There is nothing to choose between Raila and Uhuru
This is an election year and looking at the situation, all bets are off. We have to cross the elections river again even when wahenga said you cannot cross the same river twice. The river may be different but the water flowing in it has gone round the hydrological cycle into the same political river valley.
The lie of the land of Kenya is the over rated politics and politicians. This obsession is good and bad, good for checks and balances on the political class and bad as it takes social capital from other equally important aspects of Kenya. Compounded with our love for drama, we tend to fall for political actors and comedians.
Looking at two leaders- Raila Odinga and Uhuru Kenyatta who seem to have a vice grip on the psyche of their communities. People are shocked at Raila’s hold on the Luo, but recently Uhuru has risen to almost the same level in the Kikuyu nation. I have picked these two leaders because they come from two ‘politically hostile’ communities.
Let us look at Raila- I don’t buy the talk that he has never been in government that is why he has never helped Luos. His father built Nyanza General Hospital through his personal connections with Russians. Tom Mboya had the student airlifting programme from his connections with the West (Kennedy's to be specific). Raila has connections all over the world yet he has never used them to uplift the welfare of Luos. I do not expect much from his presidency for his fanatical Luos.
Uhuru is one of the wealthiest men in Africa. His sister Christina said that he was not born with a silver spoon in his mouth- then it must be a golden one. His family owns large tracts of land almost the size of Nyanza Province. The people in IDP camps who believe in his leadership are from his community. He can work out a formula for settling this people in parts of the land and get returns from them or the government.
The Luo lag behind in development mainly because of the ignored girl child and un-empowered women folk. There is no rallying call from Raila to change this trend, yet men circumcised themselves because ‘baba’ said. Imagine if he rallied Luos behind a social development agenda like saving and investing in a community bank? HIV/AIDS is causing havoc to the Luo community, yet the leaders who must abide by Raila’s word care less.
Romour has linked Uhuru to Mungiki since 2002; these are young jobless men in need of a source of income. Imagine Uhuru giving them some land and/or loans for them to raise dairy cows for milk supply to his Brookside Dairies? What idea or initiative has he ever initiated to solve the Mungiki problem in Central Kenya? Alcohol is breaking down the social fabric in Central Kenya yet the leader(s) are more concerned about votes than the voters.
I have reasons to believe that the common Luo and Kikuyu nationals have put their eggs in baskets that will not give them commensurate returns. These leaders can do a lot for their poor followers; we saw what Raphael Tuju did as a mere minister and what Peter Kenneth has done with CDF. The problem is Kenyans will always rally behind people who take them for a ride. Uhuru and Raila are good politicians but average leaders and managers. The healthiest meal doesn’t appeal to the eye while the best king sits far from the throne.
They are our leaders for this season- we can go ahead and vote for them. Never the less they are not worth killing someone or dying for. They are just men with strengths and weaknesses, other leaders will still rise to take over from them and even do better.
Politics is about people’s perceptions, maybe I expect too much (great expectations may give birth to frustrations) or I am a wet blanket. I just ask hard questions, because we have to make extra ordinary decisions if we expect extra ordinary results.
Lest we complain tomorrow, yet we have a chance today. People will still get the leaders they deserve.
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