The First Principle in Drafting a Constitution

By Mwarang'ethe

Everyone is crying out for peace, none is crying out for justice (Peter Tosh)

Almost all Kenyans fervently believe that, the executive branch of the Kenyan government is the root cause of the miseries in our land. Most Kenyans are sincere in this believe. But, the few who originate and propagate the idea, it is a necessary illusion to remove risk from democracy. We deny and reject with unmitigated contempt this believe because it ignores the FIRST PRINCIPLE of constituting a just and peaceful society that must guide drafting of a constitution. Those few who originate and propagating this idea, do so as to continue throwing sand into the eyes of mankind so as to shield them from seeing the self evident truth. They continue to do so in their monstrous but, failing expectation of finding a very huge fund of gullibility in today’s men.

Let the reader bear in mind the following Kenyan prayer/anthem:

O God of all creation
Bless this our land and nation
Justice be our shield and defender
May we dwell in unity
Peace and liberty
Plenty be found within our border

In denouncing these vulgar falsehoods, we assert that, our miseries stem not from failures of the executive, but, from the gross violation of the FIRST PRINCIPLE in our constitution that must be adhered to in constituting a just and peaceful society. This first principle flows from the command of the Creator whom we call upon in the above prayer. It is this. In the Genesis 3:19, the Almighty and Eternal God, declare that, "In the sweat of your face you shall eat bread." In this, God the Almighty has declared the Natural Law that, industry, intelligence and thrift shall be rewarded with wealth and idleness, indolence, ignorance and imprudence by destitution.

What this means is this. Without intervention of any law, agreement or contract between individuals as to what shall belong to each, Nature produces in each the notion of individuality, which extends to ownership, thereby, bestowing on each person and exclusively that which he produces or creates. Thus, before any man made law, Nature begets to all men the law an expectation that he shall be able to enjoy what he produces in commensurate to labour and skills he employs. This is the law or the first principle of NATURAL RIGHT TO PROPERTY that must be adhered to in constituting a just society.

Flowing from the above, it follows and must follow that the MAIN question in drafting a constitution is not the executive or the so called representation, but, this. Does the Constitution as drafted ensure that, the government to be constituted shall be for no other purpose, but, to guarantee the enjoyment of natural right to property? In other words, is it the sole objective of the government to be constituted to recognise, guarantee and protect the NATURAL relationship between labour and its produce? If not, haven’t such a law violated the corollary principle and Divine law that, thou shall not steal? And, if we have enshrined robbery in our supreme law, haven’t we done violence to justice that we invoke as our shield and defender? And, if justice which should be our shield and defender is dispensed with violently, haven’t we then, relinquished that which must come first before we can dwell in unity, peace and liberty? Finally, having casually relinquished the right to live in unity, peace and liberty, on what basis can we pray to the Creator for plenty within our borders?

Believing the above to be true, let the reader bear this in mind. By the Natural law, no man has or shall ever willingly shoulder the curse of his brother that he can only eat bread from his sweat of his brow. It is from this Natural Law; man has and will forever resist any attempt to burden him with his brother's curse. It follows therefore, that, so as to fasten his curse on the resisting brother, the man running away from his curse, retorts to oppression. Therein, we see that the attempt by man to run away from his curse, that he shall eat his bread from his own sweat, is the root cause of all kinds of oppression devised by man against his fellow man and the attendant slavery, ignorance, poverty, discord and misery that continues to inflict our society. In short, our ability to live in unity, peace, liberty and plenty is totally and absolutely dependent upon the preservation of natural rules of appropriation.

Let us now recall briefly, the Kenyan history. When the barbarians who knew no art or trade but plunder, calling themselves silly and blasphemous names like lord Delamere arrived on our shores, the first thing they did was to appropriate our soil by the means of the sword. To prevent Africans from challenging their barbaric acts, though legal means, their lawyers who look at words like a usurer looks at money, came up with the monstrous doctrine that, public international law could only apply only to “civilised” states. Since Africans were not “civilised” to constitute a state, this law did not apply to them. With such a devilish fiction concocted by European lawyers, the fate of African soil was sealed. Interestingly, this monstrous doctrine is still propagandised to international lawyers even today, but, without the historical context of its bloody origin. However, to protect their corporate tyrannies i.e. private powers in the name of multinationals which James Madison warned will eventually demolish the experiment in democratic government by becoming “at once its tools and its tyrants,” these monstrous absurdities and unintelligent fictions are over looked. What a miserable contradiction in the name of law?

This is the key point. By appropriating our soil, they effectively reduced Africans into slaves because whoever appropriates the soil, must as the night follows the day, pocket the surplus produced by those who must labour in agriculture and manufacturing in accordance with law of rent. In other words, to appropriate land means to claim everything that must be made using its help. In simple words, those who sweat can only pocket only a small piece of the bread that is just necessary to ensure bare survival. The bigger part of the bread they bake with their blood and sweat is thereby, pocketed by those who appropriated land, but, who do not sweat. Hereby, we now see that, this LEGAL/ARTIFICIAL RIGHT TO PROPERTY which grows not from natural causes, but, by the law of fraud or what men in wigs call the law of the land is founded on the negation of the first principle of a just and peaceful society, i.e. the NATURAL RIGHT TO PROPERTY.

