 Kwa na nesadi leidu tizu? In 2007 wa 2008 we had something called the post election violence that was brought about by the election that had just happened. Today on our topic we'll be looking at analyzing what the building bridges initiative is all about and exactly after they completed their task for yesterday at Tana River what do we want to do? Let's take a look. My guest today is Daniel Rongo, of course a political analyst. He has been here for some time now. I believe Dan. Thank you. Karibusana. Asanti. And of course I have Kabiria Baru. Yes. We're also political analysts. Yes, yes I am. Karibusana. Thank you so much. Asanti. It's nice to have you guys here. Yes. And of course you at home still of course on all of these you can interact with us on our social media platforms at Y254. Of course for me it's Karanja Alex W. Let's have this interaction together and of course just chipping in direct to the building bridges initiative. Dan I know where you stand in terms of the building bridges initiative. But before we get to that we have seen the BBI committee moving all around the country and yesterday they finished at Tana River County. What do you think are some of the issues that they may have seen? Well thanks Alex. I think like you've given us a brief on where we are coming from concerning the establishment of the unity advisory task force or what is other times called the building bridges initiative. We acknowledge the fact that we are coming from a very rough time after the election and there was a need for political truths for us as a nation to coalesce together and begin to restructure our governance. That we acknowledge. Well I think going forward with the nine point agenda and ultimately why the two excellences decided to shake hands and reassure the country of its return to calm peace and governance. But let us not forget that they were other previous handshakes that had been done before. Jaramogi o Gengau Dinga versus Kenyatta. Definitely sometimes. Sometimes Baku. Muai Kibaki versus Railu Dinga in the same floor of Arambi House in 2008. This probably would be the third or the fourth that was meant to bring come. So the question I ask is with the three handshakes if there is anything different. When you research our questions it prompts me to come back of course to you also. The three handshakes have, let me first of all come to the two, the initial ones. We may not have seen bodies that have been constituted like the BBI building by President Rurum Railu Dinga. Don't you think that's a bit of a difference in terms of listening from the views? Well also in 2007-2008 what we call the agenda for was after the handshake. Yes. Remember the police reforms, the incoming of the hearing that led to the Kofi Nan envelope that inquired by Justice Philip Waki. It was just after the handshake and it was the same. But for this one I think what's truly different is a matter of two gentlemen, it's a two gentlemen agreement. And I think one of the things Kenyans have not seen until now is the fact that the details of the handshake has not been publicized, has not been given to the public. But only the nine point agenda that is what has been in the public. So I think that could be the difference with the handshakes. So are you trying to say that the persons rather than us as we are not involved in terms of knowing the building bridges? Well, the traversing of the building bridges initiative in the counties, that probably what we call is much of public participation. But I think the finer details between these two gentlemen that has not find their way within the public. Right, yes. From that point let's first of all get to have a look at some of the issues that the building bridges initiative had been tasked to address. So number one, they were tasked to address the issue of ethnic antagonism and competition, lack of national ethos, inclusivity, devolution, divisive elections, and of course safety and security. The issue that has been affecting the country up to date called corruption. We also have shared prosperity and responsibilities and rights. I come to you Kabiria, we have almost, actually we have nine points that you are supposed to be looking at. I think there's one that really stands out to you. Well, I think the one which really stands out for me is the antagonism, the ethnic antagonism and the issues of corruption. Because this is something which we've really seen, it's recurring after maybe after every elections we are having the ethnic conflicts because in Kenya it's perceived that people voted once the ethnic lines and sometimes when we have the elections outcome it does not really end well with everyone. So I think that really stands out for me and again on the matters of corruption because in Kenya it's one of the countries whereby we are really so blessed because we have various policies to fight corruption, we have legislations, we have systems but still we are at the top when it comes to corruption. So I think there is something needed more than even just the legislation and the policies because we need something more of the good will which I think it's something which the building bridges initiative, it's something which they can be able to bring the good will and a good framework or now that can be worked. Having mentioned the issue of ethnic antagonism and competition, it's something that usually emerges during the electioneering period as you have said. Do you think it comes like for instance if right now you were to mention to people about so and so, they not even be considering about it but when it comes to the electioneering period it becomes like it's mutuetu. Do you think that's one of the impact that has led to what we are having in the general elections period it so much is creating to other negative issues? Sure, I agree to that because one of the things because when we don't look at a person maybe with your areas of merits and that when I look at you in the point of tribe or ethnic where you come from I'll be so much biased and there's a likelihood that even by the decision I'll make or the support which I'll account to you will be so much on them to where to say drum. Not just even in elections look even when we have the court cases when maybe a governor is accused of this or senator will see some electorate or people from that area coming and saying that mutuetu is being targeted so I think that's a problem which has been there it's an historical problem which maybe it came