By Salwa Mahmoud
Democracy and Inclusion in an Age of Insecurity
Lamu County today is broken. Democracy promised us freedom, equality and dignity. Instead it has delivered silence, betrayal and fear. What was meant to protect us is now used against us. Truly, our county has been turned upside down. When we look around, families in Lamu go hungry while county leaders drive big cars and hold endless meetings in hotels outside Lamu. The county receives billions in allocation every year, yet villages in Basuba and Kiunga still wait for clean water if not for the help from Northern Range lands Trust(NRT).
Youth in Mpeketoni and Hindi finish school but end up walking the dusty streets jobless, with empty pockets and empty dreams. Women in Mokowe are ignored when they speak; they are only important when they want them to sign their corrupted public participation participant lists, and their voices are treated as noise.
Fishermen in Faza and Kizingitini face endless restrictions and harassment instead of support “ety juya lifungwe lakini kutumia trolley ni sawa” they shout to demand justice. Farmers in Witu complain that their produce rots in the fields while leaders pose for photographs with fake promises of cooperatives. The poor cannot find justice because offices listen only to the highest bidder. All this happens while leaders shout the word democracy from campaign platform, asking “Ni raha si raha” so ironic.
What kind of democracy is this? A system that protects the powerful and abandons the weak. A system that calls itself free but chains its own people with corruption and lies. This is not democracy. This is betrayal. Hosting festivals to market the Islands while turning a blind eye to let Lamu drown in its own waste.
Insecurity in Lamu is not just about terror attacks. Insecurity is also the mother in Mkokoni who goes to bed without feeding her child. It is the graduate in Hindi who carries his certificate from one office to another and is sent away every time because only the politicians’ relatives and supporters qualify. It i the fisherman in Kiunga ward who spends all night at sea, only for his catch to go bad because there is no market to sell and no storage facilities. It is the silence of a woman whose ideas are dismissed because of her gender. It is the frustration of a youth who votes faithfully in every election but never sees even one promise fulfilled. These are the hidden insecurities that are killing democracy in Lamu every day.
Democracy without inclusion is empty. Elections alone are not democracy. True democracy means every voice in Lamu must matter. The youth in Pate, the fisherman in Kizingitini, the woman in Mokowe market, the farmer in Witu, each must count as much as the governor or the MCA. Anything less is not democracy.
But what happens in Lamu right now is that leaders appear during campaigns with big promises and then vanish when power is secured. Citizens are left in pain. Security is turned into an excuse to silence truth and harass innocent people, paying supporters to insult and shame hard-working leaders so that they can be bad in the face of the community. Entire communities are told to wait for a better time that never comes. The result is exclusion instead of empowerment. And exclusion breeds anger, hopelessness and finally violence.
Yet even in this betrayal, Lamu still has voices that refuse to die. Youth who rise to demand accountability. Communities that come together to defend justice. Writers, poets and theatre groups who speak truth through art. These may look like small acts but they are seeds of hope. They prove that democracy can survive even in insecurity if the people refuse to give up. The truth is bitter. Democracy in Lamu has failed because leaders have hijacked it with greed. But the truth is also powerful. We can take it back. We can choose inclusion over exclusion. We can protect every voice instead of silencing it. We can stand together instead of being divided by politics, clan or religion.
And to the governor, to every MCA, to every county officer who eats from the people’s table while families starve , your time of excuses is over. We see your greed. We see your betrayal. Stop hiding behind convoys, empty speeches and staged photographs. Democracy is not your playground. It is the lifeline of our people. If you cannot serve us with honesty and justice, then step aside. Lamu will not remain silent. We will not clap for lies. We will not bow to betrayal. The people are watching, and the people will rise.
