SURGING FORWARD: Cord leader Raila Odinga during a rally at Ntulele Primary School in Narok county on Saturday.
Subterfuge. That’s what Raila Odinga’s unilateral demand for dialogue is. A clever trick – a deception – meant to aid his real goal: that of attaining national glory; of fortifying his self-perpetuated image of “Baba wa Taifa” [Father of The Nation]. This sense of glorification is what drives martyrs – even some suicide bombers – to self-destruction. The glory always comes afterwards.
Mr. Odinga’s threat of The Saba Saba Storm is like a toxic hot air balloon attached to a drone being controlled by a maniac. Even though completely outnumbered and outgunned, he, like a suicide maniac, is determined to detonate the balloon and try to end his (political) life. He hopes that it will be an unforgettable explosion. If Raila Odinga cannot win, nobody and nothing will live.
Right now, Mr. Odinga isn’t really interested in power per se. Forget about his supporters with unrealistic hopes that he will forcefully dethrone Uhuru Kenyatta from the presidency on July 7th. Similarly, don’t listen to pseudo-analysts who have claimed that he is being sponsored by the West to effect a regime change using “rented MRC and Mungiki thugs.” Raila doesn’t have the requisite discipline, courage and stamina for a successful putsch. Nor does he have the tact and intelligence to acquire power through the ballot.
Raila Odinga knows why he wasn’t sworn in as president in both 2007 and 2013. In 2007, it wasn’t because of rigging, although massive rigging occurred. He willingly acquiesced to the electoral fraud in exchange for crumbs the same way he had bolstered Daniel arap Moi after the latter had been ensnared following the 1997 elections. In any event, that’s now water under the bridge after Mr. Odinga himself voluntarily vested upon Mwai Kibaki superior executive powers in a lopsided power-deal that was strongly opposed by virtually all his best brains and strategists.
Raila didn’t lose in 2013 because of perceived rigging. No one could become president without enough, properly trained and completely loyal election agents stationed at all polling stations in the country. Those were the people to secure Raila’s votes and gather credible evidence about rigging; not octogenarians who were either drunk or dozing off at the Bomas of Kenya when the alleged electoral theft was occurring. Relying on a horde of sympathetic foreign diplomats, civil society and the media has never been the path to power in Africa – and Raila knew that.
The main reason – and it might shock some people – why Mr. Odinga isn’t president today and Uhuru Kenyatta is, is because Raila Odinga took his quest for power for granted. He thought and believed that nobody could defeat him. He internalised a false premise that an incumbent cannot lose elections in Africa. He thought wrongly, that Uhuru and William Ruto would concede defeat without real, genuine contest from him. And because Kibaki, his coalition partner, was retiring, Raila believed, wrongly, that he was effectively the incumbent even though he knew that his slice of power was thinner than a piece of paper. He was over-confident, acted lazily, spoke carelessly and thought unstrategically.
On both occasions, Raila Odinga lost long before Election Day.
Let me illustrate. First, nobody acquires or retains ultimate power in any country without the acquiescence of the military. Yet, instead of cultivating confidence and quiet support – or even a lackadaisical attitude towards him among the high command within the Kenya Defence Forces – Raila antagonised them prior to both elections. In fact, he did worse. He publicly accused the Chief of the Defence Staff – before, during and after the 2013 elections - of being part-and-parcel of the alleged rigging schemes against him.
Many will argue that a professional military stays neutral in political affairs; that all they do is vote, like everyone else. That’s both naïve and reckless. There is no military in the entire world since antiquity which is not political. Military science isn’t an important component of politics for nothing. Nor is politics an important component of reputable military training academies for elite officers just by happenstance. Any professional military must, therefore, study, analyse and fully comprehend both national and international politics. The Constitution must be read contextually, not literally.
What is proper and accurate is that a professional military shouldn’t interfere or overtly participate in partisan political activities and must allow the country’s institutions to function freely without coercion. But ultimately, the military’s primary role is to preserve and ensure national security. Their role cannot be limited to repulsing external attacks; it includes ensuring that our country is both stable and secure – internally and externally.
Second, Mr. Odinga had antagonised, abused and threatened senior civil servants, police officers, the electoral commission and intelligence chiefs for weeks before Election Day - so much so that he had managed to turn virtually all relevant institutions mandated to ensure a smooth transition to loath him.
There isn’t any presidential election in Africa where allegations of rigging haven’t been made. Nor are there presidential elections anywhere else in the world where the ground is completely levelled, the rules totally fair and the credibility and integrity of the entire electoral process unimpeachable. That’s an ideal we must continue pursuing. However, I have never heard of a victor in a presidential election who had managed to alienate every major state institution against him before Election Day and still emerged victorious.
A serious presidential candidate doesn’t have to be presiding over the levers of power to win. All s/he needs is to generate confidence from the controlling institutions of power: the military (including military intelligence), national intelligence service, police and financial institutions including the treasury. Either that or he leads a popular uprising. Anything else is a dream.