from the 1963 going forward because we had inequality and that inequality is what really learned some communities being signed in terms of development in terms of even appointments looking at even the cabinet appointments and other parastato appointments from independence you'll really be shocked you'll see a very repeating pattern of the same faces, same families same ethnic communities which I think now it's becoming cancer in the system and really which need some immediate intervention when you mention that I'm going to go to Dan Dan that's something we call head speech in the country which apparently falls around the ethnic antagonism issue because when we mention about this particular person is from our tribe when someone talks something vulga we are like ni mutuetu I agree with what Kabiria just what you are looking at where we are coming from again in so far as is trying to bring ethnic harmony trying to deal with ethnocentric based politics we as a country right now as we speak I think there are some strides that has been made in so far as those who would still thrive on inciting hate and inciting conflict fused within the community with different agenda and I think again on the second handshake that is the one that was mediated by the late Kofi Annan the agenda for was establishment of the national cohesion integration commission whose work was to really try to bring matters of cohesion to fall you also remember the truth justice and reconciliation commission whose reports are not still find its way to be implemented in the public so we are coming again in 2019 after the handshake in 2018 9th of March bringing and forwarding another task force to do the same thing so for me I would be very interested to ask the BBIs since is an institution that is already established and has been gazetted even as you make public hearings in the counties it's quite important that while coming up with the report to try to check into the recommendations that were made out of truth justice and reconciliation and also the work of national cohesion integration commission but then my issue always been very categorical we are talking about conflict in perpetration of conflict we are always looking at the youth who are either the promoters of violence and the victims of violence but when it comes to hearing the issues that are concerning conflict the youth are not at the center stage of discussion neither at the representation so I would question first of all always persistently questioning the composition of building bridges initiative not only building bridges initiatives but even all these initiatives that they are member composition has lacked the youth component of representation what we are treated to is a fanfare of asking the young people to bring their recommendations of which not until these recommendations are made to the public and reported handover to the two principles that is when we are always able to know that indeed this has been taken care of now you are talking about matters of inclusivity you are talking about matters of avoiding trying to deal with ethnic antagonism and always political conflict each and every election it would be very detrimental lack of progressive in its nature to exclude the voices of the people who are always in co when it comes to matters that we are dealing for example talking about shared prosperity why are we not having shared prosperity is simply because resources are lacking out are not equally distributed and who are the four is women and youth lack of employment and under employment massively we are looking at the nine point agenda and the issues that you outlined it is also important that we always look at youth based strategically talking about youth based discussions insofar as this nine point agenda is concerned looking at what you have mentioned you have mentioned about inclusivity ethnic antagonism safety and security and of course shared prosperity I want us to discuss for just a minute you seem to have a concern about the people and inclusivity in the building bridges initiative that has 14 members 14 members of the committee apparently they come from a political field religious field and renewed scholars do you think kabere I had mentioned something probably you would make me understand what he made by probably why lack of I think he said something about youth missing out in the representation because when you mention about representation it is simply a general word because when you mention representation it simply means in the governance in terms of leadership in the national assembly all over these particular members that are formed I think maybe to just give a tip of what I really talked about when we talk about inclusivity it means that factoring out maybe the other even the minority voices and other people may not be able may make that loud noise now looking at inclusivity let's talk about let's look at even the youth and even the people from even the minority communities but now looking at the BBL we have a 14 member 14 member committee which is being chaired by Yusufaji and being deputy being Adam Solow but now looking at this in terms of the real face which we can really associate to and when I talk of this I'm so much specific about one of the young people and the time when I've seen the young people being involved is I've been on one forum where I saw a group which is drawn from the student leaders when they made their own deliberate action to go and actually look for the BBL committee to make a presentation so that's the only platform which I saw very organized probably you could mention where it was yes it was in Capitol Hill it's a group called Kuso Kenya University Student Organization and even it was made public even through the media when they went just to make a presentation and they hand their own structures but now looking at maybe in the committee itself there is no face from the young people so we are just left as the fans, the participants just people who are like I can say the fans trying to chair mach which is being played on the field when you actually should be the people now in the mach it's quite an issue to address and when we're looking about the issue of young people and employment also I know Dan has really so much into that but I want us to look at it this way young people are the highest in terms of population in the country and when you look at the issue of inclusivity it seems to be lacking according to what you have given