Regaining Trust: Our Challenge

Recently I went through the Rift Valley attending several workshops on peace-building among the communities that were hard hit by the post election violence. The good thing was that this was not your usual workshop crowd but rather the average Kenyan, people who were both victims and perpetrators of the violence. One thing that hit me was when one participant in Nakuru said that one of the effects of the violence was that communities have lost trust in one another. If this is truly the case, then I am worried for our future...but again I am not surprised.

I can however say that I am disappointed at the lack of urgency in addressing this fundamental issue. How can we live with each other if we don't trust each other? While this a situation that your typical Kenyan politician will relish, as they can play on our fears for the sake of garnering votes, it takes a scary dimension when one considers a recent research finding by Media Focus on Africa that stated that a significant number of people are ready and willing to fight again. This is corroborated by sentiments in one of the workshops where some participants stated that next time they will get rid of all the Kikuyus in their area, while in yet another workshop, a lady participant said that she could not believe that she is actually seated in the same room with members from another community that had chased her from where she previously lived during the violence of early last year. It took a lot of pleading from other workshop participants to cool her down.

I don't have the answers to what needs to be done, but this is something that we all need to ponder about.