The weepin widows of Wagalla

By NZAU MUSAU Photos by JEPTUM CHESIYNA

Ah, could my anguish be measured and my calamity laid with it in the scales, they would now outweigh the sands of the sea. Because of this, I speak without restraint- Job 6: 1-4.

CLUTCHING a waste kindling, Saharah Abdi stares into the patchy roof of her lonesome manyatta as her mind loads up the details of the painful event am seeking to unearth.

Looking me through sunken eyes, falling eye bags, wrinkled face and shriveled fingers, she cuts the image of a troubled soul, one that has for 26 years now wept over immense sorrows brought upon her by a state that forcefully incorporated her community into the nation.

As she begins to speak, it dawns to me that for her, Wagalla- the infamous massacre of February 1984 happened yesterday. The three aspects of time- past, present and future are bound up in one- the present:

“Wagalla found me right here,” she says as she taps the sandy floor of her manyatta where we are all seated cross-legged: “It found me right here, right inside this house,” she adds authoritatively.

On the eve of 10th February 1984, she recalls she slept pretty well with her family. Nothing had seemed unusual in the past few days until that early morning when she woke up to sound of heavy boots pounding her compound.

They were littered allover this place, she says, the military men. Before she could fully apprehend the going’s on, they had already stormed inside her compound and pounced on her husband, his two brothers and their old man.

“They hurled all the men in this yard inside their truck. As if that was not enough, they pounced back on me and started to rape me. I tried to resist but one of them stabbed my breast with his gun; I fell unconscious,” she narrates with a tinge of bitterness.

Bitterness knows no shame for if it did Saharah would have hesitated to show me the bayonet stab-scars in her thighs and boot imprints in her back.

Her husband had been a civil servant working for the ministry of water but that day, there was no regard for anyone as long as he was Degodia, the Somali clan that was the target of the government operation allegedly seeking illegal guns.

“He did not make it far as I later learnt when I woke up to a dead village. He’d tried to resist saving me but they bayoneted him fatally. They threw him on the way to Wagalla and he bled his way to death,” she says.

That was the last day she ever saw the four for they never came back. Those who survived the orgy of beatings were driven to Wagalla air strip twelve miles away and herded alongside hundreds of others collected from allover Wajir.

There, they were made to strip naked and to sleep belly-face in the graveled strip. The four day ordeal of torture, rescue attempts by the women and a fatal break-away began in earnest.

“We tried to go see them but we were repulsed on the way and many of us badly assaulted. They suffered a lot from what we have heard from survivors- burning, beatings, poison- name it all,” she says.

Her story is corroborated by Raha Garat, another victim neighbor of her and whose husband lived to tell the story. Raha had come visiting when she found us engaged in deep conversation and immediately started weeping.

According to Raha, God saved her husband Garat Sanae but left him with permanent injuries which have confined him to bed ever since.

“He was coming back from the mosque when they descended on our manyatta hounding everyone, beating everyone up, stabbing me as they attempted to rape me and burning up the manyatta,” she tearfully recounts.

She, like many others was collected unconscious by an Italian Catholic volunteer Annalena Tonelli who was then working in the area and taken to hospital.

For her, Wagalla is an everyday problem since 1984 as she tends to her husband ever since. We took a stroll to their manyatta a few metres away and found the old man lying on a spread mattress.

It was a morning like no other, he tells me, as he peeps directly at me through his thick glass lens. I later learned that one of his eyes turned blind from the beatings of that day.

“They raped my daughter right in my own eyes and dragged me along into the truck where I found all the men from my village. We were taken to Wagalla and made to lie upside down in the scorching February heat,” he recounts.

Then Wagalla air strip had just been constructed and had a fresh wire mesh around it. Heavily armed military men surrounded it and worked in shifts throughout the four days the men were held there, he says.

By the first day on Friday, some rebellious men were already dead- shot or beaten dead by the officers. By Sunday morning, others had started to die of heat and thirst. On Tuesday, the dead were collected to be thrown away in the bushes and that was the escape for Garat.

“I was collected alongside the corpses and cast away as a dead. We were about 80 ‘corpses’ in the truck and we were driven about 50 kilometers away into the bush and dumped; hyenas feasted on that day,” he says as he attempts a tear.

For him, his life is dedicated to the Catholic volunteer Annalena who went about trailing military trucks in search of the injured: “She took 15 of us alive but many of that number died in her hospital. Many more were eaten by hyenas by the time she found us.”

At this point, Garat pulled down his shirt to reveal a huge scar between his chests: “These are effects of being gritted against hot murram by soldier’s boots.”

But it was the huge protruding growth beneath in his loins which shocked me: “It expands and contracts a time; now it has contracted. This is a result of the beatings and stabbing I went through in the hands of my own government.” He says.

Bitter and lost for more words, the old man struggled to wake up and staggered his way to lunchtime prayers as his sons and grandchildren took over detailing to me the pain of growing up as Wagalla victims.

They took me round the village showing me the vacant plots of Wagalla victims. Here, they told me, women are more than men because most of the men were killed in the massacre.

For Abdi Bellow my guide, the many drug addicts, mad-people walking round Wajir town and troubled orphans abound in the village are living testimonies to the injustice suffered.

“My father died in the massacre. My mum is now insane probably due to what she went through. Her mother was burned alive as she watched. It’s not only my mom who is insane but also her two sisters… my aunties,” he recounts to me.

In one of the manyatta’s, we found a lonesome badly-thatched hut where one mentally disturbed young man spends his entire day in. “He used to ask about Wagalla everyday before he went quiet. He does not talk much any more ever since,” he sister Halima Hussein said.

