By S Nyanchwani
I can understand the timing of the launch of the SGR to coincide with the launch of the campaign period. I can understand the hurried construction of Outering Road. I can understand the grand launch of the grant PORTAL to magnify the microscopic achievements of Jubilee.
What I cannot understand is the utter disrespect of human decorum, decency, common sense, logic and morals as to try and milk some political mileage out of compensating Internally Displaced Persons, ten years since the fact.
What happened today in Kisii is not to be celebrated. We need to retract to a place where we can think on how low as a people we can go. It is the biggest insult to the collective will, intelligence and spirit of Mwanyegetinge. To those saying, ‘better something than nothing,” you need to stand in front of the mirror and notice how ugly you look.
A set of IDP from a community were given Sh 400,000. In Kisii today, an IDP will receive Sh 50,000. This discrepancy is sickening, when you think about it.
In 2007, many Kisiis were butchered, hacked to death, lynched, their property was burnt down, their worldly possessions stolen, some dispossessed of their hard-earned land and property worth several years of hard work and sweat. Many had left Gusii land in the 1960s, 70s, and 80s, in search of greener pastures as the land sizes kept shrinking in Kisii. Other had been chased away because of one reason or another, and they had nowhere to go, and for ten years they have been IDPs. I know of some who were quite rich, millionaires, who had to start from zero, and many a man died, of stress and depression. And injustice.
Us older Kisiis, know what happened and we will always keep it in our hearts.
Over the last ten years, we have seen how other IDPs have been resettled, compensated and overcompensated, as our kinsmen and those from other tribes were told to go hug a porcupine for all the government of the day cared.
To show up today with bland tokenism in search of votes goes to show how morally bankrupt, utterly classless these government is.
Every time I think about the events of that fateful New Year of 2008, I’m livid, and the aftermath is often more sickening. That some people would enrich from themselves and still live with the conscientious goes to show how different we are as human beings.
That some Kisiis in Bobasi and Bomachoge may even think of waking up to vote this government deeply saddens me. Of all the governments since independence, this government has nothing but contempt for Omogusii.
On IDPs, one Kisii singer, Sagero summed up our experiences in his tragic, but humorous and deeply philosophical song that was the best seller for nearly three years after the post-election violence. If you can find a Kisii to translate for you, it will be worth your time. It is the true reflection of how Kisiis view life. And why we moved on. And why don’t care about Uhuru’s visit.
Any Kisii who will say what the President did today in Kisii is right will be blocked without second thoughts.
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