Sunday, January 27, 2013

Has Wetangula just landed from Mars?


Weta’s Foot-In-Mouth Disease
Moses Wetangula.
Folks, the season of high drama is here. It started with the circus that was christened “party primaries” and is promising to rival soap operas that keep us glued to our television sets in the evenings. If the tempo set by the primaries is anything to go by, then the “secondaries” will blow you away.
In due course. In the party nominations, Kenyans were aghast that winners were edged out so that party honchos could reward their cronies, allies, sidekicks and praisesingers. We saw popular candidates win the polls but losers pocketed the certificates. If this is not turning logic and good order on its head, I don’t what is.
If these are the parties whose candidates we are waiting to elect on March 4, this country needs divine intervention. And that is putting it mildly. As the drama of the nominations reached a crescendo, enter one Moses Wetangula, the guy who represented the interests (or did he?) of the constituents of Sirisia in the 10th Parliament.
In scene 1, Act 1, Wetangula, a lawyer, tells Kenyans they should not elect guys who made fortunes through land grabbing. I am aware one clown who goes by the name Kalembe Ndile has made the same appeal in public a few times, with specific reference to Uhuru Kenyatta. Now, why would Wetangula ignore the tenets of decorum in this age and time?
While we know where to pigeonhole Kalembe and let him be, does Wetangula belong there? In the period just before the polls, and knowing how emotive our elections can be, why would a man of Wetangula’s standing want to make utterances that are, at best, populist and at worst, reckless and unwarranted?
Why would he want to inflame passions in a manner that reminds people of the events of five years ago? By the way, has he just discovered the country has what he refers to as grabbers? As a lawyer, does he have the benefit of evidence to back his rather inflammatory utterances? Why has he not acted? Has he just landed from Mars? Scene 1, Act 2: Enter Watangula, yes, again!
The location is a public rally and he is bellowing, never mind that he is using a microphone, and saying, yet again, the very unsavoury things. He is castigating his political nemeses for making what he perceives as careless utterances. And says that one would wish one’s ears were at the buttocks, to be sat on, so that one does not hear such things!
Holy Moses! Just where did he lose it? This country has had more than its fair share of politicos and apparatchiks making all manner of public utterances, most bordering on antics. Wetangula could do us lots of good if he could tell us why he wants to contribute to this unpleasant lot of politicians who have a penchant for insidious malevolence directed at imagined enemies.
Wetangula has served as cabinet minister for several years now. Does he want us to doubt his aptitude in observing and maintaining collective responsibility? Does he value the mantra and credo of uniting Kenyans and obeying the Constitution? Does he value and hold in high esteem the need for co-existence among Kenyans?
Can he stand tall and say he is a peace-loving Kenyan? Come on now, Mr Wetangula, Kenyans expect better from your ilk. We could use less of that sort of shenanigans from either you or any other politician. Jokes aside, who was it who talked of ensuring that your brain is engaged into gear before your mouth

No comments:

Post a Comment