No Justice, No Peace: Listening to the Youth
Malesi Kinaro is the director of Uzima, a Kenyan youth empowerment organization with programs in Nairobi, Western Province, and Nyanza; she also helped to found the organization Friends in Peace and Community Development, which helps bring together individuals and groups working for peaceful solutions and which worked extensively with refugees from Burundi and Rwanda.
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Through the two organizations I work with and in other formal and informal networks, peacemakers in Kenya are focusing on reaching out to Internally Displaced People (IDPs), and on giving the perpetrators of the violence the tools to express their grievances in constructive ways.
We are striving to create forums where the things that hurt Kenyans are discussed openly with a genuine desire to change those things. Unless these problems are addressed, the next time this happens Kenya will have a worse massacre than what happened in Rwanda. As I have talked to people I have heard even very peaceful people say some really strong statements about the inequitable distribution of resources, and the arrogance of the elite.
The poor and the youth of this nation must be given a say -- not a token!
In the past weeks in western Kenya. Uzima has held open meetings with the vulnerable youth, giving them a safe place to ventilate their anger, frustrations, and their view of the root causes to the violence we are experiencing. Based on these discussions, we wish to hold workshops on active nonviolent direct action. The young people feel that it is their right to press for justice because they have told us categorically that there can be no peace without justice. This will help them to be able to demonstrate without causing damage.
We know that one of the root causes of the violence is economic disempowerment, and we will continue to try and meet this need with Uzima's revolving loan fund. We feel that as we teach these youths nonviolent skills we must be in a position to improve their economic status.
We have some powerful tools in the trainings we are able to give, the Alternatives to Violence Project (AVP) trainings and community healing workshops based on models used in Burundi and Rwanda. We have been doing AVP workshops in the area for some time, and the community members who have learned from those trainings have much to offer. This week we went to Eldoret, the worst hit town in terms of the intensity of the violence. We talked mainly to the prison wardens who have done AVP. It was a very powerful time. We have asked them to put some reconciliation process in place. It is still very dangerous to be seen to be supporting the "enemy" but we believe that they can do it.
It will also be important to try and work with police, many of whom have killed unarmed youths. I have witnessed police brutality since when I was in the university 36 years ago -- I lost a relative, and my son's best friend who had just graduated was killed. During this most recent crisis, police have shot to kill. The first thing that needs to be done is for the Police Commissioner himself to be taught not violent methods of stopping riots.
Meanwhile, we have also reached out to the people in the IDP camps. We have bought food, blankets, sanitary napkins, and other supplies. We are partnering with local Friends churches to do what needs to be done. Today we began to talk to the displaced people to just listen to their pain as they figure out what to do. We have four teams of two each. We have two teams to talk to the women, one team to the men and one team to the children.
The lesson that stands out for me is the fact that we could actually come out and start to do something. We were scared but our training was very useful. For me my experience with violence made it easy for me to empathize with those who were suffering. It helped me channel my anger to positive work. The people in the camps have accepted us even though it is our people who hurt them. The young people we talk to see the folly of using violence to air their pain and are ready to learn new skills.
The most difficult has been the attitude of the government. This really hampers our peace efforts. Attacks have stopped when there has been hope of dialogue and resumed when ministers make public statements showing their unwillingness to compromise and their insensitivity to the crisis for ordinary Kenyans.
