Termie
Your experience alone should be enough to dissuade you from writing what you just wrote. I have known you not to be a sycophant so I am wondering who it is you are trying to please. No offence intended and now let me explain below:
David Ndii is right about tribalism. It's especially problematic and more consequential when practiced by a group in power. What is interesting? I am yet to see anyone, including resident Kikuyus, on this forum, condone the tribalism.
I have been absent for extended periods so I cannot for sure state that there is any resident Kikuyu who has supported tribalism. In any case since the likes of Njamlik visit in disguise it is not easy to know who is and who is not.
That said you have missed the point that David Ndii is making. Those who support the bigotry do so in private and within gatherings of those who share their own views. I stated at choo.com my own experience when persons who I knew and thought of as being above triablism shocked me when they expressed pedestrain tribal views in my presence. They had come to believe I "could be trusted". I have lost one or two friends over time when I came to figure out that tribe was more important to them than anything else.
So if you are expecting a bigot to openly state and acknowledge bigotry you will wait for a very long time.
That said, tribe is the unit by which political mobilization happens in Kenya. The Luhya just recently anointed their spokesman at Bukhungu and expect every Luhya to toe the line at the risk of political oblivion.
First of all what Atwoli did is still being debated. Frankly speaking I believe it is Atwoli's own retirement plans where he wants to become the Governor of Kakamega.
That said, there is the little detail about generalization... which you have been waving over my head. "Does it mean every Luhya..." (you can complete the question.
On a serious note: The tribalism that i is discussing has nothing to do with the appointment of a "spokesman". He has his focus on something more nefarious and diabolical:
- It is the cultivation of a culture of supremacy;
- The infusion and collective indoctrination of a whole population to hold colonial-like views over fellow citizens
- Mass demonization of legal and official opposition on a personalized scale
- Legitimization of illegalities and denigration of morality and ethics
The list is long.
It goes without saying that people like Raphael Tuju are ostracized for not bowing down to the Luo sovereign.
I have no idea how and when Tuju was ostracized. How was he "punished"? Is it because the "Luo Sovereign" failed to endorse him? Was Tuju dependent on "Sovereigns"? Here is what is publicly known:
- Tuju ran for office on an LDP ticket then upon reaching Parliament bailed from his party and started voting against it.
- He lost the ensuing election.
- It is also a fact that Tuju convinced DP later PNU that he could rival Raila Odinga in Nyanza and for that received massive financial resources.
- He failed to get enough signatures to make it to the ballot.
I have also heard the propaganda (Tuju is sells Propaganda for a living. He has an Information / PR firm) to the effect that he was rejected by the people of Rarieda because they love backwardness so much that he annoyed them with his "Development". Perhaps Termie can stand in for Tuju and specifically state what that development was? We live in a country where the meaning of Development got lost way back in the 60s
If the Luos hate Tuju because of Development why can't he be sponsored for election in Nyeri or Kiambu? CORD has an elected Indian MP in Kisumu. ODM offered Uhuru Kenyatta a seat in any constituency outside Central if membership to parliament was all that took him to support Kibaki in 2007. He declined.
What Ndii is talking about, and he is right, is his experience with one example of a phenomenon that affects the big tribes in Kenya. The our man syndrome. The other tribes become rivals or even enemies. You can be sure unsavory views of other tribes are not the preserve of Kikuyus alone.
I disagree. The so called anti Kikuyu feeling is provoked by what I have described above
It would be nice to see some ideas of how ukabila in politics can be reduced or overcome. Its anatomy is already well known. In that sense there isn't anything new or even useful that David Ndii is saying in this article.