{"id":17958,"date":"2021-10-24T07:41:14","date_gmt":"2021-10-24T07:41:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/barazalab.com\/?p=17958"},"modified":"2023-09-04T05:41:17","modified_gmt":"2023-09-04T05:41:17","slug":"each-others-promises","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tuwele.com\/baraza_update\/each-others-promises\/","title":{"rendered":"Each Other\u2019s Promises"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Wanjiru Nguhi<\/p>\n

This week\u2019s newsletter is continuing the tradition of inviting members of our community to write From The Curator\u2019s Desk, and for this edition, I\u2019m happy to hand it over to my friend and colleague Wanjiru Nguhi, host of the \u201cMine is a Comment\u201d podcast. I\u2019ll be handing over this section of the newsletter to my fellow colleagues and to Baraza members from time to time, please do reach out to me if you\u2019re interested in writing this section and you have something of interest to share to our community \u2014 a trend you\u2019ve noticed or something you\u2019d like us to think about.\u00a0<\/span><\/i>
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\n<\/span><\/i>~ Christine Mungai, Curator<\/span><\/i>
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\n<\/span>Silly season is upon us. In this season, politicians will ride donkeys, walk barefoot, and eat things in places that are supposed to show their \u201chumility\u201d. All this effort is an attempt to remind us how in touch they are with you and I. If you search for the definition of obtaining power by false pretense, I\u2019m sure pictures of our Kenyan politicians will pop up.<\/span>
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\n<\/span>We know these people by their stripes, spots, and claws. The leadership we have been exposed to especially in the past five years has tried and tested us in ways no citizens deserve. If their decisions haven\u2019t killed us, they have left us traumatized, filled us with a sense of hopelessness and a legitimate apathy towards the electoral process.<\/span>
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\n<\/span>Whenever so much power has been robbed from people, it is necessary for the people to build community and solidarity within themselves. If there is anything we continue to learn from this pandemic, it is that we can only manage institutional failure by being each other\u2019s promise and hope. We already have a culture of what is now being called mutual aid – we fundraise for healthcare, collectively make noise about an injustice and comfort each other in the face of loss and heartbreak.\u00a0<\/span>
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\n<\/span>It is also within these communities that we must organize and hold political institutions accountable. Community is powerful, but the center cannot and will not hold in the absence of holding political institutions to account and participating in political processes.<\/span>
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\n<\/span>The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) recently began the registration of first-time voters, which will run until the 2nd November 2021. The reality about elections in this country is that names don\u2019t just appear on ballot papers. There are various institutions that make those choices possible, and these institutions have disappointed us spectacularly. Another reality about elections is that electoral processes give us an opportunity to be heard. \u00a0Even though our voices are muffled, silenced, and overridden by algorithms, the electoral process remains one of the most critical political processes.<\/span>
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\n<\/span>For local communities, the focus can begin at the County Assembly level. Members of the County Assembly (MCA) are the closest leaders to the people. They represent the ward which is the smallest county unit of administration. Holding MCA\u2019s accountable politically as a community is possible and very critical. The quality of life we experience in our homes is directly affected by the quality of leadership at the county level. The tone of the county government’s leadership is determined by the caliber of MCA\u2019s. My plea would therefore be for us to rise above the apathy we have settled into and register (for those that haven\u2019t) and be very deliberate about the MCA we elect. Taking back our power is gradual and it will be collective.<\/span>
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\n<\/span>Finally, we are still in the deep throes of this pandemic. My deepest condolences to us for the loss we have experienced and continue to experience. I am sorry to all of us navigating neglect on institutional levels across the continent. We truly are each other\u2019s hope and promise. May we not forget that, and may we extend grace to one another and to the most vulnerable among us.<\/span>
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\n<\/span>Let’s continue to mask up, sanitize and if you can get vaccinated please do. Please, please do.\u00a0<\/span>
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\n<\/span>In the meantime, here\u2019s:<\/span><\/p>\n