For Mohammed Khamis, an ex-police officer in his thirties, only the victims of Wagalla can appreciate their sorry states and no much telling it out will help.

“It was a complete disruption and destruction of a society in terms of wealth, lives, social structure and organization. We feel it everyday, we see it, we live it and no justice has been forthcoming so far,” he speaks in his refined English.

For Sahara, Wagalla is a walking shame: “Up to this moment, I cannot hold my urine and the stench around me tells it all. Only God knows about us… only God,” she says as she breaks into tearful and infectious soliloquy:

“Look at us, what is left of us? only God my son, only God… its not even good to be left alone when all our people have died, not any good…”

For a mother who has been jailed five times for speaking about Wagalla massacre, life cannot get any more painful and that is why she is vowing to die fighting for justice of the victims.

She however throws a caution my way: “I fear for you. Anybody who talks about Wagalla is endangered by the very act of speaking… every person who tries. That is why most people are quiet about it.”

As she leads me out through the village, she points out at a spot where some of the dead where thrown and poses the immortal question: “Did a government which exists for the people have to kill them sue gruesomely?”

What Wagalla entailed: The story of the massacre.

According to a sworn affidavit filed in the High Court on 24th February 2005 by Salah Abdi Sheikh, about 5000 men of Degodia clan of Somali community were rounded in the security operation.

The operation sanctioned by the provincial security committee was directed, controlled and commanded by the then North Eastern Provincial Commissioner Benson Kaaria who also served as chair of the provincial security committee, the affidavit says.

It says the men were surrounded by officers from the military, regular police and the administration police on the ground and Kenya Aiforce personnel in military helicopters from above.

“In this horrific, cruel, inhuman and most degrading operation women member of the clan were humiliated through beatings, assaults, torture and rape in presence of their children, relatives,” Salah says in his sworn affidavit.

At the airport, the men stripped naked and made to lie on their bellies in the hot murram under the scorching sun. “Soldiers whipped men until they were a mess of blood,” the affidavit reads,

For days, they underwent torture until about 3000 attempted to break off and scale the high razor fence that enmeshed them: “Only a few made it to the nearby bushes. Bullets felled the rest.”

A massive cover up was then ordered with the dead and the injured being ferried and scattered in the bushes of north eastern districts. Some bodies are said to have been collected as far away as the Ethiopian border.

Others were found in Habaswen and Ewaso Nyiro riverbed. Mass graves have since been discovered in Wagalla, Elnoor, Samatar, Griftu and even in Wajir town at the Wajir TB Manyatta.

Over the years, Salah and Truth Be Told Network comprising of orphans, survivors and victims of the massacre have collected names and identified at least 400 men who died in the operation.

Justus ole Tipis, a minister in the Kanu government in the 80’s told parliament only 57 people died in the massacre when the matter was brought up by area MP Ahmed Khalif. Fifty two of these were civil servants.

No one has ever been charged in court or reprimanded in any way for even these 57 deaths. Informal apologies have however been made to Degodia clan elders by some of those who ordered the operation.

Ends……………/.

Why disbanding the truth commission is not an option

By NZAU MUSAU

STANDING on the edge of a valley overlooking Mathare slums, Nancy Wanjiru takes a deep breath as she surveys the canopy of the noisy shanties beneath.

Barely in her forties, her eyes have sunken and the face is already forming wrinkles out of pain she says she has undergone over the past two years owing to a tumultuous election outcome in early 2008.

On the fateful morning of January 3rd, 2008, Wanjiru was attacked, gang-raped, her husband badly cut up with machetes and her house dismantled by rioters protesting the controversial election of Mwai Kibaki as president.

“They took turns on me as others dragged my husband down the river cutting him up with pangas. Badly hurt, I staggered to his rescue and we took him to Kenyatta hospital. I walked back only to find my house had been brought down. I became an Internally Displaced Person,” she narrates.

She struggles to hold back her tears as she explains the ordeal that turned her life upside down: “I was smelly and felt unworthy of living after all that happened that day. To add salt to the injury, I found out that I had been infected with HIV and there the agony began.”

Her quest for justice ever since has been a torturous one and has not borne fruit. Her violators still taunt her, her life took a turn and she has never been compensated for the loss of her dignity. Particularly striking to her is that no judicial mechanism has nailed her violators.

“I see them every other day. They are still my neighbours. They taunt me that nothing will ever happen to them. I am very bitter with everything,” she exclaims as she rubs her hands together as though submitting to her sorry fate.

And now adding to her bitterness is the current talk of disbanding the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission, the only national mechanism that has been set to deal with all human rights violations that occurred in the country from 1963 to February 2008.

Attempts to set up a local special tribunal have thrice failed. The International Criminal Court has been slow in coming and the local courts have not helped the situation either.

They want to throw it away because they did not suffer a thing, she says. “They want us to forget everything and move forward. But how will I do that when I do not have an opportunity to say what happened to me and when I see my aggressors, the people who raped me every day?” she poses.

Wanjiru’s case is no different from Wafula Buke’s, a former student leader at the university of Nairobi in 1980’s and who was arrested, tortured and imprisoned for five years for allegedly spying on the former President Daniel arap Moi’s government.

We caught with Wafula in town while he was running some errand with her 12 years daughter. Like Wanjiru, Wafula has no love lost with those seeking to disband the barely a year old commission because of a credibility crisis occasioned by the chair Bethuel Kiplagat’s adamant refusal to quit.

Kiplagat’s credibility questions have sucked in the entire commission and elicited one resignation of a commissioner. In addition to leadership crisis, the commission has lean funding, no staff and lacks the critical support of civil society and donor community.