out as your views how best can we bridge the gap well Alex very interesting question before I probably come to that I think it's important to tell the young people who follow this channel a lot that it's important to unmask the building bridges initiative it is important to let young people understand why it is important for them to participate in this process in whatever platform they have I will tell young people that this building bridges initiative is an initiative that will predetermine what will come in the next months or the next years before election and so when you want your voice to be heard it's important to give you input to this particular initiative now building bridges initiative I watched in all as Dr. Kurekot was presenting the other initiative and there have been a lot of initiatives to try to address the same thing Punguza Mizigo that has now been called Punguza Mgunia Punda Mechoka or Nelson Kure Moses Kure now building bridges I think the clergy and religious community had also come up with another initiative but particularly this one is the fact that this initiative is not anchored in either article 257 or article 256 it is neither parliamentary initiative or neither popular initiative so that leaves us young people with a task of finding what is this initiative then where is could we put how do we put our input into it and that leaves us only with the public hearing its appearance of public hearing which is very unfortunate because then that limits public participation in the voice of young people for example like Kabiria said young people must out to just make a deliberate attempt it should not be this way it should be based on a platform where you are given so I think it is important to advise you to make a deliberate effort like the ones that the students bodies made and other bodies to go and give their input but then you asked how do we bring the gap even as this task force is just winding up its recommendations to hand over to the two principles I think the fact that it is not custom stones that that is not the solution it is still important to even ask for a petition to put the input because it is lacking out in its content I do not know the number of people who so far has contributed and has appeared in the public hearing but what I know is that they still need for more voices to be heard but also young people are not really entitled always that each and every time you sit on your board rooms and your bedrooms thinking that this is alright if something that is not for us or something that is not with us is not for us I think that kind of entitlement should be something that we should really avoid as we speak so that we make a deliberate attempt in governance initiatives in political platforms so that we make our voices be heard Just to come to you, do you think youths are really aggressive for them to be heard? Well I think I like what Daniel has really talked about concerning the youth being aggressive and taking up their spaces but one thing I really believe in before maybe I come to say whether they are aggressive or not is that there is nothing like an entitlement that this is a granted right for you as a young person to be given this because as we've said if you hand the conversation during the Laboso's memorial service the women were speaking, they were saying as much as we were talking about affirmative action this does not mean that we women we just sit back and wait for us to be given this appointment in that and it's the same case to the young people but one thing I like about the young people is that first the numbers which we have and even the way we have really been able to see we have been able to take the challenges which are facing us we really have a reason to be aggressive because look at the issue of like unemployment and all that it's hitting on each and every person if maybe you are employed you are afraid that in one world or the other it will come back to you so one thing in terms of the young people being aggressive I can say yes they are aggressive but not a very big percentage as you would expect because when we talk of being aggressive it's not making noise on social media just tweeting and using the data battles it's about taking the deliberate action but for example now if we have maybe this BBI initiative and all that and we have also other appointments coming in front we cannot just keep complaining but what I'm trying to think of what if now these young people you are able to package yourself in a structured way and prevent yourself being divided along the ethnic line or maybe another line that's what most of the people do they divide their youth so that at least you don't have that common voice because with that common voice you are able to champion for either appointment for position, for representation and all that do you think university leadership is really really really aggressive in terms of advocating for youth development well that would be looked into relatively because looking at the history of university leadership and I think our history has is that by the times of for example James Arangun University and you know Babuna Mambas you know there was some level of political vigilance there was some level heightened level of aggressiveness when they were actually tackling matters of national interest and that time I think you could remember the time of the single party dictatorship and all these things but even with that kind of political environment they are very clear cut that this is what we really want to achieve that we do not only want to participate in university politics within but then even without reflecting on matters that are concerning national politics but even as we transition you realize that university leadership in some campuses have become you know what I really call also fun fair by this hundreds of hundreds of Babuna and the likes of you know leaders at Egypton and the rest I think you could look at there was a salient transition in that it was warm mad by the number of other social issues compared to really critical political decisions so I think it's important to begin to revive these movements to align leadership to align themselves to matters of national interest because then it is a reflexive of the youth voices and what the nation is actually waiting for to be endorsed as the leaders right there maybe a quick one before we get on the issue of student leadership because this really touches me on a personal