Kenyan Referendum: It’s the Rich vs the Poor

The stand taken by various groups either supporting or opposing the Proposed Constitution proves that Kenya is at war between the rich and the poor. The supporters of the current constitution, which strongly favours the rich against the poor, are hiding behind the “NO” group claiming to be dissatisfied with the Proposed Constitution. Their main bone of contention is ostensibly based on issues concerning the Kadhi courts, abortion and land. But in reality they are scared stiff of the proposals of the Draft Constitution because it is taking most drastic steps to introduce real democracy and equality in this country.

The “NO” supporters are people who have acquired a lot of wealth under the dictatorships of Jomo Kenyatta and Daniel arap Moi. Both the first and the second Presidents of this country used land as a major political weapon with which to bribe their supporters. Public land, including forests and even public toilets, were illegally grabbed and allocated to individuals who became multimillionaires after selling them. Now they are mobilizing the “NO” votes by bribing gullible church leaders to make all sorts fictitious criticism against the Proposed Constitution.

The war against the parts of the constitution supporting the people’s rights started in Naivasha when the PSC was examining the first Harmonized Draft Constitution by the CoE. At that time the Second Generation Human Rights recommended by Nzamba Kitonga were all wiped out by the same parliamentarians now led by William Ruto to oppose the Proposed Constitution. Their real anger is the fact that Nzamba Kitonga actually reinstated the Second Generation Human Rights in the final draft which is now the Proposed Constitution.

Nzamba Kitonga’s Harmonized Draft had made very commendable recommendations on social security which must haven offended the likes of William Ruto in the PSC. In Article 61, for example, Kitonga suggested that every person had the right to social security which compelled the State to provide appropriate social security to persons who were unable to support themselves or their dependants. Nzamba Kitonga had suggested in Article 62 that every person had the right to health care and that no person would be refused emergency medical treatment.

In Article 63 Kitonga suggested that every person had the right to education and that the State would institute a programme to implement the right of every child to free and compulsory pre-primary and primary education and in so doing would pay particular attention to children with special needs. In that draft Kitonga also suggested that the State would take measures to make secondary and post secondary education progressively available and accessible. In Article 64 Kitonga called for the right of every person to accessible and adequate housing and to reasonable standard of sanitation. Article 65 of the Harmonized Draft said that every person had the right to be free from hunger and to adequate food of acceptable quality. Article 66 of the Harmonized Draft Constitution said every person had the right to clean and safe water in adequate quantities.

When William Ruto and other Parliamentarians had a look at Nzamba Kitonga’s proposals at Naivasha they changed all the above Second Generation Human Rights into a small Article 40 they called “Economic and Social Right” that said that the State shall take legislative, policy and other measures including the setting of standards to achieve the progressive realization of the right of every person to social security, health, education, housing, food and water. In other words the rich people meeting in Naivasha under the auspices of PSC changed the command of the Constitution into a proposal to make legislation in future to look into people’s welfare. They did not like the categorical demand from the Constitution asking the State unambiguously to provide Second Generation Human Rights. They did not want the Constitution to bridge the gap between the haves and the have-nots.

They therefore mutilated the Nzamba Kitonga’s Harmonized Draft by removing every aspect of the Constitution that boosted the lives of the ordinary wananchi. They also took stern measures to fight the Fourth Estate by removing the article which called for access to information. Luckily the mutilated Draft from the PSC had, by law, to go back to the CoE to incorporate the views of the people before the Proposed Draft was handed back to Parliament for debate.

It was when the Draft was taken back to him that Nzamba Kitonga reinstated the Second Generation Human Rights which now appear in Articles 43 called Economic and Social Rights which says every person has the right to highest attainable standard of health, which include the right to health care services, including reproductive health care; to accessible and adequate housing, and reasonable standards of sanitation; to be free from hunger and to have adequate food of acceptable quality; to clean and safe water in adequate quantities; to social security and to education. This Article also says a person shall not be denied emergency medical treatment and that the State shall provide appropriate social security to persons who are unable to support themselves and their dependants.

These are the parts of the Constitution which anger Daniel arap Moi and William Ruto with his gang of Kalenjin MPs. Nzamba Kitonga came to the rescue of the Fourth Estate by reinstating in Article 35 the important human right issue of Access to Information which MPs had deleted. For all the above reasons the Fourth Estate in the country has an obligation to inform the people the importance of voting YES even if in doing so they will make Ruto and Churchmen accuse them of being biased.

Kenyans are about to go through a historic moment when they will determine whether or not to accept the Proposed Constitution. The media have been challenged to remain neutral on this matter and as a matter of fact churchmen have accused journalists of taking sides by openly backing the Proposed Constitution. Following that complaint the media must not start downplaying the debate on the Proposed Constitution. This is the time when journalists should continue to do the good work they are doing now of telling the people the truth about the content of the Proposed Constitution in order to educate them.

Journalists must not ignore their very important ethical principle of Accuracy. As a matter of fact the very first ethical principle of the Code of Conduct for the Practice of Journalism in Kenya is about Accuracy and Fairness. It says that the fundamental objective of a journalist is to write a fair, accurate and an unbiased story on matters of public interest. It goes on to say that all sides of the story shall be reported, wherever possible. By failing to tell the people the truth every time opponents of the Proposed Constitution deliberately misinterpret its articles, the journalists are taking the risk of being unprofessional.

In covering the constitutional debate currently taking place in the country journalists have an obligation to tell the truth and nothing but the truth about both what is going on in the debate and what the subject matter of the debate is all about. Journalists have a professional duty to tell the people of Kenya the truth about the differences between the current Constitution of Kenya and the Proposed Constitution. It is their professional duty to tell the people of Kenya the weakness and strength of the two constitutions' Bill of Right. If they do so sincerely and professionally they will expose the fact that Proposed Constitution is far better for the people of Kenya than the current one. All they need to do is to tell the truth as accurately as possible. It is their professional obligation to do so.