(by Peter Okelo, Kisumu, Kenya)

Kenya stands on the verge of avalanche, a landslide of socio-political, but most importantly,
a further national psychic transformation. I emphasize psychic because nation building is in
essence a psychological process. I do so without truncating the reality of cumulative nation
building process, nor overlooking the practical impacts and implications of the same, and
hopefully do so without reducing this all important process to a matter of mere psychology.

The current constitutional draft and process of adopting it is part of an essential process of
building and reinforcing what Frantz Fanon might call a ‘national culture’ (see The Wreteched
of the Earth). Our national culture has been all this time based on a document with limited
collective national input, a document convenient and provisional at the onset of the nation;
independence from colonialism.

There are all indications on the ground (yes, one has to keep one’s feet on the ground to make
credible and legitimate judgments) that the Yes group will prevail, and that the No team, which
is essentially a diluted Yes movement, a Yes with qualifications of sorts, will, if you may, not
lose everything, but instead have an opportunity to raise the issues of contention they have
been basing their campaign on.

In regard to religion and politics, if the church initially appeared bent on collective evangelical
fervor, latter development clearly shows that not every Christian is convinced by the call for
a general harmonized bleat of the flock at the command of a self-righteous shepherd. The
Anglican break from the earlier trend to urge members to vote as a block is one such strong
indications that Christians will not vote as one obedient herd. The Catholic Church though is
still hopeful that its members will vote no, with a unanimous singularity. One can only wish the
Vatican well in these democratic moments.

But again, considering the fact that a significant number of Christians are young people who
owe allegiance to Church and change alike; one can rely on the fact that public momentary
emotional response to the initially strong evangelical opposition to the draft is not quite the same
as a reconsidered solitary moment when one dialogues with oneself in the presence of the

Similarly, there is no guarantee of mass uniform ethnic rejection of the document since there is
no guarantee that the campaign flashes of red cards on TV screens will translate into individual
rejection of the proposal at the ballot box. Indeed my premonition is that some of the most
surprising voter support for the document will come from the Rift Valley, which, one would
be humble to remember, is not a homogeneous block of people just as the Church is not a
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harmonized flock of similarly thinking sheep.

It is for this reason that those who rely on ethnic support will be rudely shocked by the
referendum results on Wednesday the 4th of August. The meeting of Kalenjin professionals
in Nairobi on the 2nd of August to discuss the constitution, just before the referendum, is part
of the indicative developments attesting to the fact that even the Kalenjin community will not
necessarily vote No just because they are Kalenjins, supposedly following one Ruto and one
indispensable untiring retired Moi; this is the impression one gets from the trail of imagery on TV
Inflationary claims about the constitution only seem to have inflamed curiosity among the
electorate about the document, with a renewed desire among people to read, even where one
may not be quite able to do so, and understand. Many an electorate would find it difficult to
locate the basis of some of the claims; like the one that people will be made to give up their
small pieces of subsistence land.

Indeed the constitution making process, and the campaigns in particular, raises interesting
questions about literacy (and illiteracy alike), reading and comprehension, as well as honesty of
interpretation of the object of reading—the constitutional text. Claims by the Minister for Higher
Education that the draft document should be rejected because of its ‘layout’, that it ‘cannot
be read like a newspaper’, leaves one baffled about the seriousness of such claims. Has
interpretation been a weapon of mass deception?

The entry into the debate and campaign by the former president inadvertently lent much fuel
to the Yes campaign as the group was readily presented with an easy contrast backdrop
to compare the promises of the draft constitution and the symbolic reminder of the ills that
beseeched a nation due to lack of constitutional checks in the first place; indeed Moi represents
the prolonged denial of constitutional change to Kenyans and Kibaki has not hesitated to seize
this golden opportunity for a pragmatic distinction, wooing of votes, and way of promoting his
own new-found image as a progressive leader.

If in the past Mr. Kibaki did not succeeded in exercising an entirely effective intervening
presence when such intervention had been an overwhelming collective desire, instead shrouded
in a rather by-standing, removed silent academic objectivity that may have been construed
by the public as bordering on indifference to collective national expectation; the constitutional
debate and campaign has provided him with an opportunity to step in the midst of it all
with an unusual energy and evident consistent determination devoid of a ‘wiper’ ambiguity.

In regard to outside allegations of external funding and support, rumours of support of the No
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team by the right-wing side of American politics that is traditionally opposed to Barrack Obama’s
presidency and generally opposed to Black decisive participation in politics leaves much to be
desired about such funding. One significant question that the possibility of such funding raises
is whether a group opposed to progressive changes would support a group in an essentially
Black country like Kenya for the benefit of the country or for the benefit of its militant opposition
One thing less unclear though is this; that on the 4th of August Kenyans will for the first time
since independence participate in a collective constitution making to reaffirm their hope of
building a positive national culture that in turn becomes the basis of much desired national
collective development. One is here reminded that a country does not develop, provide for its
citizenry, because it has gold and precious stones, much as these are important ingredients in
the project of service to the nation; but instead a nation moves ahead because of its national
spirit, a united national psyche, a positive national culture.