Having appropriated our soil, they did not sheath their sword. Still dripping with the blood of the innocent, they kept it on their hands and proceeded to engrave the law for the conquered and vanquished. As anyone knows, these first law makers and their descendants had one thing in their mind. To preserve in perpetuity the power and privilege so established. Thus, we have a law founded on oppression, upheld by force and fraud, and intended solely to preserve ill gotten power and ill gotten wealth, i.e. land so as to maintain dominion of the soil by the aristocracy so as to perpetuate slavery, ignorance and poverty.

However, since the natural right to property is ingrained in the heart of all men by their Creator, whenever this right is violated, they revolt. It was revolt against the appropriation of wealth of those who labour by those who are idle contrary to the Divine Law, i.e. negation of the first principle, which is implanted in the hearts of all men that drove Kenyans to fight to be free. Here is another key point to note. It is the origin and meaning of constitutions. Since the governing and legislating class have throughout history, sought to annihilate the first principle of society, i.e. the natural right to property as in the case of slavery, in the case of colonialism and apartheid the victims of this robbery, have always sought to guarantee against such violation via constitutions. Thus, the constitutions are not and cannot confer any rights. Their purposes are twofold. Firstly, to affirm previously violated natural rights of man. Secondly, to be a testimony to the future generations of how law makers have sought throughout history to annihilate natural rights of man and thereby, call for eternal vigilance.

Unfortunately, when we gained independence, all that changed was the colour of the law makers. The principles of oppression and plunder were left as the foundation of our political and legal edifice. Consequently, it is this unjust appropriation of wealth after the so called independence that has been the source of revolt ever since. Thus, the objective of a new constitutional order was and should be the re-introduction and affirmation of the first principle of constituting a just and peaceful society.

Unfortunately, what should have been about recovering the natural relations between labour and rewards, has been turned into matters of preservation of power by the law makers in the name of executive and so called people’s representation. It is because of these frustrations we have witnessed the unprecedented bloodshed in Kenya of late. Sadly, when men revolt without understanding fully the source injustice they feel in their hearts, they revolt in a manner that harms themselves and others in their blind efforts to correct the great injustice.

It is from this view; the violence among Kenyans and the government response we have seen of late in Kenya must be understood. So as to maintain order in a society where men are revolting against unjust appropriation of their sweat, the government retorts to barbaric means to combat the lawlessness. Unfortunately, such police measures as we have witnessed against Sabaot “rebels” and Mungiki guarantee one thing. More massacres by the police and the military of both the active participants and the innocent bystanders. All this, leaves a society drenched in blood while retarding its moral, social, economic and political developments. This goes on until the final breakdown. Kenya has now entered this vicious cycle and it seems appropriate to warn that this new constitution may be the last trumpet. If it does not address this first principle meaningfully and comprehensively, all other “reforms” shall be in vain and we would have reached the end of road as it concerns peaceful reforms.

Thus, let us stop chasing shadows looking for the cause of our tribulations. We need only look at political institutions that were originally founded by the sword and have since been maintained by the sword of the majesty, injustice of the judge and an army of black myrmidons. Unfortunately, these institutions can only breathe hatred, discord and bloodshed. In simple words, as long as we seek to maintain principles flowing barbaric aggression, mutual oppression and plunder decreed by dead mad men whose highest and most noble vocation was slaughter of the innocent, using the hocus pocus and the mystic interpretation of law by lawyers, we shall be forever be tormented by open theft, fraud which destroy confidence which makes men act for themselves alone, instead of mutually exchanging their services and goods in mutual exchanges which is the basis of order in society and not police.

We reiterate that in the face of reason and facts, the imposition of artificial or legal right to property or that idle coinage of the brain which has no basis in the laws of nature, which therefore, violently overthrows the natural right to property, is the root cause of the Kenyan mess. It must be the root cause because it servers the NATURAL CONNECTION between LABOUR and its REWARDS. This artificial right to property creates a class of idle rich men who are not inventive. More so, since their natural wants are already met, and are idle, out of their low imagination capacity they come up with fancy and unreal wants and expensive vanities to meet their whims. Unfortunately, since they occupy the highest positions in society, their love of expense sets the fashion or the example which is copied by those below them. To copy these idlers is the beginning of corruption which eventually corrupts the whole society as it falls into vice and crime.

In conclusion, what we have sought to explain is this. Law makers are only known to invent new taxes and only conquer the pockets of their subjects. It is for this reason; they have diverted the need for reforms on right of property into creation of offices which will preserve their power (read 349 mps idle mps to be paid by those who labour). However, on our part, we insist that, the distribution of wealth in terms of wages, rent and interest which is the most critical issue in the stability of a nation should have been the priority. Without addressing this matter, we shall still be with a governance system dedicated to unjust appropriation of wealth of those who labour. From this parent theft, it shall surely flow all the theft, fraud, all vanity and chicanery that shall surely torment Kenyans worse than a pestilence and famine. This is because, it is impossible to violate the decree of the Creator we call upon in our national prayer with impunity.