By KWENDO OPANGA
Posted Saturday, April 7 2012 at 18:39
Posted Saturday, April 7 2012 at 18:39
IN SUMMARY
- While the Orange party has lost almost all members of its top organ, Kanu leaders cannot even agree to meet
The singing in Mombasa streets ironically in celebration of Mr Najib Balala’s sacking from the Cabinet and the exchange of brickbats between the Mvita MP and Prime Minister Raila Odinga may have helped to mask a bigger problem in the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM).
Conversely, the widening schism between chairman Uhuru Kenyatta and ally Stanley Murathe on the one hand, and deputy chairman Gideon Moi and secretary-general Nick Salat on the other, over failure to convene a meeting of Kanu’s apex organ exposes the rot in the union.
Kanu, the party of independence and Kenya’s most successful electoral outfit, is on its death bed. The situation must be critical, otherwise how can Kanu explain its failure to celebrate its Golden Jubilee on June 11, 2010 and use the occasion to re-invent itself?
As for ODM, the acrimonious fallout between Mr Odinga and Mr Balala leaves Co-operatives minister Joe Nyagah as the only member of the Pentagon––the supreme policy-making instrument––still standing with the party boss where, at the outset (in 2007), there had been five.
Oldest party
There is something seriously wrong when the leadership of the country’s oldest political party cannot bring itself to call its most important policy instrument to a meeting.
There is something doubly wrong when the party that could lead Kenya so thoroughly dismembers its top organ.
Do top organs in fact mean anything? Hardly. No sooner had the National Rainbow Coalition (Narc) whitewashed Kanu in the General Election of 2002, than President Kibaki distanced himself from the Summit, off-loading it on his good-natured Vice-President Moody Awori.
By distancing himself from the Summit, President Kibaki had rid himself, at a very early stage, of political encumbrances that were to arise in the coalition that was cobbled together before the General Election to ensure Kanu’s defeat. This way, he also set in motion Narc’s slow death.
Tight grip
Whereas President Kibaki rid himself of the Summit in order to concentrate on the business of steering the ship of state, Mr Daniel Moi before him maintained a tight grip on every limb of Kanu to ensure he was in total control of the politics and the politicians, in addition to the ruling of the land.
But Mr Moi’s Kanu flourished when it enjoyed constitutional monopoly of power. Then, in the first decade of political pluralism, it depended on Mr Moi’s ruthlessness to stay afloat. Mr Moi’s successor, Mr Kenyatta, did not enjoy the former and has not demonstrated a streak of ruthlessness in Kanu.
But he did show opportunism in taking Kanu into the Party of National Unity (PNU) amalgam to take him to Parliament and the Cabinet and, most importantly, close to the power (State House) that he wants for himself.
When he did that, Kanu ceased to be an added value to his political life.
However, the uncertainty in the political arena occasioned by The Hague, the desire to tame Mr Odinga and the siege mentality gripping the Central and Mt Kenya communities have caused Mr Kenyatta to keep one foot in G7, half a foot in Kanu and the other half in PNU.
But if Mr Kenyatta appears to have several houses, the same cannot be said of Mr Odinga. His house is ODM, but its roof is leaking.
He has lost Mr William Ruto and Mr Balala; an unpredictable Mrs Charity Ngilu appears uninterested, and a previously loyal Musalia Mudavadi is after his crown.
There is no doubt that Mr Odinga will move to mend fences and build bridges. But that is a high turnover at the Pentagon. It is this Mr Balala was alluding to when he asked who would be next at the exit and wondered whether it would be Mr Mudavadi for opposing his party leader.
Intellectual capital
What exactly Mr Ruto, Mr Balala and Mrs Ngilu brought to the Pentagon in terms of intellectual capital is not in the public domain. What is known to everyone is that they have had a falling out with Mr Odinga and sought to move out of ODM with their supporters.
Mr Balala does not have immense clout at the Coast compared to Mr Ruto’s in the Rift Valley.
But he moved swiftly to package his sacking as a betrayal of the Muslim community. It was an explosive propaganda card that forced Mr Odinga to pitch tent at the Coast to smooth feathers.
And therein lies the trouble for Mr Odinga. He has far too many fires to fight; he may not have enough time to put his house in order and concentrate on winning elections.
Kwendo Opanga is a media consultant opanga@diplomateastafrica.com
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