“The chair is holding the commission at ransom and creating the circumstance for its disbandment. No one in the coalition government top hierarchy has told him to resign. Instead, they are loud on disbandment, why?” Buke says.

Instead of giving up on the commission because of its problems, Wafula says people should try to get the best they can out of the commission as is.

Kenyans had better be “pragmatic enough” to seize the opportunity as is and get the best out of this situation: “We used Kibaki in 2002 to dismantle the Kanu apparatus despite his known weakness as a conservative. We can do the same with Kiplagat and get what we can for now instead of losing it all.”

But Justice and Constitutional Affairs minister Mutula Kilonzo is very resolute that the commission is irredeemable and must necessarily be disbanded. Such disbandment will work in the interest of Kenyans, the minister claimed.

‘The government cannot interfere with the truth commission but will be pushing for the disbanding of the commission through parliament as the organ recognized by law,” Mutula said.

The minister however concedes that allegations levelled against the chair of the commission Bethuel Kiplagat on involvement in past human rights violations are indeed worrying but he says he’s washed his hands off the matter.

But if the minister is only daring, one MP has already done it. Ababu Namwamba, a member of the parliamentary committee on administration of justice and legal affairs has pulled a fast one on the commission:

“Unknown to the country, on 3rd March, 2010, I filed notice of a motion seeking the disbandment and reconstitution of the TJRC through amendment of the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Act, 2008.”

Ababu’s has been lying before the House Business Committee for two months now due, partly to the heavy legislative agenda in the last session which included conclusion of the constitution review process, and partly due to what he calls “sharp divisions and uncertainty within corridors of power on how to handle the TJRC fiasco.”

He explains that his motion is premised on one central factor: that the very character of the TJRC as an institution has been so badly damaged that even the mere removal of the chairman alone will not cure the damage nor revive public confidence in the commission.

“To execute its mandate effectively and achieve its noble goal of leading this nation towards truth, justice and reconciliation, the TJRC, like Ceasar's wife of Imperial Rome, must not only be blemish less, but must indeed exist beyond reproach,” he says.

According to the youthful MP, such disbandment will be in national interest and that is why he cannot wait for parliament to reconvene in June to pursue that root.

For Davider Lamba, a member of the 2003 taskforce on truth commission chaired by Prof. Makau Mutua, a disbandment of the commission it’s reconstitution notwithstanding would create a gap by abolishing an avenue to deal with the country’s “murky” past.

Despite its ills of lean resources, time, leadership crisis and all against the background of a broad mandate and huge expectations, the commission must stay on, Lamba says while drawing experience from the 2003-2007 failure by President Kibaki’s first regime to set up the commission.

“We cannot rely on politician’s words from the 2003 experience. The current commission is a creature of the National Accord and cannot be disbanded at whim, it must stay on!”Lamba said.

According to the commission’s CEO Patricia Nyaundi, the situation facing the commission is like the one that faces a father who buys a table and painstakingly transports it to his rural home only to realise one of its legs is shorter.

“The question here is do you transport it back all the way to the city to fix it or do you find a local solution. A wise father would find something to leverage it and the table would still serve its purpose,” Nyaundi says.

The commission has leadership and other institutional problems which should not be the basis for its disbandment; Nyaundi says and adds that Kenyans must pull all the stops to get the best out of the current arrangement.

She says disbandment would not only be expensive in terms of termination of contracts but will also drag the transitional justice agenda and spill it over into the “usually vicious campaigns” associated with our electoral cycles.

“Assuming the government is rich enough to pay us all, when is the earliest that a disbandment can occur? Parliament will be back in June and will busy itself with budget up until September.

There will be a referendum and so issues to do with us may not be a priority,” she argues.
But the minister insists that a new TJRC which has confident of all would not be affected by the campaigns:

“There should be no worries of the coming referendum and 2012 election campaigns; they will not interfere with the commission at all”

The way forward for Nyaundi is that the civil society ought to close ranks with the commission to advance the transitional justice agenda and the Chief Justice expediting the process of appointing a tribunal to investigate the allegations against the chair.

The dilemma facing the country is captured by the ambivalent stand taken by the Kenya Human Rights Commission, the country’s premier human rights body and which single-handedly led the quest for a TJRC.

“We are still deliberating on the way forward but as for now, our approach is that of non cooperation with the commission. We are however working with the victims on documentation of their accounts,” acting deputy executive director of Kenya Human Rights Commission Tom Kagwe said.

Kagwe’s personal opinion however is that a disbandment might sound a sure death knell to the commission which his organization has pressed for many years and whose chair (Mutua) chaired the task force of 2003.

He does not even like the media harping on disbandment option because it gives the impression that it’s doable.

“We should be talking about salvaging the commission because disbandment might play into the hands of some people who do not wish to have a truth commission. The fact that Kiplagat has refused to listen to everyone including Desmond Tutu should make you suspicious,” Kagwe says.

According to him, a way should be found to resolve the leadership issue probably through replacing all commissioners but retaining the secretariat and taking advantage of the possible momentum if new constitution passes through to jolt the process forward.

The truth commission was agreed on during the Serena hotel national dialogue and reconciliation talks of 2008 which gave birth to the National Accord. It took a year or so to develop the TJRC Act and half a year to recruit and appoint the commissioners.

Its mandate includes probing human rights violations in the form of massacres, sexual violations, murder and extrajudicial killings, grand corruption, irregular acquisition of public land, causes of ethnic tensions and state repression including torture and cruelty.

The violation cases themselves run into thousands and thousands of cases but the commission has indicated it will work on a framework of establishing broad patterns of the violations without necessarily handling all cases.

