Most Kenyans think that political elections are not much different from the elections they may have had in primary school to elect a class monitor. How laughable.
I see it in the numerous cocky but extremely naïve comments both here in this blog and social media. Apparently we have a new generation of young Kenyans who know everything, especially the ones who have made a little cash from some corrupt government tender deals.
It was former influential AG Charles Njonjo who remarked as he was going down that politics is a very dirty game. Most Kenyans dismissed the statement as sour grapes, however the truth is that the man was coming to this realization rather late in his brief political career. Njonjo is a man who has his suits flown out to the UK to be dry cleaned at Saville Row. Despite his slight Kikuyu accent the man must have some pure English blood flowing through his veins, the way he behaves. The fact that he wielded immense power both during the Kenyatta and Moi days probably made him think that he was above petty politics. He was of course wrong.
Njonjo and Mwai Kibaki have always been bitter enemies despite the fact that they both served in the same cabinet for many years. However Kibaki made exactly the same mistake and has paid for it with a troubled presidency where he has to reach out for spin doctors to tell the people what he has achieved when his achievements are actually supposed to be doing the talking for him. The truth is that the president has only delivered 10 per cent of what he was capable of.
Admittedly it did not help that he hardly ever gets out of bed before 11am meaning that almost half the day is already gone. But even then Kibaki came into office with many good ideas that would have revolutionized and impacted Kenyan lives positively. This is why it is very sad that his was a presidency of under-achievement. The chief reason was simply because he thought the presidency was an office that was above politics and mostly petty politics at that.
The truth is that politics is a very dirty game indeed and a lot of the politicking is usually petty but deadly.
Let’s go back a little in time to elaborate this key point of this post. There was a leader of a nation called King Saul and one day as he rode into town with his trusted soldier called David Jesse, the women broke into songs of praise for the two men. That is where the trouble started. The King must have felt that it was wrong for his majesty to be included in songs of praise being sung for a commoner. Matters were made worse when the women (probably carried away by David’s looks, because we are told he was extremely handsome) started singing in their song that King Saul killed thousands and David killed tens of thousands. From that day the King did everything in his power to assassinate the young boy called David Jesse.
Human nature has not changed thousands of years later.
There was a leader of a nation called President Moi who went on a trip to the United States. At one point during that trip his American hosts remarked that his polished foreign minister, Robert Ouko would have made a better president of Kenya than him. (Why is it that Americans still want to measure people’s intelligence from how eloquent they are in English?). A few days later Dr Robert Ouko was dead. The mystery of his death has never been officially solved to this day.
And I can go on and on.
My point is that even as we analyze our politics let us never forget that the world over this is indeed a very ugly game (if you want to even call it a game).
To be continued. Next post: Examples of dirty politics in this election.
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Tuesday, January 15, 2013
Friday, January 11, 2013
Is this what Uhuru and Ruto are really up to?
Guest post by Joe (You can visit Joe's blog to see other articles)
I am not one who sees into the future and neither do I profess to be a soothsayer, a tea leaves reader, a clairvoyant or a Mayan! I do not know how to read palms, or shells, or the dregs of your coffee and neither do I commune with witches, wizards or anything ‘shetani’. In other words I am not a political commentator or an armchair politico, whatever that means. I use my mirror on the wall into the world.
My mirror on the wall tells me that politicians are a very clever though devious lot. They are very good at manipulating the status quo so that they come out as projecting a larger than life persona, a mythical god like image that they can then use to bargain at the table of power. My mirror tells me that Uhuru & Ruto and their Jubilee alliance are just such clever politicians, who have managed to imbue in their followers this god like status and larger than life persona. They have a fanatical almost suicidal following among their tribesmen and that they command great political power is not in doubt. The Kikuyu will almost certainly to the last man vote for Uhuru while Ruto promises to bring a mountain of votes to the ballot paper for Uhuru through his Kalenjin community.
Now these two fellows are very clever and therefore they are not foolish. They know that with the ICC cases hanging over their heads like the guillotine of old, Kenya will be in extremely dire circumstances should they be elected as president and deputy president respectively. They are astute businessmen in their own rights who own either directly or through numerous proxies some of the most profitable businesses across Kenya as well as tracts of land the size of small countries. They are in businesses which rely on the international perception of Kenya including tourism, banking, insurance, real estate, insurance, dairy farming, minerals etc and it would be foolish for them to jeopardize these businesses once elected to the highest offices in the land. Their businesses must also have also lost massively after the last fracas in 2007.
