When the boot is on the other foot

The government of Kenya is currently having a taste of its own medicine. The current street demonstrations and calls for mass action are reminiscent of scenarios in the early 1990s, when those now holding senior positions in the government were either opposition MPs or civil society activists. And they went to the streets to demand a new constitution as well as reintroduction of multi-party politics to ensure democratic governance. They accused former president Daniel arap Moi of dictatorship whenever police arrested or dispersed them.But how times change! Now that they are in government, they are amassing all the means at their disposal not only to stiffle demands for a people driven constitution but also to violently harass those exercising their freedom of expression.

What cannot be gainsaid is that the issue of the constitution will haunt this government forever.Elected on a reform platform, it promised Kenyans a new constitution in the first 100 days in office. Two and a half years later, there is no new constitution. What was recently approved by a few greedy MPs as the acceptable Draft Constitution is just a replica of the current constitution, which has undergone several amendments, and which vests enormous powers in the presidency, hence the people's desire to replace it. It is ironical that after spending billions of shillings to get Kenyans a new constitution, the government now takes the lead in scuttling the review process.

It is not lost to observers that when he was in the opposition, President Mwai Kibaki and his cohorts, including Justice and Constitutional Affairs minister Kiraitu Murungi presented a memomrandum to the Constitution of Kenya Review Commission [CKRC]in which they argued that powers of the presidency should be reduced and that the Prime minister should be the head of state and government. But once they assumed power, they shifted their position - a clear indication that the memorandum was drawn with the former president in mind. With all these twists and turns, the person who is laughing his heart out is good old Moi, who was against a parliamentary system of government.

Yet the upshot of the current stalemate is that Kenyans will have to wait a little longer for a constitution they have yearned for for almost a decade. With the official opposition KANU and a coalition member LDP having been locked out of the review process, chances are that the referendum planned for later in the year may not sail through as both KANU and LDP have vowed to incite people to vote against it.