YES, ICC MUST STOP SUSPECTS FROM CHURNING HATE SPEECH AND PROPAGANDA.

Twice in a span of one week I have witnessed scary incidents in which what started as a harmless discourse among passengers in Public Service Vehicles (PSVs) degenerated into physical confrontations between members of certain ethnic communities ostensibly because unacceptable flak was directed at their perceived paramount political leaders. With the commencement of the Hague trials coupled with the fact that 2012 is drawing closer, and with politicians already going hammer and tongs against each other, one can only conclude that such incidents are symbolic microcosm of what is to happen to Kenya`s fractious society in the months to come.

In spite of the grotesque proportions of the emerging scenario, tribal chieftains continue enjoying a more extravagant personality cult among their communities. The question many are asking is why the public is easy prey to the vile schemes of these wily politicians. We need not look far. It has everything to do with propagation of vile propaganda.

Harold Lasswell (1927), a pioneer of propaganda studies in the United States, defined propaganda as "the management of collective attitudes by the manipulation of significant symbols." Since then, it appears as though this term has spawned as many definitions as it has euphemisms.

In Kenya for instance, propaganda has become part and parcel of the country`s body politic. It has come to mean the manipulation of ethnic psychological symbols to achieve ones selfish political objectives. Tribal chieftains and their sycophantic political elites have resorted to churning propaganda upon propaganda aimed at activating or agitating latent ethnic predispositions among their ethnic constituents to discredit the ICC involvement in Kenya`s 2007 PEV cases as well as direct their misplaced anger at perceived political nemeses.

It is worth noting that propaganda is more effective where the audience is less educated. According to Carl Hovland “people of lower academic ability tend to change their opinions on issues of lesser complexity, less supported by facts, and on issues that more intelligent men find difficult to accept.

This view bodes well with the Kenyan populace given that majority of them are either semi literate or completely illiterate. Accordingly, these significant population cannot rationalize and is therefore unable to take political decisions based on carefully reviewed information and ‘enlightened self-interest’ processed from available facts. Instead, consumption of mediated political messages laced with ethnic undertones takes precedence over facts. For instance, at the moment, a section of politicians are doing anything and everything to make sure that the electorate forgets the fact that they (politicians) were the architects of the Hague process.

Then they preferred The Hague process over the formation of a credible local judicial mechanism ostensibly because The Hague would take eternity before presenting them at the International Criminal court (ICC) to answer to charges of crimes against humanity. Now that the storm of justice has begun swirling around their political kingpins they are now desperately trying to peddle cheap propaganda to save themselves from the ignominy of having shot themselves in the leg.

They are now opining that by submitting “ourselves” to the ICC we have allowed foreigners to trample upon our sovereignty. What hogwash. The last time I checked the meaning of the term “sovereignty” it never meant turning the victims’ quest for justice into a revolving array of musical chairs dependent on the political whims of a few rowdy politicians.

Those who have consistently resisted attempts at defeating justice have also borne the brunt of propaganda. They have been labeled the devil incarnate. Some have christened them agents of the neo-colonialists. The sole intention of these totalitarian propagandists is to create a political battle-axe to completely obliterate the credibility of those political leaders whose principles cannot allow them to support their evil ways. Like Adolf Hitler they have discovered that "The most brilliant propagandist technique will yield no success unless a lie is repeated over and over. This explains why some suspects continually allege that the PM is using his foreign contacts in manipulating the ICC into eliminating them from the 2012 presidential race. Obviously, this claim is wacky as it is baseless.

Still, others buoyed by the flicking cameras and the global audiences have even callously referred to the realities of the 2007 PEV as a mere “horror movie!”
Some of their sycophantic followers have also issued blood cuddling messages to the effect that should some among the Ocampo six be incarcerated then “some people will know who the real owners of Kenya are.” That such incendiary remarks are aimed at engendering fear and animosity, appealing to people`s ethnic identities and fomenting disturbances is not in doubt. That the utterances contravene article 33 (2) of the Kenya constitution is also not in doubt. What is in doubt is whether those churning such utterances will be placed under the bar of justice, given the drooling inability of our institutions in containing the runaway verbal hemorrhage.

Much as many conscientious Kenyans certainly commend the ICC for stating that it will not hesitate to replace the summonses to appear before the ICC with warrants of arrest should some of the Ocampo six continue issuing inflammatory statements in the public domain, this in itself will not end the propagation of vile propaganda and hate speech in the country. Sycophantic political elites will step up the game. It is therefore incumbent upon the Government to complement the ICCs effort by reigning in on hate mongers.