“Allah Akbar! My son, time has healed all the wounds of your heart,” my Imam keeps telling me this. Narrating my experience of Kenya’s 2007 post-election violence is hard. I lost family members, friends, and neighbors. Men were killed, young girls and women were raped, and the old were burnt as the world witnessed in horror. Those whom we trusted to protect us had turned against us. We were alone, but Allah was with us.
My name is Mwalimu Khussein. I was born of a Muslim father and a Christian mother. My mom left when I was two years old, and so I never met her since my childhood. I grew up in Bangladesh slum in Changamwe in Mombasa county. Bangladesh slum has people from different tribes and races in Kenya. We lived in peace with Indians, Arabs, the Swahili, and Watu wa Bara. My childhood friends and I would play on garbage heaps, swim in dirty water and gaze at the sky beyond the Indian Ocean. Sometimes I wondered where that water ended.
Violence erupted during the last week of 2012. The tension was high on 29th December of 2012 in Changamwe. This was a day before the presidential results were announced. It was 6.30 pm when I left madrassa at Masjid Mosque. On that particular day, it was announced our area had been sealed off to avoid violence. A curfew was declared in the surrounding areas of Makupa, Mikindani, and Bangladesh. I could not go home. The night became darker and horrifying. There were no lights, no movements, and only gunshots could be heard in the distant air. Since I couldn’t go back home, I headed back to Masjid. Many people had come to take cover at the mosque. Christians, Hindu and Muslims, had been united by one thing; care for humanity.
At 10:00 pm Sheikh Musa broke the bad news. Women had been raped, and Children who had taken refuge in a church in Msambweni had been burnt and that the slum was on fire. The police who had been deployed to the area, could not get there due to fears of being attacked by unknown assailants. The whole country was fighting, and over 1000 people had been killed. It was Kenyans against Kenyans. Our food at the mosque ran out after five days before I hit the road to find my family. I counted over ten bodies rotting on the streets. My home was nowhere. It was in ashes, and none of my family members or friends could be found.
I am now 20 years old. A community leader and founder member of Nipe Sauti Africa, a community outreach group that promotes cohesion and oneness amongst Kenyans. My main objective in life is to clean the poisoned waters that feed the hearts of Kenyan youth. As a youth leader, part of religious groups that call upon the judiciary to prosecute anyone found to be inciting Kenyans against each other. Leaders who preach hatred are the poison in our waters. I call upon all youths around the world to take a step and show an act kindness to others.
#PEACE #WE_ARE_ONE #JUSTICE
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