RAILA ODINGA IN TROUBLED POLITICAL WATERS

By Jerry Okungu
Nairobi, Kenya
March 10, 2009

The sounds of war drums are all over the place. Rift Valley warlords are spoiling for a fight. Central Province is beating its chest, being urged on by Eastern Province. Nyanza is biting its nails and cursing once more as Western Kenya watches the developments carefully.

The peaceful coastal region, volatile North Eastern and Nairobi Provinces are waiting on the wings to see which direction the wind blows.
In all this familiar drama of Kenyan politics; one thing is for sure, that the hounds are baying for the blood of one Raila Odinga.

Raila Odinga must be ready to pay the price of always rehabilitating the vanquished. Now the people he extended a hand of friendship to when they were down are up in arms against him. He is the common enemy every one seems to have, either in his own party or outside.

When he decided that corrupt KANU officials under the Moi regime should not be prosecuted, he made a fatal mistake. When he restrained Kiraitu Murungi from pursuing Moi and all to recover Golden Berg cash and other economic crimes, he made a grave mistake he will live to regret. He allowed impunity to take root and flourish in Kenya. Now the same people are up against him.

Forget Mwai Kibaki’s legacy. Forget Martha Karua’s pronouncements about the 2012 elections. Forget the constitution review and all those high sounding meaningless phrases. Our politics is not interested in those invisible reform agenda. The real picture is beginning to form around Raila Odinga. He is the real prize that all the hunters are aiming at. And they have many reasons for aiming their arrows at him. Yes, he has been a pain in their necks since 1982.

Chances are higher that Kenya will soon be ungovernable by the present coalition. One way or another, Kibaki will be forced to dissolve Parliament in another 12 months or less.

The hounds rocking the coalition boat are former KANU stalwarts that were scattered to the four corners of Kenya when Raila Odinga’s tsunami entered the political scene in early 1998 with his National Democratic Party outfit. That was the party that Raila used to entice Moi and finally dismantled KANU five years later. That was soon after the then KANU Secretary General had prophesied that KANU would rule Kenya for 100 years.

By the look of things; it would appear like Kamotho’s prophesy will be fulfilled in his lifetime because KANU is about to come back to power with a bang after a 10 year sabbatical under Kibaki ; which in reality was never a break.
Look at it this way; in the present cabinet we have 21 out of 41 former KANU stalwarts serving under Kibaki.

Most of them were senior cabinet ministers in the last Moi government while others served Moi in senior government positions as permanent secretaries, personal secretaries or his lawyers. Of these 21 former KANU ministers 12 of them were actually appointed by Raila Odinga in the present cabinet.

This means that of the 20 ministries assigned to ODM, 60% of them are former KANU stalwarts. This is the group that has come together and formed a faction within the ODM to scuttle Raila Odinga’s future political plans.

These KANU members in ODM have nothing to lose if Raila Odinga walks out of the coalition now or loses the presidency again in 2012. They have no tears for the man who has told them to their faces that the 1982 coupe attempt was justified because Kenyans were fighting a dictatorship.

They have no tears to shed for a man who gave them sleepless nights in 2002 and caused KANU its first defeat in 40 years. They are awaiting payback time for the humiliation Raila Odinga gave them in 2002. And they are many who have an axe to grind with him.

To begin with, a lot of these characters never wanted Raila in KANU in 2002 when Moi was hell bent on merging KANU with Raila’s NDP. That merger saw then KANU Secretary General JJ Kamotho and Vice President George Saitoti lose their top KANU posts to new comers Raila Odinga and Uhuru Kenyatta as KANU Secretary General and First Party Vice Chairman respectively.

That alliance with Moi hardly lasted three months when Raila bolted out of KANU to form a loose movement called the Rainbow Coalition. That was after Moi had employed his usual dictatorial tactics to impose Uhuru Kenyatta as his successor without the due process of internal competition. That decision alone angered so many hopefuls that included Raila Odinga, George Saitoti, Kalonzo Musyoka, Musalia Mudavadi and Katana Ngala. All of them, including Moody Awori, William Ole Ntimama and Fred Gumo followed Raila Odinga to form a KANU faction then known as the Rainbow Coalition.

In bolting out of KANU in late 2002, he harvested more than he had brought in. His ability to convince KANU old guards to abandon Moi was unprecedented. The feat left Moi vulnerable and confused. This is the group that teamed up with Kibaki’s outfit to hand Moi and KANU its first defeat.

Uhuru is angry that Raila denied him the presidency that Moi had promised him in 2002. George Saitoti has never forgiven Raila Odinga for overlooking him and instead declaring Kibaki tosha at a rally in 2002 that was to finally put Kibaki in State House. That feeling is shared by Simeon Nyachae who also felt he was the right choice for the Rainbow Coalition that year.

Moi and his sons are angry with Raila for humiliating them a second time in 2007 when all his three sons lost the elections to ODM. Moi has not come to terms with the fact that the entire Rift Valley turned against him and voted for Raila’s party. In fact all those Moi faithfuls who lost elections are looking to the day William Ruto and others will turn against Raila and cost him his political career. They are itching to have the last laugh.

More importantly, Moi has a permanent grudge with Raila Odinga for allegedly having been the mastermind of the 1982 failed coupe; a role that Raila has never denied.
That was the first time Moi felt a real threat to his four-year old presidency. That was the day the Kenya Air Force ruled Kenya under Private Ochuka for at least ten hours before the uprising was quelled.

The reason Raila Odinga must change tact, go back to the drawing board and revise his political operating manual is because a lot of these people now ganging up against him have been his faithful and keen students. They have mastered the art of political acrobatics to stay afloat just like Raila Odinga.

They have realized that to deal with Raila Odinga on a level playing field; one must have a fanatical primary constituency. That constituency must be the tribe to be used as the spring board and bargaining chip with other tribal leaders. That primary constituency is what kept Jaramogi in the limelight for forty years despite his woes with the Kenyatta and Moi regimes. It is the same constituency that propelled Matiba to the lime light and kept him there until his health could not allow him to continue his political activities. It is the same constituency that sustained Kibaki during the 2007 campaigns. That is the constituency that is now up for grabs that Uhuru Kenyatta and Martha Karua are fighting over.

For many years, Rift Valley was Moi’s primary constituency. He held onto it until 2007 when William Ruto fought hard and dislodged him from it. And for all practical purposes; Ruto intends to keep it as the only means of forcing other tribal kings to the negotiating table. As long as Ruto knows that Rift Valley MPs can continue to eat from his palms; he can decide to talk tough and negotiate meaningfully.

Then there is this new phenomenon in our Kenyan politics. It is the coalition phenomenon that has made it very difficult for a single tribe, no matter how large to win an election. Kikuyus, Luos, Luhyas or Kalenjins alone have no chance in a million in putting their son or daughter into the State House. The moment other tribes realize that a single tribe is trying to monopolize the political landscape; they readily gang up against it.

This horse trading among tribal political warlords is what is eroding merit and competence in Kenyan politics. Kenyans may never choose a competent and visionary leader as long as they are captive to their tribal chiefs no matter how corrupt and incompetent those chiefs are.

Meanwhile, as upheavals and tantrums are being thrown about inside ODM boardrooms, other forces equally angry with Raila like Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka are waiting in the wings with baited breath to see if the enigma of Kenyan politics will finally be cut to size.

Whether he loses this looming battle or not is the subject of a future story. But one thing is for sure; Raila Amolo Oginga will give them the fight of their lifetime.

jerryokungu@gmail.com