By: Mohamed

Mohamed — Sat, 06 Mar 2010 13:03:58 +0000

Not really, Bichii. In the Kenya of today (well, there’s not much of that left, anymore) if we look back, now, two years thence, we find that this increasingly misunderstood and resented ‘?middle? class’ (wherein non-blacks would share in offering something in terms of addressing the crisis that few others were able to) believed in something beyond humanity. They, too, dreamed about and mourned their Kenya and they have every right to. Indeed, they are the only ones who hold on to an overarching dream (however abstruse or led by dreamers from a consolidated foreign, colonial culture). There is no evidence that the youth and the activists of today have not accidentally stumbled on the symbols of that dream for their own new Kenya. Everyone is an agent of that colonial dream; everyone will be a European and everyone will be a liberated African all held together our history. There seems to be very little else on offer except a desert of new tribalism (rich versus poor) on the horizon.

Some of the people Mike Eldon met may have simply been passing through (and, like those who have enriched themselves and have flats in Hong Kong, knew that they would not have to live with what we will have to, post- election or -revolution or whatever).

Meanwhile the question that we’ll have to answer BEFORE the completion of any SUCCESSFUL revolution is “what is the Kenya that you lost and wish to recover?” and, if successive revolutions succeed, what will your place be in the pecking order of ‘new mau mau’, based on what criteria? I have not yet met an activist or revolutionary who does not think s/he is an expert at distinguishing between a comrade and a traitor, yet.

May I push the envelope? The Kenyan dream whosever’s it is, is a mediocre one! It is not too early, now, to ask “why just Kenya, anyway? Why not… East Africa or even Black Africa?” Before the colonial day we dreamed of land, women and cattle, from coast to coast. Not of sunrises and sundowners which bind us to the need for some familiarity and consistency to playact if we intend to be anybody in the order of appearance.

Not everyone’s dream about Kenya will be realised (if anyone’s) and, if the funding agencies have it their way, the only dream that will be realised, whether we turn left or right in 2012, is that of preparing the ground for further exploitation for the sake of an overarching dream that was dreamt by the likes of Karen Blixen and shall never be dreamt by even the third or fourth generation Kikuyu, Luhya, Masai, Luo or Muhindi, for that matter.

While the disqualified ‘middle class’ has inherited the colonial heritage and will remain the default agency of exploitation after the revolution is won, the energy will not change overnight (refer to the S African experience). Only they will hold the same place in the pecking order until someone leads them not to the left or right but echoes unawares Kenyatta’s command: “About Turn!”.

By: Bichii

Bichii — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 14:56:36 +0000

“Here were people representing doctors and pharmacists, counsellors and nurses, marketing professionals and ICT specialists, architects and engineers.”.

It is a whole year since those problems, Mike, but looking back at your essay, especially the professional composisiton of those folks you met, I can only say that it was natural for them to feel they way they did. I mean com e to think about it, who are they? Aren’t they the real owners of this country, and therefore the ones who would lose the most if things escalated?

Comments on: Unsung Heroes of Kenya – by Mike Eldon

By: Mohamed

By: Bichii