Impunity is exception from pain
What you need to know:
That “punity” may once have been in use is suggested by the adjective punitive, which, my dictionary says, means “…relating to, involving or with the intention of inflicting punishment…”
Part of the word “punishment” indicates that the adjective punitive and the verb to punish are etymologically related.
The “im” element in the noun “impunity” implies that this is the negation of a grammatically positive word. If “punity” existed, it would refer to the punishment, recrimination or other form of pain you may suffer for an offence.
SOCIAL PURPOSE
That “punity” may once have been in use is suggested by the adjective punitive, which, my dictionary says, means “…relating to, involving or with the intention of inflicting punishment…” Part of the word “punishment” indicates that the adjective punitive and the verb to punish are etymologically related.
Both come from the Old French infinitive punir and participle puni(t), which, for their part, are derived from the Latin verb punir (“to punish”). In its turn, punire comes from the noun poena.
Those linguistically alert can already see where we are headed. For poena is also what has given us the word penalty. In that case, it is what is responsible – at least etymologically – for all of our world’s “penal codes”. Literally, a penal code is a “code of punishment”. More ideally, it is a “code of chastisement”. For its theoretical social purpose is to reform, not to destroy, the culprit. In my opinion, then, crime et chatiment — the French translation of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s title – is more accurate than the English crime and punishment.
Secondly, it affirms that, while some punishments are purposeful and subjective, others are purely objective.
NATURAL HARSHNESS
The subjective kind includes the punishment that a teacher may impose on a pupil or a parent on a child for a crime or some other misdemeanour.
The objective kind imposes itself purely from the given circumstances. Even if nobody ever stirred to inflict any mental or bodily injury on Mwai Kibaki, to be the President of an extremely unruly country like Kenya would still be punitive. Here, there is no intention. The task punishes you merely by its natural harshness or by your over-exertion to discharge. It taxes you beyond measure.
It so tires your body and mind that you may need close medical attention regularly. Whenever you romp into State House after an election, you may expect to undergo a great deal of “punity”. It is only from those tasks which do not punish you in this way that you may be said to escape with impunity”. Here the impunity is objective only. It is not a result of dereliction of duty by those in charge of the legal instrument.
LEGALLY SANCTIONED
What Kenyans are more interested in is subjective impunity, which means legal or socially sanctioned immunity or exemption from any painful consequence for an offence; or official and often criminal neglect of the “due process” against a certain class of offenders.
Again there is an etymological link. Pain itself comes via the French peine from the Latin poena. Pain is the poena -- the penaly, the punishment -- for your offence. For instance, the law forbids murder “on pain of death”. But in that pain, were I a constitution-maker, I would include all those responsible for Kenya’s official impunity.
The writer is a veteran editor.
