Tim Querengesser And Kenneth Ogosia
28 September 2007
Nairobi — The world apostles of peace meeting in Nairobi have at one point been victims of violence. All the 150 civilian peacekeepers, among them a Nobel Peace Laureate, loathe revenge.
Even as the peacekeepers from Europe, Asia, North America and Africa are discussing peace as war rages around the world, they are disturbed by the latest incidents of election violence witnessed in the country.
In fact, they are wishing they could seek audience with all political party leaders, Electoral Commission of Kenya and President Mwai Kibaki to offer them free lessons on the need to use the last of their energy to safeguard the country's peace enjoyed by the grace of God.
Save for the few Kenyans at the conference, most of the other delegates have tasted war, and through its tormenting effects, are in pursuit of nothing but peace.
Nobel Peace Laureate Mairead Maguire married her sister's husband after she committed suicide as a result of violence which claimed her three children and left her life in a shambles.
Conference theme
"Nobody has the monopoly of goodness and evil" the theme of the conference read.
Bishop Baker Ochola also recounted a similar ordeal which befell his family when Ugandan rebels gang-raped his daughter. She committed suicide due to dejection and his wife died a few years later when land mine planted on a road she was using exploded.
The two and many other heart-rending and spine chilling stories were being told to Kenyans by the civilian peacekeepers meeting in Nairobi just when political violence had reared its ugly head three months before the General Election.
Mrs Maguire and Bishop Ochola watched in disbelief how peace in Kenya is taken for granted as they watched televisions and read newspapers about the incitement being made by the country's politicians.
They anti-revenge apostles, in their respective countries, are forcing their governments to adopt peaceful resolutions to conflicts.
Pakistan journalist Farruk Shail Goindi, Mr Ram Ekbal Verma from Burma, Fr Roberto Layson from Philippines, Ms Erika Shatz and David Grant are behind the Nonviolent Peaceforce rooted in forgiveness and reconciliation without consideration of colour, tribe, race, religion, gender and ethnicity.
" Like in a family where two people are fighting, the arrival of a third party or visitor brings peace and such opportunities are often used to develop lasting cordial relationships," Mr Grant, Strategic Relations Director told the Nation.
Nobel peace prize winner Maguire said "violence is a cycle that can't be broken with bombs or bullets."
She spoke during the opening the Nonviolent Peace force International conference at the Kenya College of Communication Technology yesterday.
Just this week, Uganda and Sudan have rattled sabres over oil, and violence continues to kill innocent people in Somalia and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
To underline the danger non-violent protest can create, hundreds of thousands of Burmese monks, who have marched this week demanding political reforms in their country, have been teargassed and beaten by the country's military regime.
Mrs Maguire said peace is possible only when two sides in a conflict talk to each other, when victims forgive their oppressors and when civilians get involved in fostering peace.
"You have to have dialogue with those you have differences with," she said.
Like so many inspirational leaders at the conference, Mrs Maguire found her wisdom for peace through being a victim of violence.
In 1976, her home in Northern Ireland was ripped by Christian sectarian violence between the British-backed Protestant majority and the separatist Catholic minority, led by the Irish Resistance Army (IRA).
During the conflict, her younger sister and her four children were struck by an IRA fighter's car while they were walking down the street. The IRA soldier had been shot by a British soldier. Three of the children died in the accident and her sister suffered debilitating injuries. She later committed suicide.
Raging for decades
Instead of seeking revenge, however, Mrs Maguire sought peace. She created the Community of Peace People movement, which mobilised hundreds of thousands of civilians to march and demand the British and IRA meet to begin finding a peaceful solution to the conflict, which had been raging for decades.
For her work, in 1976 she was awarded the Nobel prize.
The non-violent approach worked, she said. In the first six months of the movement, violence in Northern Ireland was cut by more than 70 per cent. But progress was a story of two steps forward, one step back, she said. The conflict dragged on for several decades, and during that time, neither side was happy with the Peace People group.
"We were nobody's friend," she said adding that "people who take a stand are putting their lives in danger."
But in 1998, the British government and the IRA finally met, signing the historic Good Friday Agreement that officially ended the conflict.
"When you take guns out of a problem, you can do more," said Mrs Maguire.
With ethnic problems seemingly on the rise around the world, she said non-violent actions such as those advocated by the Nonviolent Peaceforce, which sends unarmed people from around the world to conflict zones, is the only solution.
Another piece of the violence puzzle that must be removed to find peace is revenge, said Bishop Ochola from Northern Uganda.
"Forgiveness sets the victim free of his or her bitterness," said the 75-year-old bishop, who has been working for 10 years to end the decades-old conflict between the Ugandan government and Lords Resistance Army (LRA).
"Somebody who has killed and has been forgiven is touched in a different way," said Bishop Ochola noting the move brings real justice for both parties.
Daughter gang-raped
Like Mrs Maguire, Bishop Ochola speaks from the heart. In 1987, his young daughter was gang-raped by rebel fighters in Northern Uganda. Overwhelmed by emotional pain from the attack, she committed suicide. To add to his bitterness and burden, 10 years later, his wife was killed when the vehicle she was driving in struck a landmine planted by the LRA.
Since that day, Bishop Ochola dedicated his life to the challenge of creating peace in Northern Uganda. His approach has been to tirelessly seek a forum for both sides to talk and find a way out of the conflict.
Though countless attempts were unsuccessful and seemed to bring only more violence, his group has now helped create a tentative peace. The Ugandan government and LRA leadership have signed a ceasefire, formally ending the war.
The two sides have also discussed comprehensive solutions to solve economic disparities in the north of Uganda which are behind the war, and have adopted restorative justice approaches to healing the wounds left from the conflict.
"When people are fighting, until they stop, they don't have time to think. The best solution is to go through the process of reconciliation. You become a new person," he said.
Governments and rebels will never find peace without civilians intervening to help them create it, said Father Roberto Layson, who hails from the Philippines.
In his town of Mindanao, a conflict between minority Muslim separatists and the Christian-dominated government has raged for decades. The war has killed hundreds of innocent people, mostly children, and seen people seek refuge in his church.
Finally, citizens of the community said "enough is enough," he said. "Peace is too important to be left alone in the hands of the government and the armed rebels. We wield so much power if we use it non-violently."
In 2003, the Mindanao community banded together into peacekeeping and monitoring forces, creating a way for the two sides to speak to one another and keeping pressure on them to honour a ceasefire agreement. Since the peacekeepers arrived, violations of the agreement have fallen from more than 700 to zero, said Father Layson.
Mrs Maguire pointed to the current conflicts Zimbabwe can only be solved with dialogue. "People should be talking to President Mugabe," she said.
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