• Mocking and ridiculing those in authority is a form of comic relief
When I sometimes wonder about the famed Kenyan resilience in the face of adversity, I am reminded that our unique and sometimes very dark sense of humour is one of the greatest shields we have.
Our Kenyan humour, savage and sharp as it can be, is known across the globe, thanks particularly to the X platform (formerly Twitter). Just ask anyone who has experienced Kenyans on X.
We can laugh at almost anything, and can turn nearly any situation into a joke and those who are qualified in such issues will say things about how humour is often a way to cope with difficulties. This humour brings us relief at our most troubled as a nation
Research shows that when people are stressed or anxious, they become calmer and more at ease after enjoying a laugh.
This is why even at the height of the maandamano, we managed to spit fire and venom at the government and its machinery, but also to see jokes where the humourless among us, particularly those we were laughing at, could not.
In this respect, our humour serves as both a defence mechanism and a way of coping with adversity.
We don’t just poke fun at ourselves and our politics. Many of us also refuse to take our religious beliefs as seriously as some would prefer we did.
In the words of Tom Cronin, McHugh Professor of American Institutions and Leadership at Colorado College, “People everywhere laugh at their political leaders, not only to vent their outrage at ineptness or corruption in government, but also to express a basic instinct for independence from authority.”
The way we laugh at our political leaders reveals both our humanness and our conflicting expectations for leadership.
It is unclear who said, “Politicians are like diapers, they need to be changed often, and for the same reason.” However, according to this 2021 Reuters fact-check, Mark Twain might have appreciated the sentiment.
I have been unable to find out who coined the saying, but I must say I have always appreciated them and in fact, I propose it should be tacked into the beginning of the Kenya National Assembly motto, which in 2020 was revised for gender inclusivity.
That motto currently reads: “For the welfare of society and the just government of the people.”
If my proposal were to be taken seriously, the motto would read: “Politicians and diapers must be changed often, and for the same reason — the welfare of society and the just government of the people.”
I am aware of some Kenyans who believe that the country is a theocracy. However, the last time I checked, while freedom of religion is enshrined in the Constitution, Kenya is very much a secular state.
The great thing about this freedom of worship is that anyone can believe in whatever they want to, even if it sounds stupid or wrong. But at the same time, they can choose not to have any belief at all.
As the country sang in December 2002, to the point that a visitor might have thought it was a new national anthem: ‘Yote Yawezekana.’
Actually for me, one of the funniest things about that particular rendition of the song, whose full title was ‘Yote Yawezekana bila Moi’ (Everything is possible without Moi) was that it was taken from a Christian worship song: ‘Yote Yawezekana na Imani’ (Everything is possible with faith).
If you know Kenyan boozers, you are aware they have a penchant for, among other things, taking particularly Christian worship songs and giving them a secular, and sometimes even bawdy, twist.
Back in the early 1990s, the bastardised song of choice for many a drinker was Faustin Munishi’s ‘Niko Chini Ya Mwamba, Mwamba Juu Yangu’, which loosely translated to, ‘I am under the Rock, the Rock is higher than me’.
Dear Reader, please use your imagination to figure out how Kenyans turned this song into a crude drinking song. If you have trouble doing that, perhaps have a few drinks with someone from that era and start humming the tune.