For now however, the commission is in a limbo and suspicion abounds between the two sides as the nation awaits the verdict of CJ Evans Gicheru on truth commissioner’s application for a tribunal to be formed.

The trouble with the tribunal however is that Section 17 of the Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Act of 2008 does not give a timeline on how such an inquiry might last. A similar tribunal set up in 2004 to investigate judges accused of corruption has just cleared its work.

According to a 2006 United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights publications, “Rule of law tools for post-conflict states: Truth commissions, successful truth commissions must have the three critical elements of political will, support of victims and cessation of conflict.

It must have operational independence, enjoy legitimacy and people’s confidence as well as receive considerable international support in terms of funding.

Majority of these are lacking in the Kenyan case begging the question: Is it by design or by chance that the truth commission is failing before its task begins?

Ends...................../.

Proving the existence of God: St. Thomas Aquinas five ways

By NZAU MUSAU

Writing in Summa Theologiae (handbook of theology), St. Thomas Aquinas demonstrates that God exists by analyzing five phenomena which indicate to the necessity of his existence. He does this by drawing attention to a certain phenomena’s (five of them) whose relative, dependent and caused character is evidenced. In all five, he demonstrates that the actual reality of the original causer of these phenomena cannot be explained by invoking the explanation of an infinite series of contingent causes. The long and short of it, is that, God can only be the person or entity behind these phenomenon.

1. The first way: Cosmological argument for God’s existence

St. Aquinas argues that this is the most apparent as the phenomenon of change/movement which is considered here as perceptible through the senses. The universe and the objects within it contain change. Girls become women, seeds become trees, leaves wither and young men become old.

Each such a phenomenon however points out to something else besides the particular change. This is to say it points to a certain origin of the change or potency. Change must necessarily have an origin as it cannot cause itself. Another phenomenon is necessary in order to cause this change, St. Aquinas implies.

When it is agreed that the every action/move has a cause/mover, a series of causes/ movers is established which St Augustine says cannot go infinitely. There must be the first mover and anything else is unthinkable. This first mover/cause is itself unmoved/uncaused and is the origin of all change and motion. St. Aquinas says that this is what people call God.

This way of proving God’s existence has however been challenged in a number of ways among them being that change does not necessarily have to be instigated by something else (cannot things change on their own?) and that change does not necessarily have to have a starting point (cannot the universe be infinite in the sense that it does not have a starting point?). Also, critics have postulated that the first cause/mover need not necessarily be God as claimed by St. Aquinas (cannot this first cause/mover be anything else apart from the Christian God?).

2. The second way: Causal argument for God’s existence

Largely corresponding to the cosmological argument, this causal argument for God’s existence however builds on the connection between cause and effect. Every effect of a cause points back to the cause which points to another cause and so on.

The fundamental phenomenon here is that of efficient causality which is subordinated by other causes. There is no known case (neither is it possible) in which a thing is found to be the efficient cause of itself. St. Aquinas proceeds to argue for a foundation in a principal efficient cause of itself which would otherwise be before itself and therefore absurd.

With this argument, St. Aquinas disapproves as absurd the principle of progression to infinity. He says any attempted explanation of this principle will only create a colossal edifice of inadequate causes. In such a case, there would be no first efficient cause nor there ultimate effect or any intermediate efficient causes. Moreover, to take away the cause is to take away the effect. His conclusion is that there necessarily is a first efficient cause which is God.

3. The third way: Argument for God’s existence based on necessity

St. Aquinas third argument is based on the two concepts of possibility and necessity. It is found that in nature, things are possible to be or not to be. Since there were once not, it is impossible that they will always be for that which was not at one time is not.

If therefore all things came to be according to St. Aquinas, it means at one point there was nothing in existence. This he says would be absurd since all things begin to exist at the instigation of something else already existing. Also if this (that at some point in time there was nothing in existence) were to hold true, there would be nothing in existence to this date. This is not true since things already exist.

His argument here is that there must be one thing, one being whose existence is necessary. This thing would be opposed to the things already in existence whose necessity is caused by other things and as already proved above, this (the chain of necessitation) cannot go on to eternity. We cannot therefore help but admit the existence of some being having of itself own necessity which is independent of any other and which is the origin of all necessitation. This is what is known to men as God.

4. The fourth way: Argument for God’s existence based on the idea of a highest degree of perfection and of being

St. Aquinas bases this on the gradation which is found in things. We see all that exists is more or less perfect and has more or less being. This more or less, St. Aquinas argues, is predicted according to the extent to which they resemble in some way to something which is the maximum.

For instance, someone is said to be noble inasmuch as he nearly resembles that which is noblest. So that in every true thing, there is the truest, every noble the noblest and every great the greatest.

This reasoning point’s beyond the earthly towards something that is perfect and that is absolute being- and this is what is called God. This is the thing which is to all being the cause of their being. It is also the paragon of perfection, the chief embodiment of the good.

5. The fifth way: Teleological argument for God’s existence

This final argument is taken from the governance of the world as observed by St. Aquinas. He postulates that a critical look into the things in existence, order will be observed or even experienced. The universe appears to be well ordered or structured. Even things that lack knowledge appear to act for an end and to the best result.

They achieve their end not by chance but by design. The design aspect is deduced from the fact they always appear to act always or nearly always, in the same way so as to obtain the best result. For example, the earth which has no known knowledge of its own is constantly spinning in its own orbit and does not deviate or move closer to the sun.

This way, it sustains life which is most likely its purpose as designed. St. Aquinas argues that whatever lacks knowledge (as the earth does) cannot move towards an end, unless it is directed by some being endowed with knowledge and intelligence. An arrow cannot direct itself unless an archer does so.

