In 2015, I read a Foreign Policy article on lessons that Botswana, Mauritius and S Africa founding leaders could offer other emerging democracies in Africa. The thesis of the article was that Khama,Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam and Mandela ruled using the rule of law as the bedrock of their governance. They choose inclusion and cohesiveness instead of dictatorship. I agreed with this notion.
In Kenya our biggest flaw was at independence we abandoned the principles of what was negotiated in Lancaster and the leadership of the day decided to pursue selfish and parochial interests. If Kenyatta had insisted on reaffirming for example the existing Kenya tribal deliberative democracy structures that existed in each tribal nation, we would have escaped divisiveness that bedeviled his administration.
In Not Yet Uhuru, Jaramogi talks of his early learning of leadership while sitting at the feet of the elders. In the chapter titled at the feet of the elders, he talks of how he watched this deliberative mechanism work and learnt a great deal of what made his community political, social and economic structure work for the common good. If you paid attention in history you would realize that before bastardization of our tribal nations structures by colonial governments our communities had very strong social, economic and political structure.
In Agikuyu nation, no man once you became an elder was of value more than the other. Gutiri Mundurume Muka wa ungii they say ( there is no man who is a servant of the other)
There was social class stratification but in matters of of rule of law not even the richest of the tribal men were exempt from justice. Justice was fair and deliberate. There was a jury system, in cases that involved capital offences like murder, the jury would deliberate and once the ruling of capital punishment was ruled upon. The family of the victim was the one tasked with killing the defendant. One the day of the execution, the defendant would be put on a beehive and taken into a cliff, at the bottom of the cliff a family member of the defendatnt would wait with a noosed stem. if the defendant survived the injuries of being rolled over the cliff this family member would have to finish them off by strangling them to death. this right here illustrates that there was no chance of shenanigans. A crime once committed had to be punished.
My point is that for us a Nation to rebuild, we need to devolve most of the governance structures back to the communities. We are a diverse nations and we cannot become like westerners. We cannot adopt the Chinese or western models of governance. The only way democracy took hold in the west is because White People abandoned their tribal identity and adopted religion and economic structures that created a more hegemonic society. Africans are different. We have a different reality of life and we have no need to be alike. I do not want a luo to be a kikuyu nor does a turkana want to be a kikkuyu
What I have observed with the African is that he/she can be a PHD , Amani suit wearing, Bible thumping modern man or woman but in the DNA he has a tribal Engine. This tribal engine is good if it is harnessed to deliver social, economic and political diversity. In short I want Luos to appoint their own leaders, the Mijikenda to do the same and let use meet in Nairobi and agree that no tribal nation leadership is subservient to the other.
What BBI should do is structure the executive (PORK) position in a way that it's power will be shared and checked by the grassroots leadership. This grassroots leadership should be able to sanction, impeach and remove from power a incompetent and injurious president.
Below is summary of the FP article:
It is Botswana’s history of visionary leadership, especially in the years following independence, that best explains its success. Sir Seretse Khama, Botswana’s founding president, came from a family of Bamangwato chiefs well regarded for their benevolence and integrity. When Khama founded the Botswana Democratic Party in 1961 and led his country to independence, he was already dedicated to the principles of deliberative democracy and market economy that would allow his young country to flourish. Modest, unostentatious as a leader, and a genuine believer in popular rule, Khama forged a participatory and law-respecting political culture that has endured under his successors, Sir Ketumile Masire and Festus Mogae.
Although operating in very different circumstances, Mauritius’ first leader, Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam, held to the same leadership codes as Khama. Ramgoolam gave Mauritius a robust democratic beginning, which has been sustained by a series of wise successors from different backgrounds and parties. Both Khama and Ramgoolam could have emulated many of their contemporaries by establishing strong, single-man, kleptocratic regimes. But they refused to do so.
Effective leadership has proved the decisive factor in South Africa, too: without Nelson Mandela’s inclusive and visionary leadership, his adherence to the rule of law, his insistence on broadening the delivery of essential services, and his emphasis on moving from a command economy toward a market-driven one, South Africa would probably have emerged from apartheid as a far more fractured and autocratic state than it did.
Too few African leaders have followed the examples of Mandela, Khama, and Ramgoolam. Ghana, Lesotho, Mali, and Senegal are all showing promise. But in many other African countries, leaders have begun their presidential careers as democrats only to end up, a term or two later, as corrupt autocrats: Bakili Muluzi of Malawi, Moi of Kenya, and, most dramatically of all, Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe. Other leaders, such as Sam Nujoma of Namibia and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, may be heading in the same direction.
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