Baraza

Category: Uncategorized | Date: Apr 02 2008 | By: admin

One of the many things I respect Dr. Richard Leakey for is that his entire career has been a struggle for truth, justice and equality for all living creatures including the ones that deserve it the least - us humans. Most people outside of Kenya will know Dr. Leakey and his family for their commitment to palaeontology. Three generations of patient digging has contributed to our understanding of human evolution.

And of course, within the wildlife context, Dr. Leakey is internationally acclaimed for putting an end to the elephant slaughter in Kenya more than 20 years ago. It saddens me terribly to think that the recent spearings in the Amboseli region might be a sign that these senseless killings are creeping back in.

In Kenya, however, Dr. Leakey is a household name for his relentless struggle for good governance, and justice. During the bad old days of the Moi regime (sadly it seems the bad old days are still with us even though Moi is not), Dr. Leakey was made Head of Civil Service to try and help clean up what was considered as one of the most corrupt civil services in the world. In 1995, he formed the Safina Party in opposition to the corrupt government and received several beatings (literally) and death threats for all his efforts.

And the fight goes on. As Chairman of Kenya’s Transparency International, he and many others yesterday stood up to tell the government that we just won’t tolerate the possibility of creating over 20 more Ministries in Kenya! In a press conference yesterday, Dr. Leakey told Reuters, “It is of grave concern for a country that sustained extensive economic losses…to consider a bloated cabinet that would cost Kenyans an estimated $64 million annually.”

Meanwhile two other true great leaders and a number of civil activists were downtown at Uhuru (freedom) gathering to march to parliament with a letter demanding that there should be No More Than 24 Ministers. Nobel Prize winner

Professor Wangari Maathai whom you will all know for efforts to promote conservation and women’s rights and Maina Kiai, one of our greatest human rights activists started the demonstration with a symbol of peace and sensibility by planting a tree on Freedom Corner. I feel ashamed as a Kenyan not to have been there but fortunately my sister, Mine Pabari and good friend and photographer Georgina Goodwin (thanks for getting the pictures amidst being tear gassed Georgie!) as well as fellow activist and co-founder of Awaaz, Zahid Rajan were amongst the sadly tiny section of middle class representatives who are sick to their stomachs of being ripped off by our politicians.

And suprise, suprise, our competent police force responded to a peaceful tree planting session by tear gassing everyone! Well, as my sister wrote on our blog, they have actually furthered the cause by getting the story strewn across every media outlet in the world and front page in all of Kenya’s papers!

I guess the point is that our fight here in Kenya is not for one thing or another. It cannot be just for the animals or just for human rights or just for the environment. And having great examples like Professor Wangari Maathai and Dr. Richard Leakey, as well as others such as Maina Kiai and Muthoni Wanyeki (who both head Human Rights Organisations) makes me wonder why there are not more of us Kenyans who are out there on the streets or in there in cyberspace fighting for equality for all.

As Samuel Beckett says, “I can’t go on…I will go on…“

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