This order in the world and its many subtle connections point to a fundamentally rational and good design. And since this design is not obviously the work of man who himself is amazed by it and in fact seeks to understand it, it can only be the work of a greater rational spirit which not only designs but also actualizes it in the universe. This, according to St. Aquinas, is what we call God.


Bibliography

1. Ten great works of philosophy, Robert Paul Wolf, Signet Classic Printing Press, March 2002.

2. A history of western thought, Gunnar Skirpekk and Nils Gilje, Scandinavian University Press, 2000.

3. A history of medieval philosophy, Battista Mondin, Theological Publications in India, 1998.

A contextual look into modern philosophy and its antecedents

By NZAU MUSAU

Introduction

The sprouting of modern philosophy from 17th century up to 19th century came against the background of certain overriding features of the period preceding it and largely known as medieval period. Among these were scholasticism, religious crisis, nationalism and renaissance among others.

These features to a large extent influenced the rise, scope and methods of the modern philosophy a great deal. This paper discusses these background features and how they are linked to the rise, development and general feature of the modern philosophy.

The background and the link

An important feature in the background to modern philosophy is scholasticism which dominated the medieval philosophy era. This philosophy concerned itself largely with doing expositions of gigantic philosophical figures of the past. Scholasticism tended to be dominated by theologians of Catholic Church.

As Silvano Borruso observes in his book “A history of philosophy for (almost) everyone," scholasticism had like the Egyptian pyramids resisted all odds and prevailed ever since the days of St. Augustine up to St. Aquinas who is considered one of its greatest luminaries.
The impression created over those decades scholasticism prevailed was one of professing a stereotypical way of thinking shackled by authority of an all powerful Catholic Church.
Talking of the church, a crisis in its midst also formed another background feature to modern philosophy. The crisis entailed the parallels between the Catholics and the Protestants who contested each other on a number of issues.

The reformation and counter-reformation led by Luther, Calvin and Loyola reduced the power of the church. The thirty year old war that ensued persuaded everybody that neither the Protestants nor Catholics could be completely victorious.
It became necessary therefore, as Bertrand Russel observes in “History of Western Philosophy” to abandon the medieval hope of doctrinal unity and this inevitably increased men’s freedom to think for themselves even about fundamental.

The dominant Catholic Church had itself gone through “astonishing vicissitudes” as Russel calls them with the papacy consolidating power, debasing the church with their schisms, debauchery and all manner of ills. Its authority was obviously waning or in doubt.
The philosophers of the times were therefore keen to identify the nature of the true religion, means of arriving at religious truths and establishing the true role of the church as well as individuals relationship with God.

This period preceding the rise of modern philosophy was characterized also by the rise in national consciousness as marked by clear distinctions between nationalities. This entailed shift from fiefdoms to nations and from Latin which was the dominant language in Europe to the vernaculars. Gunpowder had also begun to strengthen central governments at the expense of feudal nobility and this changed the power arrangements in Europe.

But it was the feature of the renaissance in 15th Century which had a lot of impact on the modern philosophy. It involved the wave of renewal of intellectual interests and activities, technological breakthroughs and impressive high output in the realm of the arts.

Besides the overall impact of the renaissance, a number of key scientific discoveries and inventions provoked by the renaissance upset the status quo and demanded a new look into the future. Key among them was the invention of steam engine technology which inspired industrialization of the continent and conquest of far lands. Also, Galileo Galilei’s heliocentric theory and Darwin’s theory of evolution set philosophers thinking hard.
The impact of these important background features were monumental in the direction modern philosophy took. They tended to drive modern philosophy to a certain ends and this carved out certain concerns.

Among the first concerns of modern philosophy which largely had been influenced by the religious crisis was the relationship between God and human freedom. The ontological proof of Gods existence had been subject to philosophical inquiry ever since the ancient times. Modern philosopher’s rejoinder was if God existed, what then was his relationship with human beings?
For instance Spinoza took on this subject to argue that God and nature were one thing and within this reality there is no freedom to either God or man as laws of necessity are in operation.
Also inspired by the religious concerns of the medieval times was the modern philosophers concern about the mind-body relationship which Rene Descartes passionately focused on. Other philosophers like Thomas Hobbes, Voltaire, Diderot Dennis just to mention but a few concerned themselves of this matter.

The impact of renaissance particularly attributed to Italy was massive not only in destruction of the rigid scholasticism which “had become an intellectual straitjacket.” It restored the place of Plato in philosophy, promoted a genuine and firsthand knowledge free from glosses of the Neo-Platonist and Arab commentators.

It also encouraged the habit of regarding intellectual activity as a delightful social adventure, not a cloistered meditation. Besides, it liberated men from the narrowness of medieval culture.
The myth-shattering theories of Galileo provoked in philosophers a fresh concern about the nature of the universe and re-evaluation of long held positions. In the course of this critical re-evaluation, modern philosophers delved into speculative metaphysics on the nature of the universe. The questions of what is finite and infinite, actual and possible universes and the place of God in all these began to dominate modern philosophy.

The rise of nationalism and destruction of fiefdoms influenced to a large extend the philosophical interest in concerns God’s relationship with the civil authority and individual liberty. This could also trace its roots from the crisis the Catholic Church was going through. Previously, it had been taken for granted that political leaders were sort of demigods representing God’s interests, so were the Popes. They could not therefore be questioned. Featuring prominently in this debate was John Locke with his edict that human beings in their state of nature enjoy natural rights.

