Bio Wahu Mathenge
Wahu Mathenge (Rosemary Wahu Kagwi )
While she was a student at Precious Blood Secondary School, in Riruta, she wrote her first song called ‘Showers of Blessings’ (with a friend) as a tribute to God for the national academic success that the school enjoyed. The song is still part of the schools hymnal collection.She worked in the entertainment industry and used the money to pursue her university education at the University of Nairobi, studying for a Bachelors degree in Mathematics.Her first song ‘Niangalie’ drew the attention of renowned CBN presenter Victor Oladokhun, who aired it on his ‘Turning Point’ program. Her second song ‘Esha’ was a fusion of English Swahili and Kikuyu based on a traditional Kikuyu folk song, and inspired by the late Brenda Fassie. She also came out with ‘Liar’, ‘Kibowow’ and ‘Sitishiki’. She launched an album, Liar, in 2004.In 2004, she married longtime boyfriend David Mathenge (popularly known as Nameless) who was also on the Ogopa DJ’s label. They have one child, a daughter who was born in 2006. Wahu also acted in a leading role in the popular television show, Tazama on KTN.
In 2007 She released some singles including Mambo bado, Running low, The little things you do, and Sweet love.
*Sweet Love has been Wahu’s biggest song. It has received two nominations — the British Music of Black Origin Awards and Kora Awards.
Provocateur Exposed:2007 Kenyan Election
When Paul Collier, professor of economics at Oxford, publishes something, it invariably contains some very important ideas. I realised this when I first encountered his paper about civil war and insurgency, “Greed and Grievance”. Collier co-wrote it when head of research at the World Bank, where he developed a rare ability to merge his deep understanding of economics with sober analyses of a rapidly changing political landscape. Put simply, in “Greed and Grievance” he argued that armed rebellion had more to do with access to financial resources than with any deep commitment to ideology.
mong political scientists that particular paper was greeted by murmurs of approval and harrumphing in equal measure. Here was an economist treading on the keenly defended turf of political wonks, and many took umbrage. A few wonks, however, recognised the valuable contribution Collier’s research had to make to the struggle against poverty and political violence.I think some of the harrumphing that followed the publication of that paper might also be ascribed to Collier’s liberal use of baffling mathematical formulae to prove his point. I confess I had to skip a raft of calculus in his earlier work. But I am pleased to report that since he started writing bestselling books, he has dumped the equations in favour of clear prose.
This strategy paid real dividends just under two years ago when he published The Bottom Billion: Why the Poorest Countries are Failing and What Can be Done About It, a fresh and inventive look at chronic underdevelopment, its victims and its winners (the latter being few in number but abnormally powerful). The book was showered with praise as it offered many cogent explanations for the persistence of grinding poverty in a world which was until last September indecently rich. Wars, Guns & Votes carries on from where The Bottom Billion left off.
Apart from the fact that its author is not American, Collier’s work is distinguished from the books of Tom Friedman, Bob Kagan, Fareed Zakaria and several other gurus of globalisation in that it is based on extremely thorough empirical research. This puts him in the same camp as real heavyweights such as the Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz. When Collier asserts that the bottom billion are much more prone to insurgency and civil war than the rest of the world, you can be confident this is not observational anecdote. The chances are that he and his indefatigable team of student minions will have exhaustively examined the data from every civil war since the dawn of time to back his thesis.
This aspect of Collier’s books is powerful, making it hard to refute many of his conclusions, some of which are disturbing, iconoclastic or both. He is destined to upset a lot of people when he asserts at the outset that democracy is bad news for the countries of the bottom billion – it usually ends in tears, not to mention grand larceny, murder and even genocide. On closer examination, he argues that elections alone do not amount to a strong democracy. Without institutions that promote accountability, they are too easily exploited by cynical, greedy elites.
Unfortunately, the “kumbaya” politics of the 1990s held that voting was an end in itself. Western institutions became involved in an electoral circus which often absorbed huge sums. Self-selecting election “monitors” from America and Europe would travel to Armenia one week and the Ivory Coast the next to pass judgment on the validity of the process. By contrast, there was little or no investment in dealing with the consequences of the elections or building the institutions essential to ensuring that the resulting government did not abuse its power. In the former Yugoslavia, unscrupulous populists exploited the plebiscitary democracy in 1990 and 1991 to rip the place apart. And Collier saw this repeated in many countries in Africa, the continent where the great majority of the bottom billion states are found.
It is a brave scholar who asserts that democracy equals bloodshed, but Collier is not afraid of going against the grain. He gives very short shrift to the fashionable cause of self-determination or special status for minorities espoused by the Kosovo Albanians, the Luo in Kenya or the rebels in Darfur. He casts Raila Odinga, the Kenyan prime minister, and not President Kibaki as the provocateur in the country’s last elections (in contrast to most foreign media covering the story).But he mounts a very heartening defence of peace-keeping operations which, using hard facts, he is able to prove unambiguously are extremely good value for money. He then comes close to creating what on the surface looks like a surefire formula for stabilising the countries of the bottom billion, enabling them to begin economic development in earnest.