My submission therefore is that they have everything to lose if they are elected and that they are now merely running a campaign not to be elected but to entrench their positions amongst their communities so as to obtain respectable representation in parliament, the senate and other leadership positions for their rank and file so that while they may not be in government, they have the numbers to insist on their pre-election coalitions being honored to some extent even with another as president. Without these two at the apex of the Jubilee alliance, many senatorial, gubernatorial, parliamentary and other political candidates will not see the doors of the offices they aspire to occupy and that is why Uhuru & Ruto have been held hostage by these political wannabes who know that without their masters, they will get nowhere. Uhuru & Ruto badly need to be on the ballot paper as they have all along insisted but this will be merely to pander to the egos of their respective communities who want to hear nothing else other than their ‘man’ being on the presidential ballot paper.
They are therefore campaigning to lose as can be seen from the many shenanigans being played around surrounding some senior government officials, the devil and the other alliances, which are all calculated to ensure that however you look at the numbers the CORD Alliance will most likely win the next general elections, with Raila Odinga, warts and all, as the next president of Kenya and at the first ballot.
If you observe keenly, Raila has been playing a very conciliatory game including promising to fight to have the ICC trails brought to Kenya for the sake of Uhuru & Ruto and imploring Mudavadi to rejoin ODM (and CORD by extension) because this is part of the lose-lose strategy of Uhuru & Ruto’s joint presidential bid so that they get a soft landing under Raila Odinga’s presidency (assuming he sticks to his promises) as well as almost guaranteeing Mudavadi whose penchant for getting himself check mated while all along he was holding a commanding edge over his opponents is legendary, a good position in his administration. After all you would rather have a reluctant homeboy on your side and rooting for you and not on the other side barking and letting all and sundry know your dirty little secrets!! If by some miracle Raila was to succeed in bringing the ICC cases to Kenya, then Uhuru and Ruto will be suitably chastised and avoid making a nuisance of themselves in front of the benevolent Raila.
Uhuru & Ruto are now firmly in the barrel already in the river and moving with the high current at breakneck speed towards the elections waterfall and not knowing how to get off without hurting themselves. They have built the barrel and they must now ride it to its inevitable conclusion. Unfortunately, they will never accept that they are not in in for the long haul, because they know that the country will be ungovernable under their rule as well as the fact that Kenya will lose all forward momentum and economic growth and go the way of North Korea forever shunned and vilified by the international community and struggling to meet the basic need of its people.........and their businesses will all but collapse leaving hundreds jobless and destitute and the ensuing multiplier effect leading to complete economic collapse of the economy.
As I said before I do not see into the future but rely on my mirror into the world, but if I was a pragmatic man in the shoes of the duo, Uhuru & Ruto, I would do what is best for my country but still be seen to be putting up a semblance of a fight so that my supporters remain convinced that I am in it for the long run and that I still retain my status as king maker but I would 'throw' the election.
Whether guilty or innocent after my trail with the ICC my stature as a nationalist would be on the upswing giving me a better chance at the highest office in the land once free of the shackles of the Hague.
My mirror has spoken!!
You are also bound to enjoy reading...
Just how clean is Mr. Safi Kama Pamba Peter Kenneth?
Is Uhuru Kenyatta a drunkard?
What is it that leading Presidential candidates in 2013 don't want you to know?
Kibaki laughs at pretender MPs praising his rule
Cashing in on Uhuru's troubles
Where it all started Uhuru's secret deal with Kibaki in 2007
I am not one who sees into the future and neither do I profess to be a soothsayer, a tea leaves reader, a clairvoyant or a Mayan! I do not know how to read palms, or shells, or the dregs of your coffee and neither do I commune with witches, wizards or anything ‘shetani’. In other words I am not a political commentator or an armchair politico, whatever that means. I use my mirror on the wall into the world.
My mirror on the wall tells me that politicians are a very clever though devious lot. They are very good at manipulating the status quo so that they come out as projecting a larger than life persona, a mythical god like image that they can then use to bargain at the table of power. My mirror tells me that Uhuru & Ruto and their Jubilee alliance are just such clever politicians, who have managed to imbue in their followers this god like status and larger than life persona. They have a fanatical almost suicidal following among their tribesmen and that they command great political power is not in doubt. The Kikuyu will almost certainly to the last man vote for Uhuru while Ruto promises to bring a mountain of votes to the ballot paper for Uhuru through his Kalenjin community.