The aftermath of Isaac Newton’s deterministic laws and scientific grounding of causality principle incited a wave of questioning about human beings capacity for freedom or the place of determinism in man’s activities under the sun. How this question was answered would also have overbearing influence on the religious questions of the day. Modern philosophers descended on the subject and offered striking and diverse views on the matter.

Besides influencing the scope of modern philosophy, the background features were instrumental in influencing the methods of modern philosophy and hence its outcomes. For instance, Galileo’s breakthrough had inspired the individual approach as opposed to institutionally determined methods. Most modern philosophers therefore tended to operate outside the established realms and confines. Spinoza is one such example who operated outside his Jewish society and got banished for it.

The empirical approach also weighed heavily on modern philosophers because it had in the preceding period proved to be productive in the sciences. Philosophy also took an analytical approach with focus being on determining meaning and not offering meaning.

Conclusion

The preceding conditions before the rise of modern philosophy cultivated the ground upon which it thrived. The events of the times can be said to have directly, sometimes indirectly given rise to modern philosophy and also shape its concerns and approaches. Modern philosophy is therefore inextricably linked to medieval philosophy.

Constitution opinion: Have the people genuinely desired a new constitution?

By NZAU MUSAU

COMMITTEE of Experts chairman Nzamba Kitonga told of a very enthralling but analogous story of an aerial man’s view of human beings on the day he launched the first harmonized draft last year.

The story goes that this man from Mars had been watching the men on earth below (human beings) for some time and he noticed they moved from their house in the morning, entered another house (car), moved with it and entered into yet another one (office).

In the evening the same cycle would repeat with the men moving from their houses (offices) into other houses (cars) and back to other houses (home). This went on day after day, week after week, month after month and year after year.

The man from Mars began to wonder; if the idea of human beings is to be in a house, why do they move from one house to another? After much soul-searching, he concluded that human beings are either confused, chaotic or both.

This story told by the Senior Counsel on the day he launched the proposed draft constitution best captures the Kenyan plight in as far as the struggle for a new constitution is concerned.

A person watching from outside would notice the elements of confusion littered throughout our struggle which has spanned decades and made world history.

Ours is a story of both promise and betrayal, bravery and cowardice, hope and despair among other such abysses which have afflicted us in our quest for a new constitution.

If the idea of Kenyans has been to clinch a new constitution, one might wonder, why haven’t they been unable all those years?

Why do they miss all the moments; from the “No reforms No election” calls of 1997, down through the IPPG debacle, Bomas One, 2002 Narc triumphal entry into power, Bomas Two and 2005 referendum?

If the idea of a new constitution is a genuine one- because that is where we must start, what then explains all the change of color in those who once led the original cause? In this case, one would be at a loss to explain Kiraitu Murungi’s virulent opposition to Bomas Draft in 2004.

Better still, what would explain President Kibaki’s behavior in 2004 contrasted to his days as the opposition leader when he presented his views at County Hall to Prof. Yash Pal Ghai’s team and cited imperial presidency as overriding cause of conflict in Kenya.

Again if it were a genuine one, one would have to explain why both sides of the divide in 2005- Kibaki’s side and Raila’s decided to play poker with the cause and why Kenyans played along.

Interestingly, I have seen in the past politicians admitting that they deliberately misled Kenyans in 2005 for their own interests.

If the idea of new constitution is a sincere one, wouldn’t Kenyans first demand public apologies from these charlatans who are now positioning themselves as knights in shining armors this time round?

Talking of the 2005 debacle which Kitonga says produced nor winners or losers, where did the desire for a new constitution go after Kivuitu declared the Wako draft as defeated? Again, if the desire was genuine, would not have the struggle picked on from November 22nd?

Would have the so called “Orange luminaries” accompanied by one of the biggest crowds I will ever witness in this country gone to Uhuru Park to cut a victory cake or to mourn the loss of yet another opportunity?

Going by the above premised questions and their apparent answers, one could logically conclude that this struggle has not been a genuine one in as far as all the Kenyan people and their various characteristics and divisions are concerned.

I submit here and without fear of contradiction that the quest for a new constitution has not been a genuine one especially for the masses. The political class has shown some measure of divided genuineness which unfortunately is laced with confusion, chaos and self interests.

The masses have definitely expressed the need for a new constitution as exemplified by the thousands of views given to the Ghai review team but they have not concretized that need with genuine commitment to its attainment.

And yet more than anybody else, a new constitutional order would benefit the masses most because it is they who have suffered the brunt of a skewed constitutional order.

It is not too late; the masses can transform their need into a genuine desire by taking the lead this time and keep away from the deceitful guidance of the political class.

The country now boasts of substantial majority of enlightened masses who should now appreciate the vanity of an endless struggle, vote in this document mindlessly and put in place mechanisms to address its shortfalls at a later time.

African thought: Did the Greek’s plagiarize our philosophy?

By Nzau wa Musau

Holding Africa and Egypt in particular as the legitimate origin of Western thought, the theory of stolen legacy has excited intense debate key among its proponents George G James, Henry Olela, Cheick Anta Diop and Martin Bernal just to mention but a few. The question however remains whether their claims are credible enough to prove existence of philosophy in Africa and the subsequent plagiarism by the Greeks.

By and large, the evidence they adduce point to existence of philosophy though not properly documented in Africa and particularly in ancient Egypt and its surroundings. The glory of ancient Egypt for instance, was founded on African ideas long before conquest of North Africa by the Arabs between AD 639 and AD 708.

Egypt was a product of afro-ancestral thought and all its pyramids were works of continental Africans such as pharaoh Djoser who commissioned Imhotep his grand vizier and architect of great standing into building the funerary complex at Saqqara. Obviously, Egypt’s systems, beliefs, architecture, religion, social order and political organization demanded some great measure of philosophical backing.