And this is where the problems arise with his thesis. He proposes a reduction of sales in weapons to governments and rebels in these areas – so far so good, although he skips over the issue of how to police such a regime a little too lightly. It is in his central assertion, however – that fragile democracies in Africa must be allowed to flower under the military guarantee of the United States, France and Britain – that the optimism of his economic modelling clouds the reality of global geopolitics. The “command centre” that the Americans are trying to establish in West Africa is motivated by a need to secure oil supplies, not by an altruistic project to nurture democracy. And his faith in the military strategies of the French in West Africa overlooks much of Paris’s cynical manoeuvring in the region (including the promotion of arms sales and mineral exploitation).
One might argue that British, French and American motives may change; however, after Iraq, Rwanda and Afghanistan (to name but three), the political and moral space for intervention is extremely limited. But it is to Collier’s great credit that he has really opened up a debate that we need to conduct with some urgency. Even as we dither about military strategies and aid for West Africa, for example, the entire region is being captured by Colombian and Venezuelan cartels who are turning Guinea-Bissau, Sierra Leone, Liberia and even Senegal and Ghana into the new Mexico. In economic terms, even after the crash, the world still has more than enough money to raise the bottom billion out of the swamp they are forced to inhabit. As in so many challenges we face, it is political vision and political will that is lacking.
By Misha Glenny
Devolution
As Kenyans continue to debate the 4th item of the national peacemaking agenda – how to resolve historical injustices of the past – we continue to ponder if the devolution of political and economic power to the lowest administrative levels could offer a lasting solution to the exclusion of marginalised communities. The national peacemaking agenda was drawn up to prevent the recurrence of the post-electoral violence that rocked Kenya earlier this year. In countries where there is constant contestation for state power between the government and the people, genuine devolution of power has in many instances provided a panacea for resolving the conflict. In addition, devolution, as a foundation of good governance has become a reality of global norms and practices.
In any part of the world where democratisation is not in tandem with devolved governance, democracy can only be synonymous with legitimising the elites’ accession to power.Many examples can be cited where perfect harmony between democratisation and devolution has been registered. In the United States, Germany, Canada, the United Kingdom, and Switzerland among others, devolution has been the driving force of social harmony and an engine for development. In Africa, despite the numerous ethnic communities with competing political and economic interests, South Africa, Rwanda and Uganda, among others, have appreciably implemented modern devolved systems of governance with ease. In all of these instances, positive aspects of ethnicity and pragmatic approaches to decentralisation have been recognised to contribute to stability and enhance human development.
In Kenya, the fundamental flaws in the devolution debate from those opposing devolved government is essentially two-fold: firstly, anti-devolution groups have deliberately concentrated on the labels of majimbo (Swahili for federalism) rather than the content, because of too much focus on the narrow ethnic interests rather than the interests of the broad masses of Kenyan society. Secondly, the anti-devolution crusaders have not taken cognisance of the fact that the current system of provincial administration was not subjected to the popular mandate but rather, was imposed on Kenyans undemocratically. By maintaining the adopted current centralised form of governance, the people of Kenya abdicated important responsibility to the government. The consequence was a glaring gap in governance, whose remedial measure is long overdue. When the current system of provincial administration was crafted, the overriding interests were those of the ruling elites, with the interests of the people sacrificed in lieu of elites’ control of state power through a tightly controlled administrative structure.
Pragmatic criteria of socio-economic development and vulnerability of the poor and marginalised were never issues for consideration. For instance, it defies logic when one looks at the rationale used to create the Eastern province which stretches all the way from Ethiopia to near the Tanzanian border with its provincial headquarters in Embu, far off from other key areas such as Dasnatch and El Molo -about 800 km away. Likewise the Rift Valley province was made to stretch all the way from Sudan to the Tanzanian border, with the headquarters in Nakuru, about 1000 km away from Toposa and Dongiro in Elemi Triangle. Poor road infrastructure makes it impossible to connect the public in these vast areas.
The fallacy of the current system of provincial administration is that the administrative officials lack even the basic knowledge of the communities they purport to serve. An example from the pastoral and arid areas of Kenya gives a clear example of why this current system bears high risks to human security. First, most of the administrators are transferred to this harsh environment for disciplinary reasons. This is aggravated further by the standing order and code of ethics of the provincial administration, which bars the local community from participating in the institution charged with local security such as the District Security Committee (DSC) and the Provincial Security Committee (PSC). The locals are prevented from participating in the security meetings ostensibly as a measure to protect the ‘government’s secret’. Further, given the lack of accountability and transparency, these local administrators have often been accused of bias, and at best, incompetence in appreciating local conditions.