In the recently concluded elections in Malawi, the incumbent, Joyce Banda, lost to a complete outsider - and like in Kenya - a man who was facing serious criminal charges became president over an incumbent. The trappings of power didn’t help. Nor did incumbency. These aren’t material instruments for attaining power. Not in Africa. And not in the rest of the world.
I admit that total outsiders have attained power before – in Russia, China, Cuba, Libya, Philippines and Ukraine. But those power grabs were only possible through either popular revolutions or uprisings. Saba Saba antics are therefore nothing but toxic hot air balloons.
Dialogue cannot be by force
Raila’s demand for national dialogue was a smart strategy to divert – forever – the attention and bad memories from the disgraceful performance of his “Men in Black.” The demand’s ultimate import was to ensure that no internal rebellion, dissent or rumblings within ODM gained momentum beyond what Raila could manage. Attention had to be shifted from ODM’s internal rot. Jubilee’s on-going governance issues had to become the trump card. Originally, there was nothing spectacular about Raila’s dialogue. In fact, I had confused it for the “Dialogue” (chapatis) we used to demand during my University of Nairobi days!
Then Jubilee gave Mr. Odinga strength and cause through their inept reactions. The aborted unconstitutional bans of Raila’s rallies popularised them beyond even the imagination of their planners. Had the government ignored Raila’s return and the dialogue nonsense, there would have been no controversy and Kenya’s high octane politics would have returned to its normal rumble.
Before long, Kenya’s foremost skilful propagandist had seen the opportunity of stirring things up and attempting to recreate himself. He desperately needed to burnish the image of a wealthy and incompetent political manager who had increased his net worth at the expense of his starving supporters during the grand coalition government. He didn’t want focus on his gaudy Nkandla. He wanted the country to forget the fact that he was in Government when Kenya’s worst scandals were either perpetrated or investigations into them were deliberately thwarted: Goldenberg, Anglo Leasing, Kazi Kwa Vijana, Triton, Maize, Tokyo and Lagos Embassies, Turkana Oil – name them.
A man who joined government in 1998 owning almost nothing suddenly emerged from it 12 years later as a multi billionaire and nobody seems to care about the origins of his wealth. He became an instant billionaire while working full-time in public service yet he continues to carry on as if he was Karl Marx himself!
Dialogue simply means a conversation between two or more people – with or without a neutral - about a common issue or problem with a view to finding a solution. Dialogue cannot be on demand or by command, decree or compulsion. Dialogue cannot be entered into through force, threats, intimidation or coercion.
Like mediation, dialogue is an exercise of freewill. Any demands, threats or coercion contaminates dialogue and turns it into a political ping pong. The results of a dialogue cannot be choreographed or pre-determined. For dialogue and its results to be deemed genuine, the parties involved must treat each other as equals and with utmost respect. Where a ‘neutral’ presides over the dialogue like Kofi Annan did before the formation of the grand coalition government, all parties must consent to his role and agree to be bound by the outcome, even if that outcome is a stalemate.
Consequently, Mr. Odinga’s demands for dialogue cannot be legitimate. He unilaterally – without notice – demanded it. He has single-handedly – even without the participation of Cord or ODM MPs, Governors and Senators - set the agenda, deadlines and terms and conditions. He had decreed venues where the so-called consultative meetings happened, chose participants at those meetings, and has declared the outcome to be announced on Monday, July 7th. Everything is mischievously choreographed.
Mr. Odinga has appointed himself the Convenor of Saba Saba and invited Uhuru Kenyatta and his Jubilee team with a rider: Jubilee leaders can only attend if they agree to a predetermined agenda, leadership hierarchy and outcome. Raila complains about a return to totalitarianism when President Kenyatta hasn’t done anything to restrict his freedom, yet I cannot even visit my village in Nyanza without Raila’s goons trying to kill me.
What Mr. Odinga is demanding isn’t dialogue. He knows that no one can agree to such warped terms. A genuine national dialogue cannot be conducted by fiat. One person cannot dictate to and threaten the entire country. Important issues of (in)security, tribalism, corruption, disunity, devolution, “electoral bias” and “amendments to the constitution” – if those are truly Raila’s concerns - can be discussed or resolved without intimidation. Raila has the right to make demands. He has the right to organise as many rallies as he wishes. However, if Raila wants to lead a revolution, he should say so and refrain from cowering under an innocent word such as dialogue.
Since Raila has declared Saba Saba to be a defining moment in his life, we must turn it into his political Waterloo by ensuring that he explodes on that day like the political fraud that he is.
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Mr. Miguna Miguna is a lawyer and author of Peeling Back the Mask: A Quest for Justice in Kenya and Kidneys for the King: Deforming the Status Quo in Kenya.
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