Raila Taught Cameron a lot

By MURITHI MUTIGA

Okay. Let’s face it. We in the chattering classes were wrong to predict that the coalition government would be an unworkable, dysfunctional disaster.

In fact, the grand coalition has worked rather well. Its initial mandate was to stop the blood-letting that followed the botched elections and set the ground for institutional reforms that would make a return to war less likely.

The government has delivered handsomely on both scores. Pessimism is a national sport in Kenya, but it would be unfair to deny credit for these successes to President Kibaki and Prime Minister Odinga.

They have somehow managed to unite the discontented rabble within the ranks of their parties and largely delivered on the mandate of their transitional administration.

Of course, most of these advances have been achieved in spite of, not because of, the leaders.

The tight timetable formulated by Kofi Annan’s team meant that the most crucial legislation that underpinned the reform process was passed in the first few months of the administration before various players on the political scene began to prepare for 2012.

None of those was more critical than the Constitution Review Act of 2008. If the proposed law is passed in the referendum, Mr Kibaki and Mr Odinga will have chalked up a milestone achievement that might come to be judged greater than any achieved by their predecessors.

The draft law may have its flaws. But one of the best things about it is the fact it is almost singularly designed to help prevent a return to fighting following an election.

It proposes major reforms to the Judiciary that would make the courts more attractive than machetes as tools for resolving election disputes.

The draft spells out a clear timetable for a swearing-in ceremony after the result is declared, making the secretive evening ceremony in which Mr Kibaki took office a thing of history.

It spreads, however imperfectly, power to decide on key economic affairs to the grassroots, through the proposed system of devolution. This means villagers will not credibly blame an amorphous entity in Nairobi for their economic woes.

An elected governor and county committee will be in charge of a substantial budget at the local level. Failure to utilise funds adequately will mean the culprit is easily identifiable and can be kicked out of office at the next election.

If shepherding through a new constitution will be a major achievement for the pair leading the coalition, failure to push it through will be an equally unmitigated disaster for the pair.

It will sour the mood ahead of the next elections and will represent a crushing psychological blow to the coalition.

At the moment the polls show the Yes team is on track for success. It is little wonder, then, that Mr Odinga took the opportunity at his first meeting with the UK Prime Minister David Cameron to advise him how best to run a coalition.

Constant consultation, he told his younger counterpart, is vital. And he asked Mr Cameron to expect dissent from within his own party to pose the biggest obstacle to advancing his agenda.

There was much amusement and back-slapping in the newsroom when the story on the meeting came through.

The image of a Kenyan prime minister advising the leader of the old colonial power on governance at Downing Street is one that seems a bit odd. It should not be.

The coalition government in Nairobi has been, on balance, a rather successful experiment in resolving what seemed, in the early days of 2008, like an un-resolvable electoral stalemate.

mmutiga@ke.nationmedia.com