The famed of the Greek philosophers themselves attest to their schooling in Egypt as their source of philosophical prowess. Thales of Miletus who is considered father of Western philosophy traveled to Kemet and in fact advised his students to go to Africa to study. Deodorise Siculus, the Greek writer came and stayed at Anu in Egypt. He admitted that many who “are celebrated among the Greeks for intelligence and learning” studied in Egypt. Homer, the first Greek writer of the Iliad spent 7 years in Africa studying law, philosophy, religion, astronomy and physics. Pythagoras spent over 20 years in Africa. Interestingly, he would later be credited for mathematical theories which for a thousand years before him had been used in Egypt to calculate areas of rectangles, circles, isosceles and trapeziums.

And writing in “Bucyrus”, Socrates himself admits: “I studied philosophy and medicine in Egypt.” So famed was Egypt a centre of high learning and philosophical thought that St. Clement of Alexandria, himself a Greek would write: “If you were to write a book of 1000 pages, you could not put down names of all Greeks who went to Nile Valley in ancient Egypt to study and even those who did not go claim they did because it was prestigious.”

Besides existence of philosophy in abstract sense, Africans in Egypt practiced philosophy in their day to day life and the evidence of this is scattered in technological, scientific, craft and religious inventions evident in Egypt in pre-Socratic times. Egyptians wrote long before Europeans could. In fact, the earliest known medical books such as the Hearst Papyrus (7th dynasty, 2000BC), the Kahun Papyrus (12th & 13th dynasty, 2133-1766BC) and Ebers Papyrus (18th dynasty, 1500BC) show evidence of the practice of medicine which in itself implies scientific philosophy. They practiced medicine in birth (Caesarian Section surgical mode of delivery is attributed to Egyptians), in life (treatment of various ills and surgery) and in death (mummification of the dead). Yet 1000 years after the recorded practice of medicine in Egypt, Hippocrates would be considered as the father of medicine.

The treatment of Greek philosophers upon return from Egypt clearly indicates that the philosophy they sought to practice was alien and unpalatable to Greek tastes. Their government’s policy is proof of the ‘African-ness’ of their philosophy. Plato fled to Megara, Socrates was executed and Anaxagoras fled to Ionia. The lack of their biographical data notwithstanding, their works smacked of plagiarism and possibly from Africa where they spend considerable time. Plato’s philosophy is eclectic and point to Egypt. His conception of four virtues and even the kind of educational system he vouched for reveals, as F. Ochieng’ Odhiambo says “some compatibility with the ancient Egyptian educational system.”

In fact and according to Akinyi Princess of K’orinda-Yimbo, “Phaedros” is what he learned from the fable of Thoth, the Egyptian god of wisdom and sacred texts when he (Plato) lived in Anu (Heliopolis) under an Egyptian philosopher priest called Sechnuphis. In her work; Dark Europe and Africa’s Past- A Critical Observation of Neighboring Continents, Akinyi Princes says that while Socrates awaited his condemnation, he admitted to his students that he plagiarized work of an African philosopher Aesop, the Ethiopian (560 BC): “I availed myself some of Aesop’s fables which were ready to hand and familiar to me and I versified the first one of them which suggested itself.” His host at Megara when he fled persecution in Greece; Euclid was an African, a greatest mathematician never mind that Thomas Jefferson (who would later became US 3rd president) would many years write that “no negro could comprehend the investigations of Euclid,” that in imagination blacks are “dull, tasteless and anomalous.”

Aristotle, the most influential of the Greek philosophers to modern Europe is largely a product of the loot of great libraries of Egyptian cities and especially the great library of Alexandria which he converted into a research centre and university for education of fellow Greeks. “Aristotle, together with his students Theophratus and Eudemus took full advantage and did research at the Alexandrian library, but must have helped themselves to some texts”, says F. Ochieng’ Odhiambo.

In conclusion, Greek philosophy points to Egypt as the pedestal of intellectualism and philosophy long before Europe’s. Egypt on the other hand is a product, as Cheick Anta Diop in Negro Nations and Culture: From Negro-Egyptian Antiquity to Cultural Problems of Black Africa Today says, of heartland Africa including Ethiopia.

As I observed severally above, the stolen legacy theory merely points to existence of philosophy in Africa and in reality does not pin-point it or crystallize this pointer. It is not enough to attribute Greek philosophy to Africa without giving concrete evidence to back this up. In my own considered opinion, the stolen legacy theory succeeds in merely inferring existence of philosophy in Africa and not in essentially proving it. Much more work needs to be done to prove the practice of philosophy in antiquity Africa and before the alleged Greek theft or plagiarism.

For it to be credible, Africa will have to trace and indeed produce the works of its famed philosophers whose works, ideas are claimed to have been looted or lost. These include Imhotep (2700 BC), the first recorded physician, architect, counselor to a King; Ptahhotep (2414 BC), the first ethical philosopher who believed in harmony with nature; Kagemni (2300 BC), teacher of right action for the sake of goodness and who came 1800 years before Buddha showed up and revolutionized the Orient; Merikare (1990 BC), classical teacher of good speech; Sehotep-Ibra (1991 BC), the nationalist philosopher. Others include Amen-emhat (1991 BC), the world’s alleged first cynic, Amenhotep son of Hepu (1400 BC), the most revered of ancient Kemetic philosophers and Duauf (1340 BC), master of protocols.

