"Buy me Dinner"

After two solid weeks reading case-files filled with raw accounts of police abuse of power, tonight I had an up-close and personal experience with corruption myself. I was returning home from a wonderful evening spent with my new roommate and her girlfriend. We went rock climbing at a local bazar called Diamond Plaza. After rock climbing, we enjoyed an amazing meal of Indian food and some great conversation. Driving home, we decided to stop for ice cream cones. Overall, it was an extremely pleasant evening, one so familiar to any good Friday night enjoyed back home. As I've written before, Nairobi is developing at a quick pace, and with indoor rock climbing and late night soft serve joints, it's easy to forget where you are. On the way out of the little plaza with the ice cream shop, my new friend forgot to switch her headlights on. Before we even pull onto the road, we are waived over by two uniformed policeman, both armed with AK-47s. My friend, although American, has spent most of her life in Kenya and she greets the police in Swahili, trying to determine why they've pulled us over. The cop informs her she is driving without her headlights on and says she has violated the traffic code.

In Kenya, the police do not give out written citations for traffic offenses. If you violate the traffic code, you go down to the police station to sort out your citation—an ordeal which can take hours. The cop knows we don't want to go through that, and after a few moments it becomes clear he expects us to “settle it here.” Now, I have never been confronted with a situation like this, but my friend has handled several. I'm in the back seat not knowing what to do, but she manages the situation like a pro and insists she only wants to do what's right. After pressing her a bit using vague terms that an inexperienced person in Kenya might take as perhaps the way a traffic violation is handled, it becomes clear this office is simply looking for a bribe. He tells us we can go if we buy him dinner. My friend insists that if she must go to the police station she will, but she is not giving him any money. Eventually, after several rounds of this, he lets us go. 

I was thoroughly delighted with the way my friend handled the situation. She was respectful to his position, but not to his demand. She used humor and a feigned naïveté which kept the police man off guard but in good spirits. She stood her ground, but allowed him to feel in control of the situation. She smartly prolonged the conversation and the length of the encounter in hopes the policeman would lose interest in a fruitless endeavor, and that's how it went. She handled the whole thing with grace and poise. It was truly impressive. 

I, on the other hand, was seething inside. I was so angry that this man would use his authority in such a base and corrupt manner. I had a good look at this guy as he leaned in our car, so confident in his ability to control us. The tone of his voice oozed the subtle violence of abusive power. “You broke the law, judge yourself,” he says. It's this arrogant self assurance that his station and his AK are all he needs to get what he wants. I was disgusted, but grateful that I was not the one doing the talking and that while it was unnerving, it was short lived. I wanted to say to him, “Either fine us or let us go, but we are not paying you anything....and you ought to be ashamed of yourself...you're supposed to protect and serve the people not coerce them into giving you money.” I don't know how well that would have worked out. Thankfully I had the sense to stay quiet while my friend masterfully handled the situation.

Earlier I wrote that I had almost forgotten where I was, and that makes me think about a lot. First I think about home and just how easy it is to take for granted the wonderfully simple, yet globally rare, concept of safety. Safety to enjoy a Friday night with friends and loved ones, free from the threat of violence in all its forms. Safety is always relative, but at times, back home, I've been sitting in a park, or walking down State Street, and I think to myself, “The last thing on anyone's mind right now is the thought that they could be victims of violence. Their minds are filled with a million things, but the idea that this peace could be shattered is not one of them.” What a glorious gift we have in safety. It frees us to experience the simple pleasures of community and allows joy to flourish in our interactions.

On the other hand, that leads me to think about another thing, my offense. Why am I offended by the officer's demand? Why do I have such a visceral reaction to this relatively insignificant injustice? As a middle-class white American, my experience with law enforcement back home is much different than, say, a poor black American. My sense of injustice at me being the victim this first time might be comical to some of the blacks I've known who have experienced racial profiling and actual physical police abuse multiple times throughout their life. But does my unfamiliarity with police corruption necessarily lessen the injustice I feel when confronted with just this brief encounter? I'm not shouting out “Poor me, poor me, I'm a victim!” No, I'm describing what my first personal taste of injustice felt like. And where does that sense come from? Why is it that this action was wrong? In an age of moral relativism, is it not so plainly clear that when a person uses the power given to them by the state—with its monopoly on violence—to extract personal gain from a citizen, such an act is wrong? I think it is. I think that even though it would be so simple to do, to hand this guy what would only be a few dollars so he can buy dinner, would be to acquiesce to evil. 

I read all day long about police who don't just let the folks go after they hit them up for a bribe. No, when these extremely poor folks cannot pay, they become the victims of the most grievous forms of violence. Beaten. Raped. Killed. All because they are poor. All because the police can. Although we could have suffered a lot more than just a few awkward moments, a car full of white Westerners is not exactly low profile for a police officer to push his luck on getting a bribe. However, when I read the files of IJM clients, they don't get such a benefit. I have no idea on how to go about fixing a problem like this. I do know that the only way to start fixing it is by confronting it. That's what IJM does, and that's yet another reason I'm proud to be here doing the work I do.