is civil disobedience the way forward?

Civil disobedience is the active refusal to obey certain laws, demands and commands of a government, or of an occupying power, without resorting to physical violence. It is one of the primary tactics of nonviolent resistance. In its most nonviolent form (known as ahimsa or Satyagraha) it could be said that it is compassion in the form of respectful disagreement.
Mahatma Gandhi advocated civil disobedience in India which he incorporated in his Satyagraha philosophy, the same civil disobedience was put into Action in South Africa by Mandela and his comrades, by Martin Luther King, Jr. in the USA, and Sondhi Limthongkul did it in Thailand. Bottom line is; they all worked. Where am I heading with all this you may ask?
I have been keen on the African leadership and Kenya in particular for the last 15 years or so. At my young age I have discovered that our leaders have been presented with a lot of power at their disposal and there are no systems in place to actually regulate them on how they exercise their executive rights. They are powerful beyond the state itself, so much so that they practice arrogant leadership fostered by greed and selfishness. They have amassed all the wealth they could possibly get and in the process stepped on the heads of the common man for their own financial gains.
Recently, the well paid people in Kenya (Mps) all of whom do not deserve that kind of salary, were quick to reject a proposal that was put forward in parliament to tax their pay. They gave inane reasons not to be taxed; paying funeral bills for their constituents from their salaries, Harambee contributions and other form of dubious excuses. I wonder why these altruistic men and women are usually the first to downplay any form of contribution towards the welfare of the common man and yet very quick to unanimously agree on matters that satisfy their own financial gains. It is very sad that a common mwananchi who is paid 10 times less than these Mps and does not receive any allowances whatsoever, is taxed, yet these “service men” who earn their living from sitting around on the benches of parliament only to be paid six figure salaries vehemently reject the idea of being taxed!…yet they are quick to claim every five years that they want to bring change…what change?
In a country marred by scandals of public fund misuse and fraud amongst its politicians and businessmen you would think that the leadership would act fast to clear its name and restore faith amongst its people. Yet it seems all they do is to try and protect their cronies from the hand of the law. There have been so many commissions of inquiry into large scandals whose findings are either never revealed to the public or are never acted upon. It is sad that a man who steals ksh10000 can face up to 3 years in prison but those who embezzle millions are pardoned all in the name of amnesty. Amnesty should never replace justice. Selective justice is no justice at all.
It seems our leadership keeps failing us all the time. They have discovered they can get away with anything because no one will follow up. Nobody wants to get their hands dirty. Probably it’s time we, the citizens, looked for alternative options of ensuring we get what we deserve. Violence is not an option therefore we need to try means that are violent free. We need to drastic measures. It may be an old means but it seems the only option we will soon have is civil disobedience. Maybe then will the leadership of this country change for the better.

The search...

