Kenyans must respect the Constitution
Written by Macharia Munene

Macharia Munene
February 5, 2008:

For more than a month, Kenya’s Constitution, the laws, and the rule of law have virtually been suspended.

A new doctrine has been introduced in that after an election, some politicians are free to operate outside the Constitution and procedures if their purported supporters can mount violence designed to paralyse the country. With support from foreign powers, the losers will create power vacuums and force the winners to negotiate themselves out of power; for the sake of peace.

Often called donors or international community, foreigners have little interest in upholding the constitution and procedures as they help to put the losers on an equal footing with the winners and then demand “negotiations.” This is what happened.

The development of this doctrine is assisted by the seeming helplessness of those charged with the responsibility of upholding the constitution and enforcing the laws.

The apparent executive indecisiveness in dealing firmly with those suspected of plotting to destroy the country through violence contributed to the growth of a sense of impunity.

The rationale for tolerating impunity might have been to allow expansion of democratic space but that rationale apparently failed to take account of the need to balance national well being and security with the exercise of individual freedoms.

The purpose of government is to ensure that evil people do not misuse “freedom” to deprive others of their lives and properties. An individual’s “freedom” to undermine democracy, to incite people to kill, and to destroy other people’s property is a recipe for anarchy.

It denies the victims freedom to life and the enjoyment of the fruits of their hard labour. A society that prides itself in catering to the needs of its people should not allow the “anti-freedoms” of evil people to destroy the freedoms of others. No one should have the “freedom” or right to destroy other people’s lives, homes, democracy, and agreed procedures.

The duly constituted government, the political players in the country, the bureaucrats, and foreigners claiming interests in Kenyan affairs have operated as if the Constitution and the laws of the land are irrelevant when it comes to political disputes.

Collectively, they have set a dangerous precedent to the effect that it would be politically acceptable in future to suspend the Constitution and the Kenyan laws when a defeated candidate refuses to accept defeat or to follow agreed procedures for settling electoral disputes.

Such a candidate would then be free to mount pre-planned violence in order to alter an official outcome and should, as a matter of right, expect the support of the international community in doing so.

The international community would then issue decrees ordering the winner to sit with the loser and work out modalities of sharing power or repeating elections as a condition for stopping well calculated violence.

In the last one month in Kenya, the international community has shown deep prejudice and pre-conceived notions of how they wanted the election results to be. They were disappointed that the results did not go their way.

They seemingly developed collective amnesia, became allergic to evidence, or were willingly victims of falsehoods and half-truths that reinforced their imperial prejudices.

The fact that there are enough local proxies suffering from the same allergies emboldened them to make strange demands on the kind of “solutions” they want to see in order to have “business as usual” with Kenya. And the only business they appeared to be engaging in was that of threatening to cut humanitarian “aid” to the affected areas.

Munene is a professor of History and International Relations at United States International Univesrity.

kenya government should deal effectively with the specific international community issuing out decrees to kenya legitimate government of President kibaki.

Kenya should also EXPEL and deny its visa to all those evil, JELOUS, western loud mouth.

If one can leave the international opionons, "jelousy", "evil" and imperial prejudices out for a minute:

What does the the local juridical institutions say about the constitution you refer to?
Who wrote it? Was it clubbed in a haste?
Was there any changes made of the constitution during Moi to make the presidency stronger (and maybe too strong)?
IS the power of the juridical institutions strong enough (to ensure the law is followed)?
Is the power of the civic socity strong enough?
Are the human rights respected in Kenya?
Etc.

Some of us just met with the ICJ of Kenya and they have a quite clear picture of the situation. And that is a KENYAN picture, not a imperial prejudice nini.
And this Kenyan picture is very similar to points that the "hard talks" with Annan are working around.

Munue is a professor but he have also seemed to made up his mind. Which is fine. I got a few questions to to Munue though:
- Do you think Kenya need serious social reforms?
- Do you think Kenya need to discuss the constitution?
- Do you think the Kenyan juridical institutions should be seriously strengthen, to be able to deal with for example an allegation of electoral fraud?
(Now please remember the time it took for Matiba and others when rigging became a court issue in the past: 12 month one time and 24 month the other time the opposition complained)
- If there are people in Kenya that has violated the law, and in some cases also internation law, I am sure we agree that the local juridical institutions should deal with it, but if they don't, should we then deny ICC to deal with it?
(Keep in mind: there are also Kenyan lawyers within the ICC) And:
- If the Kenyan juridical institutions fail to bring down people violating internal law: should we be angry if other countries either try to capture this people or declare them persona no grata?

Last question, for all:
- What is the highest decision-making body or authority in a country (normally)?