‘FALLACIOUS AND INVENTED': MORE ABOUT MIGUNA
Conventional wisdom says you should never review a book written by a person you know. However, in the case of Miguna Miguna’s book Peeling Back the Mask, I would say the opposite. Everyone who knows Miguna and is mentioned in the book should read it and review it and correct anything they know to be wrong – because there is much in this book that is fallacious and invented.
I am neither a liar nor a sycophant, and since I am frequently accused, particularly of the latter, I want to make that clear before I move on. Miguna himself declares in the book that he finds me honest (for what that is worth). My so-called sycophancy is non-existent. I don’t wrap up my views in pretty ribbons and I’m known to be blunt. The fact that I support Raila Odinga for president doesn’t mean I have lost my critical faculties – as has inadvertently been demonstrated by a private and sharply worded memo from me to Raila that Miguna has chosen to make public.
(Miguna had given me an undertaking of confidentiality on this. “My word is my bond,” he says several times in his book. No, Miguna, your word and your bond are worthless – just so much dross to be abandoned when it suits you. You can claim no honour there.)
There will be a lot of “I” in this article, for which I shall no doubt be lambasted. But it is because I feel I have a duty to challenge Miguna’s account in just a few of the very many areas where I know he has presented a false picture. I want to speak of that which I know. Miguna’s book is full of lies and exaggeration. Worse, he has repeatedly used a device where he takes a nugget of information that is true and then wraps it round with distortions, to achieve the desired effect – disparagement of Raila Odinga. The whole thing is a travesty of the ‘Honest John’ face Miguna purports to present to the world.
A small example occurs right after Miguna quotes in full my memo to the Prime Minister. Miguna takes that nugget of truth and goes on to say that “Sarah had observed over the years Raila becoming envious of people around him with talent. Apparently, Sarah felt that Raila was jealous of intelligent, disciplined and hard-working people with integrity.”
Such words have never passed my mouth, nor has such a concept ever grazed my mind. It is a complete and utter invention on Miguna’s part, a deliberate untruth, presented as fact to support his own ignominious crusade. Miguna again delves into the realms of fiction when describing the KICC launch of Raila’s presidential campaign on Sunday, May 6, 2007. He says Raila read his speech from a laptop, and that this was a last-minute solution to time constraints because Miguna was working on the speech from Toronto, along with Sarah Elderkin in Nairobi.
Total fiction. First, the laptop idea was one the launch team had chosen deliberately so that Raila would not be reading from pieces of paper. Though outdated now, it looked rather cutting-edge at the time. But second, and much more disturbing, is the fact that Miguna did not contribute one word to Raila’s launch speech. I know that because I wrote it myself from Raila’s handwritten notes, which remain on my file to this day. I had never met Miguna Miguna then, nor had I ever spoken to him. In fact, I never once spoke to Miguna Miguna while he was in Canada.
As always, Raila knew exactly what he wanted to say, and the idea of presenting himself as an applicant for a post that would soon become vacant (the presidency) was entirely his own. The speech still sits on my computer, with the chronology of its development. Miguna sent a memo to Raila on May 2, four days before the launch. A copy of that memo is also in my file. The covering note says, “The whole world – not just Kenya – is waiting for the big day. I have attached herewith some thoughts on some of the issues that might be glossed over as you and everyone else works tirelessly for the Big Day. I hope that you will find time to read, reflect and hopefully incorporate whatever is appropriate for the Big Day.”
The accompanying notes offer some pretty standard thoughts on tribalism, the economy, CDF, security, working in consultation with others and so on. Miguna advises Raila to BE PRESIDENTIAL. (These were all things we were somewhat unlikely to have “glossed over”.) The tone of the note from Miguna to Raila (“I hope that you will find time to read …”) clearly demonstrates that this was not from a man who was indispensable and who was writing Raila’s speech. Raila’s speech was done. But in his book, Miguna says, “Only that morning, Sarah Elderkin, operating from Nairobi, and I, doing the heavy lifting from Toronto … had made the final touches on the “application” … The speech was a tour de force, skilfully crafted … we only included what we believed Raila should be capable of fulfilling …”.
Miguna had nothing whatsoever to do with the speech. His “anecdote” about it and about his working with me – a total flight of fantasy – is typical of the way Miguna lies his way through his book, trying to take credit for many things in which he played no part. The lies are so blatant that it’s hard to believe he thought he could get away with it. And anyone who swallows this stuff is simply buying into Miguna’s delusions.
Miguna also uses the launch – which was a glittering and ground-breaking event that others this very year have copied when launching their own presidential bids – to try and portray Raila and his team as disorganised. The launch had been planned for months by the team Miguna calls Raila’s strategy team. The team was not a political strategy team, as Miguna tries to portray them (while dismissing them as clueless) but a strategy team for the launch. I was there with Dick Ogolla, Caroli Omondi, Tony Cege, Francis Masinde, Tedd Josiah, Caesar Asiyo and Mike Njeru.
