It has been some two years and two months since Russia invaded Ukraine. Twenty six months of death and terror, close to 800 days of suffering, fearing and dying for our fellow humans.
But who are Kenyans!
Don’t we, as Kenyans, have so much to worry about already without hearing more about the Russian invasion of Ukraine some 5,000km away, which has dominated international news for the last two years?
Are we not already worrying about the threat to our daughters and sisters who go out at night, with the dark shadow of femicide lurking around corner?
Aren’t we holding our breath already, as we wonder how the Kenyan shilling posted its most significant single-day appreciation in over a decade, after months of struggle?
Aren’t our hearts and minds occupied enough with NTSA, EPRA, NHIF, and NSSF to be able to fit in NATO and BRICS as well?
Why, then, should we, in Kenya, care about this faraway country called Ukraine, as it battles Russian invasion?
Should we not be concerned that this is a battle of politics and politicians, where decisions and bloodshed began and continue because of a handful of men, and some women probably, in a boardroom far away from the battlefields?
But then, we as Kenyans live this reality every day. Aren’t our daily lives and battles determined by well-dressed politicians disconnected from the traffic and trauma we encounter daily?
Should we perhaps care that people are meeting a premature death? More than 30,000 civilian casualties.
For those who read the Bible, should we not care that this invasion is a classic case of David and Goliath in terms of scale, might and budget?
Should we care because, as a species, we are ignoring requests, calls and cries for help?
Or perhaps we should make it more material and immediate. It seems the national media and our everyday conversation included the Russian invasion of Ukraine when our shopping bill was higher than usual, when the feed for our farms, and the breakfast for our children was significantly more expensive, if it was available at all. When we had to think twice about getting in our cars and encountering the one sure thing on a Nairobi morning, sitting in traffic because the fuel light would indeed glow orange earlier than usual.
Some Kenyans on X (formerly Twitter) are trying to push the enemy-of-my-enemy-is-my-friend agenda.
However, if we are to stick to the navel-gazing and chosen ignorance described above, or worse, listen to an Eastern European leader, his ministers, or his speech writer that we have some shared history because of what has happened in the past by the hands of another nation, then we are abetting political decisions made behind closed doors or agreeing to cherry-pick enemies and allies for the sake of some shared likes or retweets.
Then what? What do we do, think, or feel when international (not national, it should also be noted) news is abuzz with the second anniversary of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and we instead switch channels, roll our eyes, or focus on something more immediate for us like traffic, taxes and X.
Yet, even if we wanted to ignore the war thousands of kilometres away, its spiral effects continue to affect us each day and it is getting worse.
Disruption in value chains has resulted in price increases in fuel and energy, wheat and fertiliser prices which are critical inputs for Kenya’s manufacturing and agriculture sector.
The increased cost of oil products has a wide-ranging welfare impact through increased transport and costs of production, which are in turn transferred to consumers. For example, rising wheat prices have contributed to food inflation.
Over and above this exchange rate depreciation witnessed in the last two years has had a negative effect on Kenya’s inflation, causing an even slower economic recovery and reduction of poverty.
Perhaps we should call to mind another famous Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky, who wrote:
“Above all, don't lie to yourself. The man who lies to himself and listens to his own lie comes to a point that he cannot distinguish the truth within him, or around him, and so loses all respect for himself and for others. And having no respect, he ceases to love.”
The truth is when you remove geography, kilometres, race, or comparisons, there are more similarities: people hungry, ignored, being attacked and killed, than there are differences between us in Kenya and Ukraine.
Political commentator