I believe I have an answer to one of my own questions; Or I will try to answer myself.
'Why do we only honor mashujaas after they die?'
I have always accepted this notion as an obvious due to my upbringing in line with my people of Gikuyu's saying that " Īīragwo yaarī iria yakua. " This directly translates that ' it is praised for its high milk production after its death ' this referring to a cow. I want to believe that the Gikuyu being a superstitious lot held it that praising a cow while alive would bring misfortune or bad luck to it and hence to the owner. The Swahili believe that " Mgema akisifiwa, tembo hulitia maji " So I can generalise and claim that it is an accepted norm regionally. We are hard-wired to do so. It's in our genes.
We have probably held our heroes and heroines like the proverbial cow and would not want to preempt the gods and/or demons and bring them crashing down from the pedestals. Be that as it may, I have also realized that most of our heroes and heroines are of the rapid reaction, rapid dissipation kind, that is the type that hold true only for a short time, they come out guns blazing, spitting fire and brimstone left, right and centre, then die off to a deafening silence, not even a smoldering amber visible in the darkness left.
These ore the most prevalent in the lists of our living heroes and heroines. They have lost their place on the stage. They are deep in the decadence that is stifling the mwananchi, they have been assimilated by the enemy. Most have come crashing down from the high table and my new question of what causes this demands the answer-GREED and SELFISHNESS, pure and simple. We are in short supply of such heroes like the late Mandela who was a hero in his own lifetime, who stay the course, who hold true despite the odds stacked against them, who prevail the test of time. The other problem we have, and which we perpetuate, is the fact that we look up to non-heroes to declare the heroes. We entrust the onus of bestowing glory to those who robbed the heroes their glory in the first place. The quasi-heroes of today, who were villains just the other day, or the fallen heroes of yesteryears who have nothing but shame and self-deprecation to offer. This is a self defeating exercise. It's an exercise in futility.
It is true our heroes have continuously found it too easy to entangle themselves with unnecessary baggage. They have continued to stumble on 'the via dolorosa', not because of the weight of the burden but because of their own greed and selfishness. They have taken advantage of the mwananchi's ignorance in the absence of effective and constructive civic education and in their rush to grab a quick handful of the spoils have found themselves in compromising situations. They have fallen prey to their own affinity to riches and in celebration of our national pastime of gross impunity.
The doyen of our opposition politics, the respectable Jaramogi had an (unfortunate/fortunate?) brush with one Paul Kamlesh Patni, and like the dominoes do, several of his disciples and lieutenants in the so called second liberation struggle, too. His first vice chairman in the mass movement that was FORD got himself into the same mud-pit. It is said the fruit does not fall far from the tree, his son got into some form of arrangement with one of the most ruthless rulers Africa has had and though theirs was touted as a constructive engagement, it came out as a man's ways and means to grab power for himself. It had nothing to do with the liberation of the common man. Today, he fronts a movement dubbed 'Save Kenya' and a school of thought has it that it's the man's newest attempt at power-grab. One of the only politically active of the then infamous " bearded " septet-heroes in the late 70's and early 90's continues to waltz with Jaramogi's son- who has coalesced a number of political novices, products of our political decadence and corruption notwithstanding, and they claim to have the solution to Kenyans' problems. True heroism, that respect reserved for true heroes eludes him. He has however, the chance to reclaim and redefine self, another of the septet, Koigi, whose name aptly translates to the "sayer"-reminds me-although in the wrong sense of the word-of the 'praeco' in ancient Rome, only time will tell of his impact in the liberation struggles. He too has the chance to live up to the call. He has written several books (a rare one) and runs an FM radio station which could be a good tool for civic education. The list does not end here.
This same infection has continued to plague our scholars and experts who have tried their hand in politics. Very respectable gentlemen and ladies from the intelligentsia have found their way into parliament due to the high esteem they are held in by the masses only to fall far below the 'regular guy' as far as their contributions in parliament and outside is concerned. Some have actually paled and faded into oblivion once they set foot there. The water there should be tested.
Our heroes and heroines, both living and the dead, we should find open and fair mechanisms to tap them, nominate them and bestow upon them the honours they deserve, this should be an ongoing exercise sweeping the whole nation because heroes are made every day and everywhere-not wait till the 20th of October in the year to just chant "Mashujaa", listen to patriotic songs, speeches by politicians, eat drink and make merry and move on. No wonder to this day, we don't know(or do not care to know), where Dedan Kīmaathi wa Wachiūri is buried, who was responsible for Pio Gama Pinto's, Bishop Kipsang arap Muge's, deaths among many others. We don't even care to find out who is responsible for such atrocities like the clubbing of Reverend Njoya like a common thief or who ordered the beatings and mass displacements of poor Kenyans in subsequent elections through the years. Who have played roles in economic plunder/sabotage bringing our national economy to it's knees?
Are we to blame?
