Mbeki, you failed Kenyans

Dear Ntate Thabo Mbeki

When I heard you were in my country for election monitoring, I was pleased that an elder statesman who had trail-blazed the African Renaissance, fought against illicit financial flows and played a major role in mitigating violence in Darfur would be representing our continental institution.

I had hope that your years of experience and exposure to the good and evil that men do would make you an astute and steadfast pillar on the side of what is right and just.

And now all I have is questions. When you were choosing to side with a war crimes indictee who scuttled an international court process, did you at the very least make any safeguards?

Did you obtain any guarantees that he would not again kill Kenyans and put in place mechanisms to countercheck that he did not?

Or did you just cross your fingers and hope that the “collateral damage" would be minimal?

When you recline in the safety of your perch, do you block out the screams of my fellow women who are having wars waged on their bodies, on their children and in their homes?

Is that how you sleep at night?

Are you going to let him brutally deal with any dissent in the country to solidify his so-called election?

Is there any chance that you will think of and intervene for the poor and vulnerable people of Kenya who have borne the brunt of this attack?

I can understand that the Europeans and Americans have their vested interests, but you, Ntate, you who have lauded the imperative of African solidarity and touted the ideals of pan-Africanism, from you I expected solidarity with the people, and not the government of Kenya. Even though you denied the existence of xenophobia in South Africa, I still had hope, I had faith that your wisdom and ubuntuwould prevail.

Ntate, what have you left us with? —

Let down: As officials defer to Thabo Mbeki at Kenya’s election centre, the reader says he has turned a blind eye to the election of a president who suppressed dissent and killed Kenyans. Photo: Thomas Mukoya