LAST WORD behaviors including smoking weed and a lethal local brew ...
Mephisto would waylay Ochieng at different points along the way and spring out of hiding and Ochieng would instinctively freeze in terror . Mephisto would stare him down for a minute or so , break into laughter and proceed to ‘ escort ’ the ‘ professor ’ to school . It was a nerve wracking experience .
Mephisto never actually ever hit Ochieng but the ever present threat of a beating was what kept Ochieng unhinged and seemed to give Mephisto some exquisite pleasure as he seemed to relish planning and executing his shock treatments .
The psychological warfare would not end on the way to school but would be spread all through during the school day as every sudden movement from Mephisto would send Ochieng and his pals scampering like scared rabbits followed by Mephisto ’ s mocking laughter .
What made this harassment unbearable was Ochieng ’ s inability to take any form of action . Mephisto had not physically abused or even touched him so he could not report him . The threat of violence should he even dare report deterred him from contemplating that route .
The sniggers and pitying looks that Ochieng constantly got from his classmates were even more infuriating as he knew that his mates could neither help him as all of them were equally scared of Mephisto and would not voluntarily cross his path .
What Ochieng finds hard to believe is that that evidently immature and puerile behavior which you would imagine would be discarded as people grow up is still very evident in world affairs and bullying tactics are a governance tool .
If you happen to live in North Korea you would be familiar with the concept . The whole country is a personal fief of an individual and his handpicked lieutenants that run a country by terror tactics that keep the populace unbalanced .
Ironically the official name of North Korea is ‘ The Democratic People ’ s Republic of North Korea ’ and is on record as one of the most repressive countries to live in and is led by
“ The last word is that as unprincipled and disgusting the use of fear is , it has been , is and will continue being a strategy that gains quick traction since there is usually no time to question the allegations which are normally unsupported .”
the authoritarian Kim Jong Un as a hereditary ruler of the county .
The state , with the help of an elaborate and pervasive secret police , determines where one works , how one thinks and what one does . State propaganda is the only point of view that one is expected to hold on the pain of death .
This police state is kept in line with the threat of terror . One can only think the leaders ’ thoughts and any divergent view is swiftly and ruthlessly dealt with to ensure that even imagining a different life fills the citizen dread and anxiety .
The state survives on hero worship . The glorious leader is a god from whom all good things come from and is ever present in the citizen ’ s life . Huge billboards remind the populace of his boundless benevolence and daily rituals of rededication that involve the whole country are enacted daily .
The press is wholly state controlled and the internet which is supposed to turn the world into a village is non-existent in North Korea . The staple news is what the government dishes out and an attempt to find out how the rest of the world lives is a treasonable offence .
Why would a democratic country deny free movement within and without the country ? An attempt to leave the country is equivalent to committing suicide and the handfuls of escapees who have managed to flee the country tell of a life in hell for the citizenry .
The glorious leader does not limit his bullying tactics to within his borders but proceeds to threaten the free world with nuclear attacks since they will not sign weapon proliferation treaties in spite of the many international sanctions that they already face .
Periodically North Korea tests and detonates missiles to remind the world of its nuclear capability . Is this just sheer brinkmanship to keep the world uncertain or does the country actually have a devastating arsenal of nuclear weapons ? The country is so secretive that this is hard to answer .
Periodically the country will have a massive parade where the main display is military capacity but the question still persist on whether the weaponry on display is active or just shells to create a propaganda narrative . North Korea manages to keep the world guessing .
The massive difference between the standards of living of North and South Korea is a poignant pointer to the huge difference that accrues due to the form of governance that a country chooses or the style of governance that is imposed on a country .
North Korea is however not an aberration since extreme types of control have always been the usual choice of government and one just has to recall East Germany which before the unification with Germany described itself as the socialist workers and peasants state .
Similar deterrents were put in place in East Germany including a physical wall to discourage any attempt of socializing or sharing of information . The collapse of the regime is a recent reminder of the perils of the communist agenda which invariably comes with repression .
The total and tight grip that the tin gods of totalitarian states had so fascinated Trump that when he became president he quickly moved to try and convert his cult following into a mindless mass who would depend only on his word as the final truth on anything .
Trump confounded the American people and the international community at large when he actually set up a meeting with the North Korean leader and came out of the meeting full of praise for the despot although he did not actually manage to get any commitment from Kim Jong Un .
MAL 47 / 22 ISSUE 95