If the philosophical works of these men could be found and their biographies ascertained, the stolen legacy theory would be credible in proving existence of philosophy in Africa. If philosophy is to be proven in Africa, it is not to be sought in Europe but through undivided philosophical examination of African ways, systems, beliefs, history, cultures and reasoning. Stolen or not stolen, the evidence of practice of philosophy in Africa should be very apparent even in the present if indeed it was there. If its not, a lot of questions arise.

Ends…../.

With or Without dependency; Can the 3rd World survive?

In discussing depedency, Brazilian scholar Theotonio Dos Santos claimed that 3rd world countries cannot do without dependency nor can they do with it. In this paper, Nzau Musau discusses the claim and its basis.

In making this statement, Dos Santos is saying that the third world is inextricably and perpetually condemned to necessary dependency which guarantees survival but at the expense of stagnation. This statement is informed by a number of reasons which I will attempt to discuss below.
According to Dos Santos, third world countries cannot do without dependency because it provides the much needed capital which is very much wanting in those countries. This is caused by limited capital stocks and marginal incomes in the face of growing needs. Capital flight is also occasioned by heavy domestic borrowing leading to expensive capital within the borders. It therefore becomes inevitable that third world countries will be depended on the West for capital to develop their industries.

Third world countries must necessarily depend on the West for the expensive technologies which propel the western economies. Due to lack of capital, third world countries cannot afford to develop own technologies to propel their economies.

They cannot also afford to procure the Western technology either and therefore dependency is, again, inevitable if the countries are to develop. Technology in third world is very necessary when employed wisely. For instance, production of genetically modified foods in Africa can stave off the perennial food insecurity in the continent. Since the continent lacks enough capital to fund expansive GMO projects and spread the technology, it must necessarily depend on the West to do that. The West has accumulated surplus capital which would be idle anyway if it was not employed for this purpose.

The third world need depend on the west to turn over the bad legacy of mere providers of raw materials set by the colonialists. These countries must be able to process their raw materials into industrial products and add value to them to enable them compete in international market. And since such a venture is expensive, they need to depend on those countries which have the means and ways to enable this undertaking. Dependency seen in this light of creating a break from the cycle of dependency is positive and should actually be encouraged.

Dos Santos also bases his statement on necessity of dependency for third world on the fact that on the capitalistic reality of the world order at the moment. This implies that rich countries will continue to get richer and richer as they enjoy capital surplus while the poor will continue to get poor and poorer. Added to this is the hard fact that the international trading system largely suits the west.

If you were take the example of Europe and Africa, it will be noticed that individual African countries are disadvantaged in international trade where they individually bargain in the world market bilaterally while European countries approach the market through the EU bloc. Third world countries which are fragmented and economically non-viable must therefore depend on the developed economies for assistance.

The adverse effect’s of the colonial legacies of most of these developing countries is another factor that Dos Santos bases his argument on necessity of dependency. The nation-states bequeathed to new leaders of these countries by colonialists enjoyed very limited economic resource base, so little that self sufficiency is impracticable.

Their markets were also perpetually designed to be outside themselves. They did not have the capacity- and still do not, of fixing own prices for their goods. Moreover, labour is cheap, underpaid and domestic production discouraged. They must therefore look to the west for help and liberation from this sad state of affairs.

But as Dos Santos argues, third world countries cannot also survive with dependency. Like the analogy of bleeding a leech to fatten a heifer, third world countries in depending on the west design their own downfall or perpetual stagnation. They cannot survive with dependency because it condemns them to a perpetual begging position which is not sustainable.
Tolerance for this perpetual begging posture is expensive to the extent that developing countries are required to put in place economically hostile measures as conditions for obtaining capital. In this way, labour becomes cheap as machines take over, staff is laid off and multinational from the west are granted monopolies just to mention but a few.

They cannot do where they are condemned by the begging position to retain unfair trade agreements with the west just to keep in good books. Most developing countries as observed earlier on lack internal market and are locked in unfair trade arrangements of no benefit to them. They are required to open up their market for competition with products from larger economies in order to receive aid. Their unfinished products fetch little prices on the world market leading to lack of capital.

Largely because of limited capital stocks, developing countries are forced to accumulate loan after loan thus lacking any money or surplus for investment. This not only limits opportunities of growth but also diminishes existing ones where interest rates are pushed up the wall as domestic capital becomes more and more expensive. In such a case, capital is not only lost to the state but also to citizens. The net effect of lack of capital for citizens means that they cannot improve their lives by setting up businesses, investing in industry, education, agriculture and other essentials of human development.

According to Dos Santos, they cannot also do because some of the measures demanded of developing countries by the west like mechanization of labor lead to unemployment and end up undermining the very development they are seeking. Expertise to manage this mechanization or technology as it were is equally imported from the same west hence the leech-heifer analogy.

The economic pressures placed by dependency create a ripple effect in the socio-political state of third world countries. Political reforms demanded by the west lock the country in perpetual state of conflict between the ruling elite and the opposition. In this state of affairs, the country barely survives. The case of Zimbabwe is a classic one. Although there is a semblance of democracy as demanded by the west after the fall of the Berlin Wall in early 1989, the country is barely surviving.

The opposition has been stuck in endless power squabbles with the government and neither side seems to let up even as the economic fortunes of that country tumbles from bad to worse. In the mean time, Zimbabwe continues to receive foreign aid to fund its programmes even as inflation sky-rockets to unimaginable proportions.
The happenings in Zimbabwe although quite outstanding, represents the plight of many a third world country.

And so in conclusion, the import of Dos Santo’s statement is that although this dependency is a necessity, developing countries cannot also prosper with it. It fixes them to a situation where they cannot improve their lot but also which is unsustainable in the sense that it will not be long before they break up.