The ushering in of the Kenya Constitution 2010 heralded a number of reforms in the economic, political and social spheres of the country. While a number of reforms have started in earnest, the crux of the reforms- in the political arena, which determines the rest of the spheres on our country are yet to take place.
The political system and by extension the political class, which for several decades was the main cause of tensions and poverty in Kenya is still intact. The same behaviour that characterised the old political order people is still prevalent and many of the political parties and those aspiring for political positions in the country, though in different parties remain the same in outlook and way of doing things.
Many of the individuals, parties and those who have manifestos similar or the same, with no particular ideology and proper roadmaps for what they want to do for the country. We have watched many of us politicians declare our intentions for various positions including the presidency in this country, and other than crying for tribal backing- tribes to which we promise nothing in terms of development and how will ensure they related with other communities in the Kenyan nation, we have nothing to offer.
Indeed many of you have seen whenever we politicians stand up to address meetings or rallies, there is rarely talk about what we intend or plan to do for Kenyans but just rhetoric and calling out for people to vote for us because we belong to particular tribal groups. We don’t make it known when we were mandated by those tribes to seek alliances on their behalf, why they should vote for us nor why we want them to assist in blocking others, who mean well for Kenyans from ascending to any office in the country.
Other than the Orange Democratic Party (ODM), the party to which I belong to- which has an elaborate manifesto and a strong strategy to ensure that we not only get a serious presidential candidate, senate and governor candidates- across the country- which will ensure that the party policies are implemented, other parties have no ideologies or only concentrating on regional backing and presidential candidates.
Some have no learnt anything from the pitfalls of a loose coalition government where implementation of any systematic policies remain problematic. They having been unwilling to tell Kenyans that such large groupings- say for example the G 7- that has nothing in common in terms of orientation other than wanting to block Prime Minister Raila Odinga form ascending to the Presidency- will navigate the challenges of a coalition government to deliver their promises to Kenyans.
Kenyans must be wary of such groups that are only being united by vendetta- it happened in 2002- and immediately Moi was removed from power, the issue of broken MoUs stalled the much-anticipated change in the country- it is still happening with the Coalition government- The impunity, with which some people aspiring for higher offices in Kenya are showing, must be watched keenly so that such people are not elected again.
If people went to Parliament through certain political parties, which gave them some offices in the Government, and now they defected from the sponsoring parties, why cant they resign and relinquish those positions. A number of parties are already doing elections, without following the new rules while a number are making pre-election coalition arrangements with regard to law- will the registrar of political parties order a repeat election in such cases.
Will such individuals relinquish their positions should the courts declare that they rigged elections, or when Kenyans petition Parliament using the recall clause in the constitution because on non-performance or these guys already showing that they will cling to power. These are some of the characteristics that Kenyans should start picking on some of the leaders and reject them before they ascend to power and take us back to the dark days.
The Writer is the Sports and Youth Minister and MP, Funyula
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment