The Other Side of Politics in Kenya

As the constitution states, a country like Kenya should hold democratic elections after every five years. This is always eagerly waited for by the people of Kenya because of the excitement regarding different results. The first reason is that the people may want to overthrow the government if at all the government is not working to their expectations. The second reason is that when a public office holder passes on, a by-election should be held to fill the vacancy and through democracy, this is initiated.

But there is something ironic about this; the fact that people are excited to practise their democratic right. There comes challenges. Tension builds among people as contestants try to defend their parties and ideas. This leads to ideological differences, which to a large extent causes tribalism, especially in a case where the two contestants are of different major tribes. This is vividly seen during campaign periods; people get divided in spirit of supporting different contestants or parties they come from. These are real experiences in one of the countries of Africa. Due to political instability, the economy of the country has been going down. We ask ourselves …until when will this continue? This at large has also lead to insecurity and less investors going to the country to do their businesses that perhaps would raise the economy of the country. The country is stranded, as they do not have a stable government.

The elections that were held on August 8, 2017 were said to be un-fair and this led to a petition being presented in the court. The judges were keen enough to know that the elections were not free and fair, and ruled fairly, stating that a re-election should be done in sixty days.

For petitioners to have reached the point of going to the court, they saw many bad things going on, apart from un-fair elections. People lost their lives just to force victory. Amongst those who lost their lives are the interior cabinet secretary, Joseph Nkaissery, as well as the head of technology at the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission. Several lives were threatened for speaking the truth, and yet the country claims to embrace democracy. Solutions are always within our reach. The first one is to change, as it is said that change is the only constant thing in this world. Change then means we will see each other as brothers and sisters, but not in terms of tribes. This will enhance unity. The second thing is to embrace each other’s ideas and prevent hate speeches from the leaders, which leads to the division of the local people. We should also have free and fair elections, as stated in the books of law, for example the Constitution. By doing all of these things, the country will grow socially, economically and politically.