Timely reminders

Servant leadership is defined as a management philosophy which implies a comprehensive view of the quality of people, work and community spirit. It requires a spiritual understanding of identity, mission, vision and environment. A servant leader is someone who is servant first, who has responsibility to be in the world, and so he contributes to the well-being of people and community. A servant leader looks to the needs of the people and asks himself how he can help them to solve problems and promote personal development. He places his main focus on people, because only content and motivated people are able to reach their targets and to fulfill the set expectations.

By that definition of servant leadership, it is quite clear that the leaders of Kenya, bar a few exceptional individuals, do not see themselves as having responsibilities to the people of Kenya, the men and women who every five years elect them to high office or appoint them to positions of responsibility. The debates surrounding the Nancy Baraza saga, and the resignations of both Uhuru Kenyatta and Francis Muthaura as Minister for Finance and Head of the Civil Service respectively, has failed to address the wider failings of the leadership caste in Kenya, instead focusing on the perceived ills this class have suffered at the hands of an overeager, overreaching civil society class that is unaccountable to no one, unelected and unappointed.

Looking at the allegations levelled against the three, one shivers to think that they could have held such lofty positions when such allegations were hanging over their heads. They may protest their innocence, but that they ignored the allegations, then fought them at every turn, and now have legal proceedings initiated against them speaks volumes about whether they see themselves as servants first, serving the best interests of their respective stakeholders, or rulers whose words are law, who are to be obeyed or else...

Mr Kenyatta's argument that his position as Deputy Prime Minister is political and that he need not 'step aside' as he has as Finance Minister does not wash. Neither does Ms Baraza's attempt to prevent the coming inquiry by a presidential tribunal into her actions on New Year's Eve. No poll has been taken, but there is a sense that an overwhelming majority of Kenyans favour the courses that are being charted in various fora. We want the process of determining their guilt or innocence to be concluded speedily and their fates to be known. Of course there are those who see a political windfall, especially in the tribulations of the Deputy Prime Minister, but these should not be used as a fig leaf to deny the people of Kenya an opportunity to see these persons held to account for their actions.

It is now apparent that many will fail the leadership and integrity test prescribed by Chapter Six of the Constitution. For decades Kenyans had hoped that their leaders would impose on themselves the standards that are now engraved in law. We were disappointed at every turn. Rather than serving the best interests of the people, our leaders, whether in the Legislature or the Judiciary, frequently turned a blind eye to our needs, with the political class only interested in political power and the Judiciary only interested in their rarefied confines, aloof and isolated from the masses in whose name they handed down judgments of guilt or innocence. Today, not only is a scion of the Kenyatta family fighting to preserve the family name in a court far, far away, but a leading light of civil society and the second-highest judicial officer is facing an end to a very short judicial career for acts that both should have known would not be in the public interest. 

We do not deny that we have granted our leaders privileges that ordinary Kenyans do not enjoy. Where we see fit, we will allow them first-among-equals status simply because they have achieved what many can only dream of. But this is not a license for them to treat us like dirt; they must be reminded, from time to time, that they enjoy these privileges because we allow them to. These privileges are not theirs as of right; they are theirs because we say they are.

None of us can predict how Mr Kenyatta will fare at The Hague, or how the Tribunal will rule with regards to Ms Baraza; but we can all be proud of the fact that two different jurisdictions have taken the bold and unprecedented step of holding the two to account. Ms Baraza's case may seem as that of turning a mole-hill into a mountain, but make no mistake, if that is how she treats the low among us, how will she be able to empathise with them when their appeals finally reach the hallowed corridors of the Supreme Court? Mr Kenyatta, and his co-accused, maintain that the crimes committed in 2007 and 2008 do not rise to the level of international crimes, refusing to admit their part in the sorry state of affairs. It explains why four years since those dark days, the thousands of displaced Kenyans continue to live in make-shift camps in fear and abject conditions. The legal processes underway should remind them, and their fellow leaders, that there are consequences to their actions and that to continue enjoying the privileges we have granted them, they must serve us first and not vice versa.