''It has been a long time coming,''i said to myself...Such a long time coming.We dwell in a world in which the concepts of being on a journey are deemed as for the righteous or for the 'deep people.' But truly,what is a journey and how many of us make this journey?The battle to live a life of truth in a fake world overwhelms,and this,causes thoughts of failure to emerge,mummifying us in cocoons of self hate and disbelief.I was on a journey.Born in a society where materialism reigns supreme,i swam with the same fishes i now see in a different light.W e are all born in this same pond,a pond full of lust,money,fame,and vices birthed every second.Have you ever reached a point in your life when you get tired of all this and just look for a getaway?In the midst of my escape,my search for relaxation,a certain peace came to me,a peace hard to explain but easy to feel,i felt at home.
Home is a word used to symbolise safety,peace and belonging.Are you at home?Reach deep into the depths of your thoughts and see if indeed you are home.I searched for truth in the wrong places,looked for fresh air in the middle of sewers but something strange happened.After such a long search for truth,and failing to find it,it found me.Waking up one day,i felt different,like i had a purpose or a mandate,i felt like i belonged.Nothing in me resembled the emptiness that devoured me when my eyes were still closed to the reality of life.Questions began to stir in me,questions like what is life?What is love?What is truth,joy,meaning,freedom,what are these and where can we go to find them or where can we wait for them to find us?
The destination sometimes can look unseen because the distance is far from the reach of our eyes but that does not mean there is no destination.Often i have retreated to spots where nature is my only companion,where starlights look at me,shining my way,as if they understand me.I have watched the nightlights as they case dull nights with their artificial beauty,but still,beauty it is,and i have found peace in the fact that He who created such beauty,places in which i can call home,created me too.Gone are the day when booze and scandals with the opposite sex took the place of home,gone are the days in which i would sigh and hope but fail to make an effort to search,just laying back,thinking i had no reason to search for i myself am a search in my own right.
Where is the line between our mind and heart drawn and can we ever strike a balance between them?Many times when in conflict with ourselves,we always ask,what does your heart say?What does your mind say?Then we always come up with a notion to either follow the heart or the mind,we never choose to follow both...Is there ever a way to complete the search within oneself,to complete the journey that we as human beings are inevitably on?Are materialism,vanity,corruption and hate breeding a people who do not believe in the journey to find oneself?Are they providing a false escape route from the inevitable?Some think that life with true belonging does not exist,and that the burn in ones heart or soul when searching for who they are is make-belief.Well,this is a choice we all have to make,to find ourselves before we succumb to other peoples versions of who we are.We may reach a point in life where we do not know who we are anymore,when we slowly begin to drift away from the habits we had and found normal,and in turn feel that something is missing.
We need to search who we are,where we are and why we are.Have yo ever looked into the eyes of a child on the street with nothing to eat and feeling incomplete?Have you ever seen the eyes of a barren woman as she looks at foetuses thrown in bins?The look in their eyes is one of deep and intense feeling,a look of searching,searching for what they have never been blessed with.Now compare their look with one of a man taunting the street child with food then throwing it instead.Picture the woman who without any inner questions raised,got rid of her own flesh and blood.What is the difference between these people?Weren't they all created the same?When will we realise that the life we live does not just affect us but also those treading on the path called life?It reaches a point where we all have to look within ourselves and find what truly has meaning in life.
Inevitably the feeling will check in,knocking on the door of our existence,beckoning us to fill the void we thought we never had.The feeling will eat and gnaw looking for a way to be freed.My journey is not yet over,as a matter of fact,a journey of what is true and real never ends,never sleeps,it is always awake,knowing that detractors may settle on our souls turf.That vacum in us,the 'circle' that we will always try to fill with 'triangular' objects,until we find the right 'circle', that emptiness that will always exist until you search and journey,and find what eases your soul,it will haunt,until the light of truth sets us free...
It has been a long time coming,and if that vacum already exists in you,do not open the door to hopelesness,Search and journey with me,for our journey never ends...

What If??

Today I saw the most touching article I have seen in a minute....My friend Eric was preaching at his friends funerals sermon and his title was "What If"...these are some of the what ifs he postedWhat if Forbes named me a millionare?• What if I was famous and Rich?• What if I lived in a big house and I drove a big car?• What if I was blond like Brittney Spears…who is no longer blonde but bald! Hehe!So the point he was trying to put across was what if you died today would you go to heaven??On another different but related note I think what is driving my passion to write is that the official ten day countdown to the presidential elections begun today and the questions on everybodys minds are What if we get to see the next black president??What if Mc Cain wins?What if the votes are rigged?What if What if what if??I think my friend is right..life is made up of what ifs..Ithink what if is a defining statement that can be a defining moment in ones life depending on the answer...What if you jumped off that cliff?What if you did not get that visa?What if you were born white?So in this regard...I think America and the world are at a great defining What If moment in history if the Democrats take home White hOuse on Nov 4th....If Obama wins as the first African American president...it not only is a victory on American turf but also victory that dates back to the days of the Civil War and Rosa Parks on the all white Alabama bus to Martin Luther to the Mau Mau freedom fighters in Kenya to Nelson Mandelas 27years in prison to the continous stigma thats associated with the black race....It will be victorius in the sense that the struggle for equality has paid off - that people wil realiza that we all belong to the human race and not just one particular race....that whether you are Black white Hispanic Caucasian you have no dominion over anybody ..that you can dream dreams and set out to accomplish them...and whether you win or loose the struggle must go on!!!So what if Obama does become president....what if he doesnt??

The Negro needs the white man to free him from his fears.The white man needs the Negro to free him from his guilt. -Martin Luther King, Jr.

the african way...

