The date is 19th August 2010. A new group of postgraduate students have been asked by the University of Bergen, Norway to attend a medical test as a requirement for admission. The medical is to happen at the Haukeland University Hospital, it is the second last day of the orientation week and time is running out. A series of tests have to be done, today it is the Tuberculosis screening.
I take my seat at the outpatient bay, a lavish brown leather sofa, with freshly cut rose flowers sitting at the end of a panoramic view section. I join the queue of anxious African students waiting for their turn, we get to know one another and the conversation grows livelier. The Norwegian lady at the reception decides to join in. To break the ice, she asks whether we belonged to the same tribe in Africa.
I was the first on the board, clarifying that we not only belonged to different tribes, we also came from different countries. Then hell breaks loose. My colleague from Ghana picks a fight with me, he isn’t happy with my perpetuation of the ‘tribe’ tag, saying it was demeaning and condescending. He couldn’t stomach Africans being hounded into a pre-colonial narrative of primitive societies and savages. “We have polished, learned natives in the continent”, he says, “and this correction must get out there, starting with the girl in front.”
The problem with this lecture was that my Ghanaian friend was preaching to the choir. I have a degree in Anthropology, if that exchange needed an informed moderator, then I was the clear frontrunner. I had known too well the image of Africa in ethnographic texts I read mostly from precolonial writers. The reference to the concept of ‘tribe’ is a constant definitive marker of study subjects. Evans-Pritchard, working as a British informer in precolonial South Sudan, for example, described the Nuer as “a group of African tribes located in southern Sudan and western Ethiopia”, Meyer Fortes has written extensively about the kinship patterns of the Tallensi tribe of Gambia. Napoleon Chagnon, the most controversial anthropologist of our time, has documented all too well the Yanomamo “noble savages” of the Amazon Basin.
Historical accounts of African societies were done long before our girls started applying pancake make-up and grafting in beanstalk shoes. I told my Ghanaian friend that he shouldn’t bother holding brief for Africans in Europe, the lady could clearly see we were not dressed in loin clothes neither did we strap quivers on our backs hunting squirrels in the hospital. If the lady was not convinced by our looks that her image of Africa needed revision, it was needles wasting his breath rewriting wrongs brought about by lack of exposure and narrowing of thoughts. He needed not preach to the choir.
Former Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka yesterday refused to answer a ‘trick question’ from a journalist because he was Kikuyu and, by extension, a hatchet man for the Kikuyu and Kalenjin tribal duopoly of the current government. It was needless, Kalonzo thought, any response would generate more heat than light. It kicked a firestorm, an apology was demanded to restore his dignity. He did apologize but the damage was already done. The journalist was not alone.
I have encountered prejudice based on my tribe countless times. Last month, while on a rare pilgrimage from Kisumu to Nairobi, we stopped our car in Molo to buy fresh grocery from itinerant traders lining the roadside. I was with two of my friends, a Kamba and a Kisii. I offered to remain behind for security reasons as my two pals went haggling for the best prices.
The Kisii returned with half a bag of potatoes and the motherly seller, a Kikuyu, helped him to the car. She asked why I was not interested in buying anything that day, upon which the Kisii guy replied “huyu bado amekasirika juu mliwaibia kura” (he is still angry because your people stole their vote). I have always made everyone aware that I voted for Peter Kenneth, a Kikuyu from Gatanga, Murang’a County. I also voted for Simba Arati (a Kisii) in Dagoretti North, Mike Mbuvi Sonko (a Kamba) in Nairobi senate, and many other non-Luo speaking candidates from across the million positions on offer during last elections. Yet here we were, still being profiled based on my tribe. I needed not preach to the choir.
Ethnicity is a term that has been wrongfully associated with negativity. Fredrick Barth, the Norwegian anthropologist, describes ethnicity as a contrastive category. “I am ‘Norwegian’ because I see myself (or I am seen) in contrast to e.g. Saami or Swedes.’ I am ‘Luo’ because I see myself (or I am seen) in contrast to e.g. Kikuyus or Kalenjins. Ethnicity is, therefore, a concept describing a particular way of drawing boundaries between groups. Tribe, a sub-category of ethnic identity, is a Kenyan status symbol, it probably has a colour in our national flag. It has been manipulated strategically for political, economic and ecological reasons. Tribe creates a sense of belonging, whenever we are attacked; we rally behind our tribe for backup. It works, most of the time, and if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
Post-colonial Kenyan entrepreneurs who have struck it rich built their empires from an ethnic backbone. The Gikuyu, Embu, Meru Association (GEMA), The Luo Thrift and Trading Co. among other tribal outfits, morphed from economic empowerment initiatives into deadly political outfits. In politics, as in economics, numbers count and tribe is a proven mobilizer. In Kenya, people have had their noses on the feeding trough for years because of their ethnic profiles. Interviews have been won and lost on the basis of your surname. We owe our tribe the world. When you needed school fees you went back to your tribe who organized a fundraiser to send “our son” to school. You are a property of your tribe, you give back what you received. Anthropology has a term for this symbiotic relationship; they call it ‘reciprocity’.
I have read a number of opinions dismantling the tribe theory. They argue that it is difficult to pigeon-hole individuals based on their ethnic mother-tongue. An individual who went to ivy-league schools and doesn’t know the direction to their ancestral home, for example, cannot qualify in this category of ethnic profiling. They are right, and wrong. Right because tribe does not define this particular group’s worldview. Wrong because this particular group identify themselves with other ethnic categorizations – religion, social status, etc.
It is important to note that no category of ethnicity is lesser powerful than another, and that one individual can fall into many sub-sets of ethnic profiling at the same time; for example; a Kenyan Somali who professes the Muslim faith is twice likely to be raided by the anti-terror squad than a Kenyan Luo of a Roman Catholic religious orientation. In fact, if there is a sub-set of ethnicity that Kenyans should bludgeon with all manner of crude weapons, it is the one on social status. J.M. Kariuki’s quote rings true, that “Kenya has become a country of ten millionaires and ten million beggars.” According to this line of thought, we have two tribes in Kenya – the ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’. It is their identity and pride to amass wealth and floss around. They are an ethnic clique, the anointed rulers watching over God’s poor creation. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is not something to apologize for.
