The clown of Kenya’s politics

By JULIUS SIGEI juliussigei@gmail.com
Posted  Saturday, May 14 2011 at 22:30

His outbursts, though sometimes stinging, often provide comic relief at tense political rallies and funerals.

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For this, Lands assistant minister Sylvester Bifwoli Wakoli, 59, is a prized subject of satire on television stations.

One of the 43 MPs who accompanied the Ocampo Six last month to their initial appearance at Pre-Trial Chamber Two at The Hague-based International Criminal Court, Mr Wakoli is said to have alarmed his colleagues when he disappeared for almost the entire time they were in The Netherlands.

When he was later traced to Amsterdam, Mr Wakoli wondered why the worry and quipped in his jocular manner that a man must discover places.

He said he had gone to see his nephew. But some of his colleagues say that visit may not have been the whole story.

When asked what the trip to The Hague had achieved, he countered: “What do you hope to achieve when you attend a funeral to commiserate with your friends?”

And talking of funerals, the soft-hearted MP spends, by his own admission, a whopping Sh300,000 on burial ceremonies in his constituency every month.

At one time during the Ninth Parliament, he wailed, dirge-like, in the hallowed precincts of Parliament to the consternation of the country.

“I had differed with the then Vice-President Moody Awori, and as a teacher I knew the only way to catch the attention of the world was to wail,” he told the Sunday Nation in an interview.

The MP, who has declared interest in the presidency, says that if he wins, one of his priorities would be to legalise busaa, a traditional brew.

He once told a rally: “Unajua sisi wabunge na shetani ni kitu kimoja. Tunafanya nyinyi wananchi mpigane lakini tukirudi huko bunge tunakula pamoja. Sasa kati yetu na nyinyi nani ako na kichwa mbaya? (We MPs and the devil have similar characteristics. We make you fight, but when we retreat to Parliament, we dine together. Now between you and us who are nutcases?)

And during the debate leading to the referendum on the new Constitution last year, he dismissed the naysayers who were claiming the document would have legalised gay marriages by asking: “If that is the case, and I offer myself for marriage, who will take Wakoli?”

Before the laughter died down, Medical Services minister Anyang’ Nyong’o responded to more laughter that he would.

At one time in his characteristically shrill voice, Mr Wakoli rhetorically asked President Kibaki whether his Bumula constituency, which borders Uganda, was in Kenya or the neighbouring country, noting that it had been sidelined in terms of infrastructural development.

“Bumula haina lami. Bumula haina maji. Bumula haina stima. Je, Bumula iko Kenya au iko Uganda? (Bumula does not have tarmac roads, piped water nor electricity; is it in Kenya or Uganda?)

He says his challenge to the President paid off and that today more than half the trading centres and schools in the constituency are connected to the national electricity grid.

“Indeed, I have written to the Kenya Rural Electrification Authority to thank them,” he said, but adding that roads and water remain a challenge.

The down-to-earth leader keeps over 300 indigenous chickens. Of them he says: “An exotic hen does not lay two eggs in a day. Why go into extra expenses just because you want to show you are a mzungu?”

One of the few MPs in Western Province elected from outside ODM, he has lately been seen with the political grouping coalescing around Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta, Eldoret North MP William Ruto and his Saboti counterpart Eugene Wamalwa.

Asked where that leaves him given that Mr Wamalwa seems to be the face of the so-called G-7 alliance in Western, he says he is his own man and not part of the alliance.

“But being a presidential contender does not mean you see your competitors as enemies. I go to their meetings simply because there are crowds there. I have also been attending Prime Minister Raila Odinga’s rallies and reminding him that Wakoli, too, is in the race.”

Perhaps aware that his presidential bid has been dismissed by some as a joke, he says without prodding: “My quest for this country’s presidency is very serious. I am currently writing my manifesto and will launch it in September.”

Asked whether he had the financial muscle to mount a campaign of such magnitude, he says he does not need money to campaign. “Indeed I am running to prove that it is possible to divorce money from running for elective offices,” he says.

A close relative of the MP says his known property are parcels of land in Kimaeti and Musakasa in Bumula; another in Sirisia as well as a house in Kanduyi which he built on a plot he bought when he was a teacher.

But what he lacks in property is compensated by the success of his children who among them are two lawyers, a doctor, an accountant and several other professionals. A number are said to have attained straight As in national examinations.

Although his wife told a television station recently that they have nine children, the MP insists there are more.

“I have 12 children. What you heard my wife talking about on TV are her own. The other three are from a marriage that did not work. Do you want me to deny them?” he asked.

Cherangany MP Joshua Kutuny says Bifwoli Wakoli is a brand name and whether he is taken seriously or not, he has his own space.

“He fits in the politics of Western Kenya which abhors sophistication and rewards simplicity.”

“There are certain things which are best put by Wakoli, and his presence in our rallies is a big boost,” he adds.

At the recent Eldoret Agricultural Society of Kenya show, Mr Wakoli charged: “Last time I told them PNU was the party to support, and they did not listen to me. Now I am happy they have come back crying.”

Narok University College lecturer Solomon Waliaula said the MP’s mannerisms resonate well with his constituency which he called the melting pot of Bukusu culture.

“Okay, Bumula is a land of contrasts. On the one hand it is home to one of the highest numbers of professors in Western Province, and on the other it is the cradle of the Bukusu culture.

“Wakoli eschews the latter. This explains his obsession with funerals, which are taken very seriously in the region,” said Mr Waliaula.

Despite his famed generous contribution at funerals, some of his constituents accuse him of being stingy during fundraising events, claiming Sh1,000 is his standard donation.

Ken Wafula, the chairman of the National Council of Non-Governmental Organisations, says of the MP: “He is very humble. He eats the foods of his constituents; he speaks their language and dresses like them.”

He said that while he was not sure about the ability of the MP to mount a serious presidential campaign, he was certainly the man to watch at the constituency and county level.

So when did this political bug bite him? “It was while training as P1 teacher at Kaimosi Teachers’ Training College in 1973 that my colleagues, who included Archbishop Eliud Wabukhala of the Anglican Church, told me I was in the wrong place. I was critical and frank with the college administration, and they thought I should go into politics,” he said.

“He was fearlessly outspoken against any unjust actions on students,” remembers Archbishop Wabukhala.

Mr Bifwoli was to embrace chalk for the next 28 years albeit with the bigger chunk of this time being in Kenya National Union of Teachers politics.

“I was elected unopposed to most of these positions. As a member of the Knut National Executive Committee, I worked closely with the doyen of teachers’ politics in Kenya the late Ambrose Adeya Adongo from whom I learnt a lot,” said the former History and Christian Religious Education teacher rose through the ranks to become the Bungoma Knut executive secretary for two consecutive terms.

He won the Bumula parliamentary seat in 2002 in his first attempt. What are the secrets of his campaigns that saw his comfortable re-election in the face of the ODM euphoria in the region?

“Even as he enthrals voters with his comedy, he is also a grassroots mobiliser who uses door-to-door campaigns to woo voters. He never misses a weekend without visiting the constituency (when he is in the country),” said Fred Masinde, a farmer from Kimaeti.

“He is also very open in his handling of the Constituency Development Fund. He distributes the money equally among the 10 locations, and he has done a lot in modernising schools.”

A man of humble educational background, Mr Wakoli went on to study for a Diploma in Business Administration from the University of Nairobi and an Advanced Diploma in Business Management from Cambridge University, which he attained in 2003.