We attended the first, and likely, annual Cartoonist of the year awards at the Swiss ambassador's last week. The event organised by Katuni, a local coalition of Cartoonists, with the support of the Embassy of Switzerland was created to appreciate and promote an art form and means of political expression that seldom gets the credit it deserves.

More from our team.

The recalibration of Obama

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:09:00 +0000

On Tuesday night as the results trickled in from Massachusetts, President Obama and his inner circle watched with slow horror. This was an eventuality they had been steeling themselves against for days – but even with the odds stacked, they had reserved a glimmer of hope. Hope that their last minute scrambling, Obama’s spate of rallies over the final weekend, had been enough to eek out the slimmest of slim victories. Hope that the Lion’s legacy, one that the late senator Ted Kennedy built brick by brick over the last thirty odd years would endure. Hope that this bluest of blue states would once again reinforce a Democratic candidate victory.

Here's what Obama must do, says Dave Nyambati.

Kenya: combatting radical Islam

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:07:00 +0000

The protest in Nairobi on 15 January by a handful of Muslim youth, in which four people were killed, revealed a profound radicalisation and inter-faith resentment among Nairobi’s Muslims. Kenya must address this if it is going to avoid Nigeria-style violence in the future. It should work closely with the United States, which apart from being an important player in Somalia is involved in interconnected regional initiatives. The protests shook the foundations of tolerance in Kenya as nothing has before. It prompted some civilians to cheer the police, which is generally reviled for its many crimes against the people. Vigilantes even joined the battle on their side. But on the other hand it led to an armed protester – believed to have smuggled a gun into the protest – shooting at a policeman. The authorities have denied reports of the officer’s death, but have confirmed the sacking of a Muslim officer who defied orders to charge into the protesters.

Kenya must take its Somali immigration situation seriously. And John Oyando has some possible solutions.

Homeland by George Obama: A Review

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 09:03:00 +0000

The main reason to read a book by a man named Obama who is not the president of the United States is simple: to understand better the Obama who is president. With this as a test, does a new memoir from a Kenyan half brother to our very own Barack Obama - an African resident of Nairobi who shares our president's surname and his long-deceased father but not his mother - shed any light on President Obama as a leader?

More from G. Pascal Zachary

Brutal Crackdown of Peaceful Muslim Demo Turns Ugly

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 21:42:00 +0000

Onyango Oloo recounts Friday's demonstration calling for the release of Jamaican cleric Abdullah al-Faisal, a controversial figure who is on global terror watch list.

He argues:

The Kenyan state authorities should not be surprised if their unprovoked assault on peaceful Muslims converging near their house of prayer on Friday, one of the holiest days in the Muslim calendar, will not lead to a deepening of hostilities and precipitate a radical transformation especially among the younger Muslims to veer towards more militant positions.

More... .

Haiti Cherie

noreply@blogger.com (updates) — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 06:09:00 +0000

What word can encompass stretch its arms and wrap them around
A day when the world returns to the dust it was
Before we fashioned orderly chaos and became free

A powerful poem on Haiti.