Kenyan Police in Action

There is a general breakdown of law and order in the society, and the sooner we face up to it the better. Every five years, we put in place a set of new rulers. We then give the President the instruments of power, to uphold and safeguard, to obey and cherish our constitution. In so doing,  the voice of the people ought to be heard.

 

But when we circumvent the voice of the people with impunity and marshal state organs, we court trouble. We set in place the culture of impunity where all and sundry will do as they please because the law and the law enforcers have been compromised. Our problems become even bigger when the President does not obey the law.

 

We must build a culture where the President must act in accordance with the law, and he must at all times obey the law. We must build a culture where the police must respect the law that they enforce. In our situation, the police do not look at the law; they look at what the appointing authority wants. That creates impunity, and all citizens are alive to such things.

 

The Judiciary is supposed to interpret the law whenever there is conflict. But when we have a political Judiciary that does not understand the laws that they are meant to interpret, we are creating a bad situation. The one with the right connections will easily win even the most bizarre of cases that merited outright dismissal. When the Judiciary messes with the people, the people are faithfully watching, and a time will come when the people will rebel against the Judiciary, and that will be a sad time indeed for Kenya. If this goes on, we are living on a time bomb. The rebellion that could come from the people is far much more dangerous than what we have seen with school children. We must strive to obey law and create some order.

 

Last year, Kenyans saw their votes stolen with active participation of these institutions. The result was the kind of conflict that we saw that pitted Kenyans against Kenyans. The result was the massive loss of life and property. If it were not for the rapid return to sanity by the two protagonists, Kenya would have exploded a lot more badly.

 

To safeguard any more of this, we must all respect the will of the people, respect the law, and obey just orders. Without this, we are creating a ripe situation for chaos any other time. I must emphasize, the presidency, the police force and the Judiciary are institutions that are by law established for the good of the country. But if these are the institutions that are used to oppress the people who fund their operations, then a repeat job as the one that we witnessed in January, will tear this country apart.

 

Impunity manifests itself in how ministers handle their dockets, how teachers run institutions of learning, how matatus terrorize other motorists by breaking all the known traffic rules, how the Traffic Police stand rudderless every day in our roads, collecting money from matatu drivers instead of directing traffic, how TV editors feed our children pornography everyday on TV, how the radio talk presenters talk nothing but sex everyday on radio, and how parents behave indifferently to the bad habits being developed by their children.

 

These are the symptoms that drive our society to the precipice. In this kind of a scenario, would you expect anything better from our children? They are part of the society, and they see in us what they would want to be. We must all obey the law and set good examples for our children. What do these children see in us? They see people who have stolen big time running for public office then getting appointed as Ministers. This informs them that despite being a thief, you can be rewarded. They hence grow up wanting to be thieves so that one day they can be Ministers.

 

They see people who have run down institutions getting better political postings. They see as their role models people who operate corruption cartels that skim the country of billions of shillings getting state commendations. They see as their role models pimps and charlatans who seem to be laws unto themselves getting appointed to all important state positions. They see the police break the law, they see the Judiciary return questionable verdict, and then they form an opinion; impunity pays.

 

If we respect our laws and enforce the same, we will not see thieves in our government. If we respect our laws and enforce the same, we will not see anymore matatu madness in our roads and the traffic police watch. If we care for our children, we will not grab all the land that they should use for play fields. If we respect our children, we will not subject them to be taught by people who had failed their preliminary exams. We will not accept failures into Teacher Training Institutions. We will take the best. If we respect our children, we will not accept journey men who had no interest in the teaching profession to teach our kids. We will take those who have that calling and pay them well to mould the future of our children.

 

But when we clamp down on mobile phones, on buses and such like non-issues, it enforces our lack of understanding on this serious issue. It brings to mind how pedestrian the government has been handling all natoinal issues . This is the kind of pedestrian approach to governance that keeps confining Kenya at the lower ends of development.

 

Odhiambo T Oketch

 

Komarock Nairobi