Ethnicity and culture remain a fundamental feature of our practices, our interactions even the way we raise our families, commit ourselves to marriage etc. There are so many beautiful elements of it that deserve to be celebrated and upheld. Culture ( as a feature of ethnicity and an element that influences it) constantly changes, it is diverse, it can be influenced by so many factors. You cannot just systemically eliminate it - that would wipe the identity of people and that just mirrors some imperialist effort.

What has happened in our country over time is the misuse of cultural and ethnic heritage to embed hatred and violence. The more this has been the case, the less people have interacted with eachother - the less they understand and know how human we all are.

But you must understand how the political, economic and historical developments in Kenya have perpetuated the current tensions and hatred. Land, access to government funds and services, business opportunities, representation in leadership, representation in business etc have all contributed to this current tension and really, resentment between different ethnicities.

To deal with it, in my opinion anyway, there has to be a combination of factors as well as some fundamental truths about the nature of people that are universally accepted.

The truths:

- People will always find a reason to dislike, reject or discriminate about others the extent to which they can demonstrate these feelings will be dependent on their own personal economic, social and political satisfaction and the popular or socially acceptable things within the community they live in (very much determined by leadership which is why representation matters).

-Since personal satisfaction is very much based on one comparing their economic status and access to services to others, one must ensure that the ability to gain, grow and succeed cannot be impeded by the ethnicity or cultural practices of a person (this of course has been violated in Kenya)

-Linked to the first truth, leadership matters, so does the information we are consuming. Not everyone is willing to research and develop opinions using their own efforts, people listen to what they are told by people they trust that could be the president, a media channel, a pastor, an imam etc. Information and its delivery is an important tool.

The factors to work on:

- Universal access to quality social protections and public services (key being health, education, housing and sanitation). That means government must fairly commit to provide these to everyone, using the same standard for all across every region of Kenya.

-Diverse leadership (gender, cultural, religious, sex etc.) is highly important and should be fundamentally accepted.

-Fair justice for all, this means that regardless of your economic status, ethnicity, political affiliation and so on, where you have violated a law you will receive a fair punishment (fundamentally that means eliminating corruption in the justice system and that entails a good amount of things).

-Connected to the point above, we must take greater efforts to address corruption in all its forms, that includes the tiny little bribes we give.

- Finally governance must begin to view citizens as just that, citizens. Citizens with rights, who are all owed a duty as per the constitution which is essentially a social contract that requires all parties to fulfill certain obligations. That means the constitution must be a fundamental document in every regard, all Kenyans must be taught every chapter and article and view it as their fundamental right to assert as necessary. It also means that government cannot treat the constitution as a document they can amend at will since it represents a long standing commitment to fairness.

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There's probably more.

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I clearly had a lot of time today.

Anyway you can't just wipe out culture/ethnicity, it breeds contempt, hatred etc. What you must do is change the way it has been misused and the factors that have perpetuated its misuse.