I have the final storyboard on file. It was produced by Caesar and covers the programme minute by minute. It lists all the personnel in charge of onstage events and their assistants, security co-ordinators, protocol, press and verification team, finance manager, ushers co-ordinator and master of ceremonies. It lists the broadcast arrangements, the sound and lights back-up, generator provision, the actors and musicians, photographers, projection screens, guest comforts, branding – flags, posters, bunting, T-shirts, balloons, plants, stage dressing, carpets, confetti and the way it would fall at the appropriate moment – press packs, TV crews liaison and runners, among many other details.
The event was supremely organised and a huge success. It was something that Miguna had absolutely nothing to do with – but into which he would now like to insert himself. The audacity of his lies is breathtaking. That is not the only lie about speeches Miguna is supposed to have written for the PM. Miguna also claims that Raila called him in Canada and asked him to write a speech that Raila was due to deliver at the University of Minnesota on February 22, 2007.
Miguna goes into much circumstantial detail about how his wife was annoyed that Raila was forcing him to do this at short notice and to travel at his own expense to Minnesota and so on. (Miguna appears to have total recall for conversations, to the extent that he can put them in direct quotes years later. Hmmm.) Miguna says he told his wife, “Sometimes we have to sacrifice for a higher cause.” Very noble. He calls it “Raila’s sudden act of madness” and portrays the whole episode as some kind of a burden he was forced to bear because of Raila’s cluelessness.
Perhaps that IS what he told his wife. Perhaps he needed an excuse to make the trip. Who knows? Whatever the case, it’s all untrue. Raila never asked him to go to Minnesota, nor asked him to write a speech. Miguna travelled to Minnesota because he wanted to. The speech, on the topic ‘The place of Africa in the 21st Century’, was provided by Adams Oloo, of the University of Nairobi.
In Nairobi, I received a copy of the speech by email from Raila’s secretary, Susan Kibathi, on February 16, 2007. I still have the original text. The speech was a massive 6,297 words long and was sent to me for editing and rewriting into Raila’s style. The accompanying note from Susan said: “I must apologise for the late submission of the draft but unfortunately Adams has not been well.”
Raila was about to leave, for Korea if I remember rightly, before going on to the US. I did a very hurried tidying-up of the speech, burnt the result on to a CD and sent it to Raila to take with him. He said he would get it printed out when he arrived. I told him the speech was far too long but time had not allowed proper rewriting, so I’d look at it again and be in touch. He went off.
When I looked at this unwieldy speech again, I realised to my horror that pages of it had been reproduced word for word from a speech given by the then South African president, Thabo Mbeki, in April the previous year. I was worried about what else might not be original and I didn’t know what brief Adams had been given by Raila.
I spent some frantic time trying to contact Adams, by phone and in every other way. Eventually, I got an email from him. I think he was in Indonesia. He said an assistant had provided material for the speech, which had been hurriedly put together. Adams was most apologetic and was relieved the error had been caught in time. It was now barely a day before this major speech was to be delivered.
By some miracle, I got hold of Raila on the phone in the US (it was not so easy in those days), where he had just arrived from Korea, and explained the problem. I remember Raila’s words, because they were such a relief to me at the time. He said, “Miguna Miguna is here. He can sort it out.” And that is how Miguna ended up “writing” the speech for Minnesota. I told Raila which parts must be omitted because they were plagiarised and Miguna reworked what remained. When Raila got back to Nairobi, he told me that what Miguna had produced was too long and convoluted, and although Raila had handed out hard copies of it, he hadn’t read it at the function and had ended up speaking off the cuff.
Once again, Miguna’s version of events comes from somewhere in a world the rest of us don’t inhabit. He has taken a nugget of truth and woven around it a massive and detailed lie in order to promote himself and belittle Raila Odinga. Later in the book, Miguna reworks another nugget of truth, that he met the Prime Minister late last year to discuss his suspension and that the PM at the end of the meeting left the hotel room without paying the bill. All true, but Miguna twists it to make the PM look arrogant and thoughtless. Miguna writes, “When the waiter came in with our bill and passed it over to Patrick [Quarcoo], I suddenly realised Raila had left us with an [sic] Sh11,000 debt.”
Quarcoo, the CEO of the Radio Africa Group (which publishes The Star), has since confirmed that he was the host of the meeting. The PM was simply an invited guest. The bill was never the PM’s to pay and the matter, Quarcoo says, was “none of Miguna’s business”. There is more. The meeting was the result of Quarcoo’s pleas to the PM on Miguna’s behalf. Miguna was desperate after his suspension and the PM “magnanimously” (as Quarcoo puts it) agreed to meet Miguna after Quarcoo had interceded, to try and resolve outstanding issues and find Miguna some kind of job. “The PM was being decent and loyal by listening,” Quarcoo said.
