Sunday, November 18, 2012

Raila factor in G7 alliance talks

The President of Limkokwing University, Malaysia Tan Sri Dr Lim Kok Wing presents PM Raila Odinga wi

By Oscar Obonyo
As talks on coalition pacts get to the homestretch, one factor remains constant – how best to tame or, in worst-case scenario, team up with Prime Minister Raila Odinga.
It is a ping-pong political game that has seen the Orange party leader meet and kick off negotiations with top leaders of rival parties, only for the latter to look the other way the following day.
The trend has left pundits wondering whether some of the overtures are genuine.?MPs allied to ODM argue that rival political leaders are targeting the PM and using discussions with him to increase their political value to alternative political groupings.
According to them, the Raila name is being used (or misused as the case might be) as a threat tool to potential political partners—more specifically Uhuru Kenyatta.
“Everyone who is having problems in his or her political union is rushing to the Prime Minister as bait for better terms. I mean, if one is getting a raw deal in their arrangement, all they have to do is claim they have met or are contemplating working with the PM,” Local Government minister, Dr Paul Otuoma told The Standard on Sunday in an interview.
Agriculture assistant minister Kareke Mbiuki is in agreement.
He told The Standard On Sunday that some new faces trooping into Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta’s The National Alliance (TNA) party were outrightly intimidating and using all manner of tricks to win favours with Uhuru.
Rival camp
“Some have realised that the DPM is alert about political activity in the rival camp and so when they want to increase their bargaining value they simply threaten to decamp to Raila’s side and are recalled for better terms,” says the minister.
The PM is Uhuru’s key rival, according to various opinion polls that post the two politicians as frontrunners in the March 4 Presidential race.
According to Otuoma, however, the ODM party leadership is fully aware of such schemes and has adopted a wait-and-see approach instead of rushing to blindly embrace such public overtures from newcomers or defectors.
“The running practice therefore is that you must threaten your suitors that you will cross over to Raila’s camp and hope to be rewarded with a better deal,” adds Youth and Sports minister, Ababu Namwamba.
But a politician allied to Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka’s Wiper Democratic Movement argues to the contrary. The politician, who declined to be named for fear of being singled out as poisoning ongoing negotiations with ODM, attributes the on-and-off talks with Raila to the fear factor.
“It has little to do with Raila name-dropping by individuals who want to cut deals but everything to do with Raila the politician,” says the politician, further claiming that Raila is trusted by few fellow politicians hence the on-and-off talks they have with the ODM leader.
Among the latest high-profile encounters Raila has had, include the highly publicised private meeting with Eldoret North MP William Ruto. Initial reports indicated the talks revolved around a possible pact between the former allies turned foes.
But when news of their meeting came to the fore, Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta quickly moved in to fine tune a deal that had been underway. In fact party operatives from Uhuru’s TNA sent fillers to newsrooms indicating a “deal had been finalized”.
Contrary to perception that Raila sought for the private meeting with Ruto, a top aide in the PM’s office maintains it is the United Republican Party (URP) leader who requested for the meeting.
The aide expressed shock that Ruto quickly renegotiated his deal with TNA soon after the meeting with Raila. The speed with which Ruto moved from talks of a possible alliance with Raila to firming up a possible deal with Uhuru is, according to the Raila aide, a clear indication that Ruto was using Raila as political bait to up his stakes with Uhuru.
The URP leader, however, has sought to downplay the change of heart accusing Raila instead of acting like a jilted lover, “the moment I turned down his offer”.
What is evident here though is the inescapable fact that by Ruto dangling to Uhuru and TNA the possibility of striking a political deal with Raila, things moved with speed in the Uhuru camp to prevent a possibility of Ruto teaming with Uhuru’s arch-rival.
A few days later Ruto and Uhuru appeared to have struck a deal giving credence to observations that the Raila card played a role to make Ruto a more attractive political catch, if only to prevent the URP leader from joining the enemy camp.
Major risks
On her part, Water and Irrigation minister Charity Ngilu, who is already in the Uhuru camp, had previously given mixed signals about her stay in the new fold. At one point she warned of “major risks” within following the ICC question, and at another she pointed out that she had not severed links with Raila.
Since then, the Uhuru camp appears to have moved to quieten Ngilu and she appears pretty comfortable in TNA, at least for now. Did she use the scarecrow of decamping to ODM gain certain advantages with Uhuru’s party? Most likely.
Earlier, Justice and Constitutional Affairs minister Eugene Wamalwa, whose ties with Uhuru within the G-7 was reportedly on a downtrend, just days after Deputy Prime Minister Musalia Mudavadi had decamped from ODM, also opted to court Raila.
