The filthy-mouthed politician
Former Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko (left) bumps fists with Wiper Party leader Kalonzo Musyoka at the burial ceremony of former Machakos Senator Boniface Kabaka in Mikuyuni, Masinga, Machakos County.
Professor SUNY Buffalo Law School and Chair of the KHRC.
What you need to know:
- Funerals are sombre events to celebrate the departed and condole with the living, especially the family of the deceased.
- No one should hijack them to stage vitriolic attacks against political opponents.
Many of our politicians aren’t worth a damn. I was shocked beyond belief by the filth that spewed from some of Kenya’s senior politicians at the funeral of Senator Boniface Kabaka.
There are certain select words that are unutterable in any civilisation or societas civilis. In fact, there’s language that can’t even be used in private. Words that only belong to the museum of antiquities. We are not Neanderthals who spit out any filth out of our mouths.
Even the law punishes the use of language in certain contexts. That’s why the spectacle witnessed at Kabaka’s interment will live in infamy. May those who spake the vile words be spared similar calumny when they meet their maker.
Not long ago, National Assembly Minority Leader John Mbadi–an otherwise fine gentleman–succumbed to the darkness of Kenya’s coarse political culture. At the funeral of the late Msambweni MP Suleiman Dori, Mr Mbadi let fly a torrent of innuendos against DP William Ruto.
Then the unexpected happened. The mourners uncharacteristically refused to have any of it, and instead handed Mr Mbadi his hat. They booed him mercilessly and forced him to abandon the stage in humiliation. That was a proud moment for me as a long-suffering Kenyan.
Funerals are sombre events to celebrate the departed and condole with the living, especially the family of the deceased. No one should hijack them to stage vitriolic attacks against political opponents.
It was Joseph de Maistre, the French philosopher, who said that in a “democracy, people get the government they deserve”. Political cultures are generally a reflection of a society’s moral and social fibre. That’s why in some cultures you are flogged like a dog for committing a crime of moral turpitude. Moral depravity such as raping and molesting a child is sanctioned without pity by the courts of law and those of public opinion.
Even among criminals in American prisons, fellow inmates often attack pedophiles and child killers, sometimes fatally. Imagine that – a code of morality among inmates to sanction depravity that even they consider out of bounds. That’s why each society must lie on its own moral bed.
What the vox populi subjected Mr Mbadi to is an object lesson for all of us. There’s no gutter to which politicians will not sink, or rabbit hole they will not get into, if the people allow it. The politician is, by definition, a vulture. That’s why the term filthy-mouthed politician is an oxymoron. Vultures aren’t known to be selective about what they have for dinner, or any meal.
Gutter-prone politicians
It’s left to us–the hoi polloi–to teach our politicians the limits of their vocabulary at funerals. We need to impose on them standards of decency and morality. It doesn’t matter who it is – we must demand decorum from the MCA to the head of state without any exceptions.
I don’t know about you, but I have never met a widow, or bereaved family, that relished invective at the funeral of their loved ones. At Senator Kabaka’s send-off, some of the most senior politicians in Kenya fought to out-do each on who would be more offensive.
Two deserve particular mention because they took the cup. Deposed Senate Majority Leader Kipchumba Murkomen led the charge for his Tangatanga brigand. Disgraced former Governor of Nairobi did him one better. I heard him use the word “Viagra”, which he mispronounced every time he uttered it. He then mouthed the phrase “used like toilet paper” in reference to Wiper Leader Kalonzo Musyoka. My mouth inadvertently fell completely open – totally agape!
One can only imagine what the widows and the family of the late senator were thinking. They fidgeted and shifted in their seats, utterly humiliated. Throughout this orgy of debasement, none of the senior leaders stood up to call a halt to the rotten speeches.
Finally, Machakos Governor Alfred Mutua had had enough. He rose and denounced the callous display of crudity. It was too little too late. The damage had already been done. The bereaved had already been wounded.
I was also shocked by the boneheaded section of the crowd who cheered and egged on Mr Sonko and other gutter-prone politicians. As a country, we can’t sink any deeper into sewer. This was to our collective shame.
I have a suggestion. We can’t legislate certain moral norms and codes of conduct. But we can re-engineer our moral architecture. I believe in the simple principle of “monkey see, monkey do”. We all mimic each other and then follow suit. What the father does, so does the son.
I ask our most senior politicians to publicly engineer a new code of ethics at funerals. Let’s focus on celebrating the dead, and condoling with the living. That’s what our precolonial ancestors did. They didn’t use funerals to vilify their political opponents.
Two of Kenya’s most senior politicians–Jubilee’s Uhuru Kenyatta and ODM’s Raila Odinga–should ask their followers to cease and desist.
Makau Mutua is SUNY Distinguished Professor and Margaret W. Wong Professor at Buffalo Law School. He’s chair of KHRC. @makaumutua.
Source: Daily Nation today.
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