note because just a few years back of a student leader I was the secretary general of the student council of Jaramog University and I also happened to be the national union but one thing which has killed the student leadership movement is the new actors maybe you are aware that they are changing the actor on how the elections and the university leadership is being taken it's something which has been so much petitioned that most of the student leaders are really trying to push for the review of that because initially as you talk the terms of James Orango it is the students directly who are voting their president, their section and all that and this gave them a lot of attention because the media the attention is there and all that but nowadays what we have you will hear of a president of a universe like maybe the universe of Nairobi is the president and less than 20 students this is because they have formed something like an electoral college but by your elect representatives who in the other hand now will sit in a boardroom then they will decide on who maybe to give the votes so that has really killed the political aggressiveness of even the student movement but of course we also need to note that not all universities are doing that some of them of course have a way of involving the rest of the students but of course we will be looking at that later on but I want for us to have a look at what are some of the issues that the building bridges initiative leaders led by Yusuf Harji they have come to realize on Thursday last week majority of Kenyans expressed concern over the prevailing culture of impunity in the country while commenting on some of the submissions to the building bridges task force the committee was chairperson Dr. Adams Olo noted that the bulk of proposals made so far surround of a corruption in public surface but before we play that clip there is something that I need to probably bring on board the building bridges initiative members they said they cannot go on air for now because they have to first of all present to the president and of course the former prime minister they proposed on the recommendation that they have so we apologize that we don't have any presentation of the building bridges but of course let's first of all before we have a look at that clip corruption has become an issue that is eating up to the economy of the country from last year in H.F. Skando we have the Kenya pipeline the Kenya power and lighting company we have the Aral and Dam and Kymoral Dam Skando we have the Keambu 588 million shillings Skando corruption is becoming the order of the day and we are talking about billions or millions because it is deliberately made to be that way what do you mean deliberately made to be that way you see you made money to steal if it was not allocated for I asked myself all the citizens every time if for example in your house Alex you are living and you have left 500 shillings to be used for house budget and all this you only knew there was 500 shillings budgeted for so any thief within your house would be very careful but if you budgeted it for 600 shillings somebody will steal 100 shillings but still remain you remain with 500 to budget for so in other times I am telling you there is nowhere corruption will ever take place if that money is not allocated for to be corrupted for now why are we always thinking that this is now an issue that should be declared other people are saying it should be declared you know national disaster to be dealt with and you can realize that the president is very careful not to do that because then it becomes an agenda for the whole country and deviates people's attention towards the big for agenda and other things but this is what happens and I said if we as a country we are still crying 50 years on the line crying about corruption is simply because we are not serious about execution and execution you know we have a new synergy that is pumped within the three bodies Ethics and Rage Corruption Commission ODPP and DCI and if we are still having cases people being bailed out of case and the amount that they are being bailed with is very tiny compared to what they are allegedly and this is why I also like the proposal to some extent that could we have people who were implicated in corruption and who have been convicted forget the offices and face a sentence not really a life sentence but face a serious sentence and could we also have a situation where if you are within the courts the judiciary must come up with the time frame of concluding a corruption case and if we leave that in Walakuna we are going to see the likes of Henry Rotich running as a governor Velgeo Marakot and we treated it for a really long time that we are seeing people who were implicated in corruption being treated as our own what Kabiria was saying it is better to have our own thief this is our thief you probably need to ask a question that I wanted to ask at the end of it all looking at the building bridges of course they are supposed actually to have completed their sittings by October 23rd and submit all the findings and the recommendations to the president and the former PM by September do you think we have an issue in terms of implementation yes we have we have an issue and not just a small issue because looking back at history I will take you back to history because it really informs us on where we are going we have hand various commissions we have hand their own presentations to various bodies the Truth Justice and Reconciliation Commission by the late Beduel Kiplangat we hand they hand a huge budget and all that they made presentations but what has been implemented we have not seen that actually we hand also the work we have hand so many other commissions but the reason for this is this because when they go and collect the views they get a lot of honest views from the people and these are people maybe were the victims and people have really been aggrieved by the past historical injustices and when they are able to present that it really touches on some people in power and those people in power they want in change of whether to implement it or not so because we have seen on Truth Justice and Reconciliation and others the implication and rules that the blame game was on the people who are really in power most of them the ones who are in power so you see that they are really implementing because it will have some serious implication in terms of prosecutions and loss of property