At the time, Uhuru was weighing whom, between Mudavadi and Eugene, to entrust as link person in western Kenya ahead of the General Election.
The Saboti MP made a trip to the PM’s rural backyard in Nyanza region, where he paid homage to the late flamboyant Justice minister Tom Mboya in Rusinga Island and visited President Barack Obama’s grandmother, Mama Sarah Obama, in Kogelo, Siaya County.
Teaming up with the PM’s wife, Ida, at some point, the minister declared his willingness to work with Raila and declared to his jubilant audience that he was not ready to be part of team whose sole purpose was to isolate some candidates and communities in their campaign.
This was an obvious reference to the G-7 grouping that has been running an anti-Raila crusade. No sooner had the ink dried on Wamalwa’s speech praising Raila before Uhuru camp swiftly warmed up to the Saboti MP and since then he has become a political darling of Uhuru’s and has even been mentioned as a possible running mate to the TNA leader.
Says Nithi MP Mbiuki: “Like any smart politician, my good brother (Uhuru) does not want to lose support to his key challenger, and so when Eugene started walking towards Raila, that is when?Uhuru and Mudavadi began to talk, Uhuru quickly brought him (Eugene) back to the fold.”
Kalonzo and Mudavadi are the latest high-profile politicians to be associated with Raila, following reports that the trio were working towards a union to counter the Uhuru-Ruto led political union.
Besides the Kalonzo-Mudavadi pact, the VP’s allies through Kangundo MP Johnstone Muthama, have been warming up towards Raila sending signals that a new political marriage was in the office. In a bid to woo them back, Ruto held a four-hour long meeting with Kalonzo. And Uhuru is said to have renewed overtures towards Mudavadi.
“This trick is working and Muthama’s rapprochement towards Raila was particularly very effective in reviving a somewhat weakened candidate (Kalonzo) by dangling the ODM scarecrow,” reacts Tony Gachoka, a former head of protocol at the PM’s office, who is now in the Uhuru campaign.
There is also Energy minister Kiraitu Murungi’s the Alliance Party of Kenya (APK), which has decamped from Uhuru’s wings. Before bolting out, Mbiuki says the party had given all manner of threats to Uhuru including that they “had many better offers elsewhere (read Raila’s ODM)”.?
While the “elsewhere” was not substantiated, Mbiuki believes Kiraitu was probably talking of working with Kalonzo or Mudavadi. A couple of days earlier, Raila urged Kiraitu to abandon APK and join ODM, something which gave credence to the perception that perhaps Kiraitu too was subtly trying to use the ODM scare crow to bargain a better deal with Uhuru.
Speaking various at Chogoria, Nkubu, Meru and Timau, in Meru County, Raila regretted that the minister had left his fold and joined another political bandwagon and asked him to retrace his steps to “where he belongs among reformists.” “Kiraitu should now abandon the ‘bus’ because it has no petrol or driver meaning it is headed nowhere,” said Raila.
It is instructive that a few days later Kiraitu announced that he was cutting links with TNA although his party would still support Uhuru for presidency. The big question now is whether Kiraitu has completely abandoned any possibility of teaming up with Uhuru’s TNA or is simply acting as the father of a bride with-holding his hand in marriage to increase the bride price.
Raila’s name
Meanwhile, Namwamba attributes the “playing politics with Raila’s name” to the fact that he is the frontrunner in the race everyone is therefore keen at stopping or joining him.
“He is the giant out there and the fulcrum around whom the political game in the country revolves. He is the galvanising factor for the emerging two forces – those who are keen on pushing the wheels of reforms and constitutional implementation on one hand and those advocating for retention of the status quo,” says Namwamba.
But Mr Moses Kuria, a member of the Uhuru campaign team, thinks otherwise: “I do not think anyone would be using Raila as a tool as the road from ODM is a one-way traffic with people stampeding out of it to political safety. The entire Pentagon has now joined G-7 or is in serious talks with G7. It is unlikely that even Kalonzo and Musalia would be oblivious to that.” ?
Otuoma, however, blames the current trend to the campaign approach of the competition, “which has been to form tribal alliances”.
“It has become fashionable for several leaders to do that and then rush to Uhuru to negotiate for space in his camp. That explains why he is now bullying other presidential aspirants from central Kenya into submission,” says Otuoma.
According to Gachoka, however, neither Odinga nor Kenyatta really care about which politician is jumping where because by December 4, the two will start playing real politics.
The political transfer window closes on December 4 when all politicians and political parties are expected to have hammered out their preferred alliances and move to elections under that an unchanging arrangement.
Before then, the country is likely to see more and more politicians running around using the name of Raila as a bargaining chip. Will it work? Ultimately, everything will depend on the specific politicians’ real value when it comes to the game of numbers.






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