For the past two years or so, I’ve been having this “Holier Than Thou” attitude. Not with regards to religion, (that really isn’t my strong point) but in regards to music, and the black culture in general. I shunned the “bling-bling” mentality, the baggy jeans and white Ts with the stunner shades, pop locking and dropping while crankin that soulja boy and hollering a bay bay stuff…because to me, I felt there should be more to rap music. That’s when I got into this whole neo-soul/ conscious hip-hop tip. I even changed my look, cut off my perm, grew a fro, which I recently also cut off, that was me trying not to conform, but in not conforming, I did conform. I conformed to the standards of those into that type of thing. I still went on with the music though, some thing I’m still doing up to today… no pun intended to gangsta-rappers, but I’d rather listen to more laid back stuff, unless of course when getting high, and that’s another story.

A few days ago, I was watching Dave Chapelle’s Block Party (the DVD, I wasn’t actually there!) ummm, yeah, they had all these artists like Erykah Badu, Jill Scott, Dead Prez. Mos Def, Kanye West, Common, The Roots, John Legend, The Fugees (yes, all of them, together, on one stage), and Talib Kweli. It was an amazing concert. The music was awesome, even more for me because that’s the type of music I’m into. I felt, you know. Like I was doing my part, sticking with my heritage, I felt like I could relate because they weren’t talking about poppin bottles and booty shaking, they were talking about real stuff, you know, poverty, racism, hip-hop, society, even their songs about love were about real love, not just tappin some ass. I was on a musical high. Then, there was this part if the concert where they got really pensive and started talking about how far they’ve come as black people, how they still weren’t completely free, how they shouldn’t forget where they came from, they started talking about slavery, and the Black Panther’s and how the white man was still poisoning them… that was when I realized that I couldn’t relate anymore. I’m in Africa, I didn’t experience they whole slavery thing, o rracism, my ancestors didn’t work in cotton fields. I’m not saying that independence for my people came easy, I’m just saying that that isn’t my history. And that got me thinking again.

I knew then that I was a hypocrite of some sorts because I was hating on people who embraced the bling bling culture and here I was embracing one that wasn’t my own. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for diversity but I believe that we need to know where we’ve been before venturing out to other cultures. I’m trying to make a habit of reading, I realized that although I have read several African Writers’ works but not enough. Not enough to know my own heritage. Besides the history I was taught in school, I have never bothered to know more about the struggle for independence that took part in my country. Here I was, totally distracted by their music, I almost forgot about the music from my home. I realized that I had been ignoring the local. The poetry and literature, the traditional art of story telling and conversing. Even worse, how I am not a fluent speaker of my own tribe’s language. It all hit me. Thee is so much to have to learn, so much culture to take in, so much I don’t know about my own people.

Most of us have fallen victim to the west. Or rather, we have gotten carried away by the west. So much so that we have forgotten about our own cultures and traditions. I was watching TV the other day and they were showing young Zulu* girls in their rite of passage ceremonies. Thousands of girls performing a reed dance, some rural, some urban, but all in their traditional regalia. It is their right. I feel like we are slowly losing their heritage. I’ve met people who’ve lived in Kenya all their lives and still can’t speak Kiswahili*. What’s up with that? This is who we are. We should all do something to keep it alive, so that our kids and their kids can know where they came from.

* look it up!!!

BELIEVE!

