Commentary by Leo Odera Omolo In Kisii Town.
The much highlighted last Monday peace and reconciliation meeting between the two warring communities of Kipsigis of the South Rift and the Kisiis of Nyanza Province was nothing but simple presidential votes hunting political gimmicks of the Eldoret North MP William Ruto.
Across section of h Abagusii people interviewed here have faulted the leaders who participated at the so-called peace meeting held at Chebilat border town and reportedly attended by 17 MPs from the two communities.
They accused the participants for having made no mention about who were the aggressors and further more the hundred of Abagusii people who are still languishing in the Internally Displaced Persons {IDP} and living under a very squalid conditions.
The participant made no mention how the Abagusii people who lost millions of shillings in terms of the their torched dwelling homes, farms, properties and domesticated animals in areas like Kuresoi, Olenguruane,Molo, Burny Forest, Uasin Gishu, Trans-Mara, Trans-Nzoia and Kipkellion.
The leaders who took part in bogus and phantom meetings have also bee faulted for not having mentioned the fate of the Abagusii people who were forced out of their legally acquired land and property in two previous tribal skirmishes launched by the Kalenjin warriors in 1992/1993, and also in 1996/1997.
The situation is even worsened by the participation of William Ruto, the Eldoret North MP and a man who is currently facing criminal charges at the International Criminal Court of Justice {ICC} at the Hague for his alleged offences of human right violation including forcing people out of their homes making the IDPs to live in a squalid conditions in make shift camps.
Ruto’s participation in the search for lasting peace between the two communities look like not genuine exercise, but pure case of political miscalculation and underestimation of the intelligence of the Abagusii people who have suffered the brunt of communal violence each time there is an elections ever sine 1990s.
One Kisii town resident who requested for his anonymity gave example of close to 200 people who have perished in the recent year as the result of cattle rustling between heavily armed Pokots, the Marakwets, the Tugens and Turkanas of the North Rift, an area which are located next door to William Ruto’s Uasin Gishu district home, but for which the MP has never made any attempt to reconcile the warring communities.
Ruto whose styles of political leadership is shrouded by mysteries and intrigues and miscalculation has made no effort to broker the peace between the warring communities of the North Rift region where he lives
Moreover cattle’s rustling between the Kipsigis and their neighbor is century’s old phenomenon ever since the day’s of the War of the Mogoren and Abbosi areas, these tribal wars pitting the two neighboring communities which inflicted permanent scars and enmities took place long before the arrival of the white men in this country.
The tribal skirmishes between the two communities had continued in earnest even long after the Colonial authorities had established their administration headquarters in Kisii and in Kericho towns in around 1906
The two administrative bridgeheads by the British expedition forces came at the time when the border between Kisiis and the Kipsigis was drawn around the hills near Mokomoni an Mosobeti in North Mugirango and also near Gesima in Kitutu East and around Nyamasibi in Nyaribari Masaba near Keroka.
The colonial authorities forced the Kipsigis people out of these areas and created space to accommodate the white settlers for large scale farming in dairy cattle and later tea and coffee bushes and renamed the area Sotik highlands.
But in 1962, the Colonial Office appointed a British Professor Mackenzie who heaed a Boundary Commission in Kenya and whose Commission had come up with the finding that the areas in question belong t the bagusii people. This was due to lack of effective representation by the Kipsigis community. Th area member of the ColonialLegislative Council was then the late Dr. taita Araap Toweett who was not bothered and did not appeared before this commissions, whereas the Kisii leaders of those days led by the late John Kebaso, James Paul Nyamweya, Lawrence George Sagini, Johnson Keragori, Samson Nyambati, Johnson Nyandigisi and Washington Ondicho with the help of two powerful and influential chiefs Musa Nyandusi{Manwar wuod Ayacko} of Nyaribari and Zakiah Angwenyi {Ogoro} effectively represented Abagusii community in all the Mackenzie Commission’s public hearing meetings.held in Kisii an Kericho towns.
Finally the Macknzie Commission handed the areas now called Borabu district in an area previously known as North Mugirango Location back to the Kisii and its rightful original owners, and when the white settlers stated moving out of their farms at the time of independence in 19673 the Abagusii with the help of colonial authorities moved into the area which were created as new settlement scheme covering KIjauri, Nyansiongo, Chebilat and on hilltops areas over looking the Sotik Highland tea estates and factories. And the contentious new boundaries were drawn fresh. It had pushed the Kipsigis miles away beyond Ndanai River and Sotik town. Then the industrious and mostly densely populate Kisii people moved into the new settlement scheme in their thousands. These are the historical crux of the truth about the continued hostilities between the Kipsigis and the Abagusii people and unless the proponent and advocate of the peace looked into these deeply rooted grievances and avoiding cheap populist political gimmicks like the ones spearheaded by the likes of Ruto the solution into the tribal hatred will be far from being brought to an end.
He hostilities between the Kisiis and the Kipsgis ceased only in he late 1920s after the Colonial authorities had appointed two chiefs in Bomet and Buret locations who had the mixed blood of Kisiis and Kipsigis. These were Sgt Kenduiywo Arap Balliach {Sotik / Bomet and Cheborge Arap Tengecha in Buret in an agriculturally rich area hitherto known as Location three while Sotik was known as Location Four. The two chief who were members of the Kapecherek sub-clans meaning people with the mixture blood of Kisiis / Kipsigis meaning the Kisiis who were assimilated and naturalized by the Kipsigis.
The two Chiefs ruled the region with an iron fists and brought cattle rustling and all form of hostilities between the two communities to an immediate end. And thereafter the two communities had lived together in peace and harmony, though were scattered reports of isolated and sporadic incidences of cattle rustling her an there, but not on full scale conflagration as it happened in 2007/2007.
This he added, I because the meager and sparsely of the votes in this particular region where the loss of human lives has been so enormous. But Ruto is cleverly and cunningly showing interests in the votes rich Kipsigis and Abagusii communities. This is purely a cheap and simple political gimmicks and part o Ruto wide scheme hatched mainly for the votes canvassing in this region/ It is bound to fail no matter how he deployed the sugar-coated language unless the wronged Kisiis people are adequately compensated, given back their land and property seized by he Kalenjins in the rift Valley, he added.
It was, however, encouraging to note that MPs from across the political divide and inter party who lines participated in the deliberations, but it is also imperative to know that from the presence of Prof Sam K Ongeri all other MPs like Richard Onyonka,Dr Julius Kones,Joyce Laboso,Monda,Isaac Ruto and even William Ruto himself are all of them too young and lacked the sufficient information an knowledge about the historical background of the deeply rooted Kisii-Kipsigis enmities.
These political novices need to carry out proper consultations and research before jumping cheaply onto William Rutoi’s votes catching bandwagon.
Ends