Now these two fellows are very clever and therefore they are not foolish. They know that with the ICC cases hanging over their heads like the guillotine of old, Kenya will be in extremely dire circumstances should they be elected as president and deputy president respectively. They are astute businessmen in their own rights who own either directly or through numerous proxies some of the most profitable businesses across Kenya as well as tracts of land the size of small countries. They are in businesses which rely on the international perception of Kenya including tourism, banking, insurance, real estate, insurance, dairy farming, minerals etc and it would be foolish for them to jeopardize these businesses once elected to the highest offices in the land. Their businesses must also have also lost massively after the last fracas in 2007.
My submission therefore is that they have everything to lose if they are elected and that they are now merely running a campaign not to be elected but to entrench their positions amongst their communities so as to obtain respectable representation in parliament, the senate and other leadership positions for their rank and file so that while they may not be in government, they have the numbers to insist on their pre-election coalitions being honored to some extent even with another as president. Without these two at the apex of the Jubilee alliance, many senatorial, gubernatorial, parliamentary and other political candidates will not see the doors of the offices they aspire to occupy and that is why Uhuru & Ruto have been held hostage by these political wannabes who know that without their masters, they will get nowhere. Uhuru & Ruto badly need to be on the ballot paper as they have all along insisted but this will be merely to pander to the egos of their respective communities who want to hear nothing else other than their ‘man’ being on the presidential ballot paper.
They are therefore campaigning to lose as can be seen from the many shenanigans being played around surrounding some senior government officials, the devil and the other alliances, which are all calculated to ensure that however you look at the numbers the CORD Alliance will most likely win the next general elections, with Raila Odinga, warts and all, as the next president of Kenya and at the first ballot.
If you observe keenly, Raila has been playing a very conciliatory game including promising to fight to have the ICC trails brought to Kenya for the sake of Uhuru & Ruto and imploring Mudavadi to rejoin ODM (and CORD by extension) because this is part of the lose-lose strategy of Uhuru & Ruto’s joint presidential bid so that they get a soft landing under Raila Odinga’s presidency (assuming he sticks to his promises) as well as almost guaranteeing Mudavadi whose penchant for getting himself check mated while all along he was holding a commanding edge over his opponents is legendary, a good position in his administration. After all you would rather have a reluctant homeboy on your side and rooting for you and not on the other side barking and letting all and sundry know your dirty little secrets!! If by some miracle Raila was to succeed in bringing the ICC cases to Kenya, then Uhuru and Ruto will be suitably chastised and avoid making a nuisance of themselves in front of the benevolent Raila.
Uhuru & Ruto are now firmly in the barrel already in the river and moving with the high current at breakneck speed towards the elections waterfall and not knowing how to get off without hurting themselves. They have built the barrel and they must now ride it to its inevitable conclusion. Unfortunately, they will never accept that they are not in in for the long haul, because they know that the country will be ungovernable under their rule as well as the fact that Kenya will lose all forward momentum and economic growth and go the way of North Korea forever shunned and vilified by the international community and struggling to meet the basic need of its people.........and their businesses will all but collapse leaving hundreds jobless and destitute and the ensuing multiplier effect leading to complete economic collapse of the economy.
As I said before I do not see into the future but rely on my mirror into the world, but if I was a pragmatic man in the shoes of the duo, Uhuru & Ruto, I would do what is best for my country but still be seen to be putting up a semblance of a fight so that my supporters remain convinced that I am in it for the long run and that I still retain my status as king maker but I would 'throw' the election.
Whether guilty or innocent after my trail with the ICC my stature as a nationalist would be on the upswing giving me a better chance at the highest office in the land once free of the shackles of the Hague.
My mirror has spoken!!
You are also bound to enjoy reading...
Just how clean is Mr. Safi Kama Pamba Peter Kenneth?
Is Uhuru Kenyatta a drunkard?
What is it that leading Presidential candidates in 2013 don't want you to know?
Kibaki laughs at pretender MPs praising his rule
Cashing in on Uhuru's troubles
Where it all started Uhuru's secret deal with Kibaki in 2007
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