Mt Kenya region
The very nature and structure of governance through the provincial administration is a semblance of colonial institutions. In a number of cases, local elders have drawn parallels between the districts and provincial administrators and the British colonial administrators. It is therefore very clear that the entire governance system in Kenya as currently constituted, has limited the opportunities and impacted on lives, livelihood and human security of the people. In these arid and peripheral zones, devolved governance is inter-alia anticipated to offer a final solution to the myriad of problems that have witnessed intractable conflicts and perennial instability and displacement. And as such, the call for the devolution of power creates hope and aspiration for the disenfranchised groups, which will eventually redress the neglect and unlock human potential.
Kenya missed an important juncture to mitigate the shortcoming in governance during the advent of the multi-party political system. Both the proponent of political reforms and the regime did not embrace democracy comprehensively, thereby equating electioneering to democracy. Far away from Nairobi, many communities in Kenya often equate the period of general election as the ‘season of democracy’. This is because democracy in this part of the world is equated to a single event in five years whose principles and practice ends with the general election. And what is more disturbing is the perception about the provincial administration as an institution of government that implements democracy through tight administrative controls.
Kenyans have shown great enthusiasm towards greater participation in the government as reflected by the great debate at the Bomas. The spirit at the Bomas clearly indicated that the people of Kenya can articulate their problems and offer practical solutions. What crystallised out of the constitutional review process was the need to design a system that allows for a fine balance of ‘self rule’ at local level as well as ‘shared rule’ at national level. Through this approach, government powers are not only shared horizontally between executive, legislative, and judiciary; but also vertically between various levels of government. This will ultimately guide the spirit of Kenya as a common homeland, and attain the objective of combining unity and diversity.
In this age of globalisation, therefore, where states have been busy pursuing international and regional interests, proactive decentralisation is actively becoming a norm. The move towards devolved governance is another juncture in Kenya’s political development whose sober approach will contribute to the great historical success. Whereas four decades of unresponsive governance is a lost opportunity in terms of development, the time is ripe for Kenyans to grapple with the unfinished business of allowing the people to choose a popular mode of governance regardless of the label.
* by Mohamed A Guyo, ISS Research Associate and Dr Annie Barbara Chikwanha, AHSI, ISS Nairobi
The Fall of Jerusalem
The LORD, the God of their fathers, sent word to them through his messengers again and again, because he had pity on his people and on his dwelling place. 16 But they mocked God’s messengers, despised his words and scoffed at his prophets until the wrath of the LORD was aroused against his people and there was no remedy. 17 He brought up against them the king of the Babylonians, who killed their young men with the sword in the sanctuary, and spared neither young man nor young woman, old man or aged. God handed all of them over to Nebuchadnezzar. 18 He carried to Babylon all the articles from the temple of God, both large and small, and the treasures of the LORD’s temple and the treasures of the king and his officials. 19They set fire to God’s temple and broke down the wall of Jerusalem; they burned all the palaces and destroyed everything of value there.
20 He carried into exile to Babylon the remnant, who escaped from the sword, and they became servants to him and his sons until the kingdom of Persia came to power. 21 The land enjoyed its sabbath rests; all the time of its desolation it rested, until the seventy years were completed in fulfillment of the word of the LORD spoken by Jeremiah.
2 Chronicles 36
Eldoret church massacre suspects freed
Kenya’s high court on Thursday threw out the case against four men over tribal violence in which at least 33 people were burnt alive in a church during last year’s post-election chaos.The ruling brought to a close the only case in which citizens have been charged with murder in connection with the violence that left around 1,500 people dead and hundreds of thousands displaced.At least 33 civilians, including women and children, died when marauding militias set fire to the Kenya Assemblies of God church in the northern city of Eldoret, where they were sheltering from the clashes.The deaths took place on 1 January, 2008, and four suspects were charged two months later but Justice David Maraga said he had to drop the case, citing lack of evidence and shoddy police investigations.
“I find that the prosecution (has) failed to prove the burden of the case against the accused persons and thereby acquit them of all the charges and order that they be set free,” he said.”This was obviously a well planned and orchestrated attack and as such I was amazed to find no whiff of common intention on the part of the accused or the planning that went into the attack,” he said.”The events preceding the commission of this offence cannot have eluded the police as clouds for the gathering storm were there for all to see,” he said, reading a 45-page ruling.”I am not a politician but I am only a judge and a Kenyan who is just as outraged at the casual manner in which we are handling serious issues like insecurity in this country and by the attitude of our police force in the face of serious crime,” Maraga added.
Eldoret is in the Rift Valley of Kenya, which saw the worst tribal violence following the dispute that erupted when irregularities in the December 2007 presidential poll prompted accusations that then opposition leader Raila Odinga was robbed of victory by incumbent President Mwai Kibaki.Three days after the election, on December 30, hundreds of civilians were driven from their homes by militias, according to evidence presented in court.Some who had found refuge in the church were attacked by more than 1,000 men, who had painted their faces with chalk and were armed with bows and arrows, machetes, clubs and other weapons.The mob lit up mattresses inside the church and then blocked the door to prevent the displaced from escaping the fire. The State dropped incitement charges against Kibor