It is a word most commonly used, a term often coined in everyday phrases. It is thought by most, if not all, to mean a lot. An untapped power is tacked within it. What’s the word you ask? Believe. Belief. Believing. Appropriate to this context in any of the aforementioned forms.
What is the meaning of belief? What is it to believe? What is believing?
Belief. Defined as a feeling that something or someone is real and true. Also defined as something that one accepts as true or real; what one believes.[1]
In contemporary society today, belief is somewhat regarded as a formula, a means to a happy ending. Songs have been sung, books have been written, award-winning films made. All about belief. And believing.
It is a doctrine taught everywhere. In the church, the marketplace, even in the pubs you won’t miss the occasional voice of sense clumsily dwelling on this matter.
I am confident in stating that most, if not all of us have experienced the emotion, found something, someone to practise belief on/in. Yet I can’t help but wonder, in the heat of all that knowledge behind this mystical entity, many of us have not reached the end through which the means is believing. Many of us have not even begun to scratch the surface of the prize that is attained when we believe. Why so?
As young people, as young Africa, as a generation. Do we believe? What do we believe in? Is it in the things we do? Or in what we say? What we hear or see? Is our believing based on logic, arguments, deductions, conclusions? Do we even believe at all? In anything? Anyone?
I reckon, the saddest lives are those led without much a sense of belief. These are constantly wandering hearts and minds that are hardly ever at peace.
Reality is, we’ve got to believe. Whatever it is we believe in gives us a sense of direction. This, however, does not justify the things we believe in. Believing in things that are here today and gone tomorrow is not believing. It may seem real, but is an expendable entity real? Belief should be based on something unchangeable, immutable; something that cannot be altered by the things we say or do. Something that cannot be intimidated by that which we say. Such belief is credible, and can guarantee a path to greatness.
Young Africa, what do we believe in? What are the things we view to be real? Which people do we regard to be true? It is a sad truth to observe, that in a bid to believe, we have altered the definition of it thereof. We have interpreted ‘real’ to be the lyrics that missed the garbage can and hit the radio waves instead. We have chosen to view ‘real’ as inebriation, alcoholism, drugs, sex. These are the things that we believe in, because these are the things we define to be ‘real’. These are the things upon doing, you are keeping it real.
I ask again, what are we choosing to believe in? As a generation living in depravity and moral erosion, what are we holding on to? What do we grasp on to stay afloat in this hungry sea of despair, of disillusion, of unbelief, of death? Are we holding on to things that, just like us, can be drowned by the vastness of this dilemma? Are we drowning ourselves by holding on to things that are already down under? Or are we trying to brave the storm without so much as a life jacket?
We’ve got to believe. But not just in anything. Not just in anyone. We’ve been made aware of the wars we are in. We’ve been informed as to what the armour is. Belief. But this armour is only as helpful as you let it be. It’s only as reliable as the source. It is possible, that the very armour you so confidently rely on, could be the same one that orchestrates your demise; that turns against you to your detriment.
Young Africa, believe, but not just in anything. Believe, but not just in anyone.

He who has ears, let him hear![2]
[1] Definition from the Oxford Dictionary
[2] Matthew 13:9

the voice in the darkness

I’ve done it all. Well, most of it. The alcohol. The casual sex. The drugs. I’ll say I’ve done most of it for my own peace of mind. Feel free to call it me being in denial. I’m a statistic. I am among the African Youth who have fallen victim to all that. The number of times I have woken up not remembering the events from the night before are more than I am proud of. I’m writing this from the other side the fence. I am one of the ones that need to be gotten to, that need to change. In my defense, I know I need to change. Living the life that I live… is like a drug. It’s highs and lows are like getting stoned then sobering up. When it’s good, it’s great, when it’s bad, the worst. The night life. The drunken escapades. Waking up with hang-overs so nasty and swearing not to drink again. That has been me. I do have to say though that I’m getting better. And no, I’m not just saying it to live with myself. It IS getting better.

This is the voice of those it the dark. I call it the dark because I once walked in a lit path. I know what my life lacks. I keep procrastinating going back to the light although I know the light means life. I don’t know why I, like the majority of my peers continue to stay in the dark. I have cried, hated, resented, regretted, lied, cheated, hurt and tried to forget. This life is emotionally straining. Why then do I continue to stay here? The thought of starting over frightens me. I see it like a relationship. Actually, I know it’s a relationship. I knew Him, God I mean. But sometimes I even have doubts about that. I went away form Him. I found a new way of life with new social circles, new routines, new habits, nasty habits. Those things are now part of me. Starting over frightens me. The path I chose caused me pain, but I find it easier to stay hear, rather than changing direction.

I see those in the light. I can’t help but get jealous. I know how they feel. I know the joy that comes with being in the light. I can live with myself most of the time but there are times it gets pretty bad. At times I try and think of what the others, the ones like me are going through. It must be worse for some them, Those being tied down by addiction and lack of vision. Some have never known salvation. Some have never felt the peace that comes with the light. The mis-conceptions that are spread in the dark are killing us, in masses. We need to be saved. Some of us know we need help, the rest are just simply in denial. We try so hard to get away from the person we are but all we do is get more tangled in the web, in the dark.

There’s got to be more than the constant chanting. The echoing “repent” and “change your ways”. That’s mostly what we get from those in the light. That’s how I feel anyway. There’s got to be more. I repented once, I turned around. I tried to head for the light. My old world moved on without me. I never felt so alone as when I first went back to the light. I was confused, I felt dirty, un-worthy, unwanted. . .

Now, unfortunately, I find myself back in the dark…