Miguna, however, makes out in his book that the PM was chasing him for a settlement. Miguna has since extended this lie, to declare publicly, shamelessly and completely falsely that the PM and his colleagues were actually desperately begging him to return to his job. Quarcoo has confirmed that the opposite was true. Salim Lone tells me he likewise has not escaped misrepresentation in the book. Concerning the occasion where Miguna describes the PM’s emotional response to the absolute intransigence he faced in every meeting with President Mwai Kibaki, Miguna has written, “Salim and I looked at each other and said … almost in unison, ‘Holy Moly! What the hell was that?’ We moved outside discreetly. ‘Can you believe that Miguna? He cried. Raila cried,’ said Salim, clearly agitated.”
Salim disputes the impression given here by Miguna. He tells me he was moved and touched by Raila’s humanity and by his willingness to let his colleagues see a softer side of him, a side that said they were all in this together and that he needed their help and support. Once again, Miguna has taken a nugget of truth and distorted it to present the picture he wants, while roping in someone else’s name to ‘endorse’ it.
And so it goes on, endlessly. I was not present at many of the situations Miguna describes in his book. I don’t need to have been. From the many occasions where I do have first-hand knowledge, I can see how Miguna has continually invoked other people’s names to ‘validate’ his stories, how he has engaged in writing up long, imaginary-looking conversations to bolster his case, and how he has employed these and other devices in a myriad different ways to cast Raila Odinga in a poor light.
These might seem like small matters but their sheer volume cumulatively establishes the book’s false tenor – which is designed to lend credence to other, larger claims. After his book-launch a couple of weeks ago, Miguna started shouting about post-2007-election meetings at Pentagon House, about which he claims to know everything and in which he claims to have played a central role. I was present and took verbatim notes of 32 meetings, interviews and telephone conversations during those early days of 2008. Miguna was present for four of those meetings, in two of which he said nothing and in the two others, two sentences in each.
It was hectic at Pentagon House. Raila was fielding continual telephone calls from foreign leaders and repeating to everyone who cared to hear it his mantra of peaceful protest. People were arriving, footsore and weary, from demonstrations on the ‘battlefront’ at Uhuru Park – Joe Nyagah, William Ruto, Charity Ngilu and many others. Joe burst in with a big smile and announced with some pride, “I’ve been tear-gassed!” Charity was advising everyone to wear trainers. Miguna was not among them. Maybe he was in another room. I don’t know.
There are a hundred stories I could tell. There is no space. I would have to write a book myself to refute all the distortions in Peeling Back the Mask. Miguna’s fictionalised vignettes are deliberately intended to paint a carefully designed picture. They are not ‘revelations’, as the media like to call them, but false allegations. He builds his case on a web of distortions, gradually fashioning a straw man he can then destroy. The lies are insidious, and it is unforgivable that Miguna has stooped to such deceit in his efforts to achieve what is surely an ignoble goal.
One curious thing I noticed was Miguna’s apparent lack of male friends. He esteems his male teachers who supported him, and he admires some of his erstwhile student colleagues (that is, those he is not busy sneering at) but most of the good friends he mentions are women. (An exception is Onyango Oloo, who runs the Jukwaa web blog, and who was Miguna’s main defence witness in his 2003 trial for alleged sexual assault against two of his clients – which, by the way, is mentioned nowhere in Miguna’s story of his glorious career, even in an exculpatory manner.)
Perhaps Miguna finds it difficult to get along with other men because of his history. He was raised with no father but he had five older sisters who no doubt fondly treated him like a little prince. Then his mother would kneel before him so that he could stand and breastfeed when he got home from school, as Miguna tells it in his book. Perhaps Miguna still wants to be treated like a prince, and perhaps that is why he can’t bear anyone else to be top dog. But let me not get into amateur psychology here (let alone mixing my metaphors).
Poignantly, Miguna’s book, even bearing in mind that it is self-evaluation written by a very conceited man, reveals a person of unrealised and unchannelled talent. It initially tells the story of someone who worked hard to improve his life and who was strongly committed to what he believed in. As the book unfolds however it also reveals that Miguna’s achievements from very early on in his life have all been diminished and spoiled by his explosive temper, his lack of diplomacy, his inability to co-operate with anyone to find mutually acceptable and workable compromises that allow a way forward, and his consequent failure to find a winning strategy to achieve his various life objectives. The result is that Miguna is a very bitter man.
In the end, though, it is his lies that condemn him – for if a person tells lies on one occasion, it is unquestionable that he will do so on others. Lies fracture trust and render everything else suspect. Miguna has not operated in a vacuum. There are many other people who know the truth. Miguna has chosen to publish and be damned. Unfortunately for him, he might be.
The writer is a freelance journalist and a supporter of Team Raila Odinga.
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