By Jamesa Wafula in Nairobi.
In what might now sound like sweet music in the ears of Kenya’s new President William Ruto, cracks have started emerging in the Azmio La Umoja grand coalition whose flag bearer Raila Odinga narrowly lost in the August 9, 2022 elections.
Odinga who has just celebrated his 78th birthday in Mombasa has slammed those calling for his retirement and took issue with Wiper leader and Kamba kingpin Stephen Kalonzo Musyoka over his 2027 Presidential ambitions.
Musyoka, 65, and his allies who have thrice backed Odinga for the top job are demanding that ODM under Odinga unconditionally announce backing the former Vice President under the late Mwai Kibaki government as flag bearer in 2027!
But an angry Odinga has fired back telling those expecting him to board a one way Bondo Express bus to his rural home are day dreaming as he is still in the race for the top job. His top ODM aides have told Kalonzo to stop the “political blackmail” over elections still 5 years away!
Odinga will be 83 when he squares out with Ruto who will be 61 and seeking to win his second and last term come 2027. According to Odinga supporters, Musyoka should stop bickering as nobody forced him to support Raila for a third time. They further argue that at any rate that support did not yield the desired results which were to win power! Under the deal Musyoka would have become chief minister or PM if Odinga had won the presidency.
Odinga who narrowly lost his fifth stab at the presidency has in the recent past been bashing IEBC and judiciary over his narrow loss he keeps blaming on electoral manipulation at the Bomas of Kenya national tallying centre. He has kept faulting IEBC Chairman Wafula Chebukati. For sometime Odinga has kept telling crowds how his “victory” was stolen! This prompted angry reactions from his own home-turf who wondered where the pro-Raila government machinery was when his votes were being stolen!
But he appears to be slowly coming to terms with the unexpected defeat and has even urged county governments under his party governors to work with the national government.
Cracks now emerging in the “marriage of convenience” that was the Azmio grand alliance that brought together a massive political machine is now likely to play in the hands of the shrewd Dr. Ruto who keeps winning over MPs in perceived opposition strongholds.
The Raila-Kalonzo cold war of words over elections still five years away has given the Ruto regime enough breathing space to hold a three – day retreat in Nanyuki where government machinery and county governors brain stormed on taking the country to the next level.
Ruto who accomplished the unthinkable in 2022 when all pollsters and international observers were predicting a Raila victory to become Kenya’s 5th president, keeps saying he prefers to have a vibrant opposition that will keep the government in check. He has ruled out any backroom ‘handshake deals” like that of Raila-Uhuru of March 9 2018.
But many see this as political double speak warning that he has already slowly started rolling out a 2027 strategy to win a second term and not become the first one term president since the two term limit became law from the 2002 elections that were won by Mwai Kibaki as President Daniel Moi stepped down. Both men have since passed on all aged 90 plus.
A scheming Ruto who defied both a hostile boss President Kenyatta and a pro-Odinga state machinery to romp home last August is widely said to have started oiling an unbeatable machine going forwards to 2027.
Many say if he could manage to beat Odinga in 2022 while virtually an ‘outsider” a deputy president completely isolated from government apart from attending erratic cabinet meetings, how will anyone beat him when he is in power!
But the never say die Odinga who promised his late dad Jaramogi who died in 1994 in the opposition that one day he would occupy state house is not about to give up! Jaramogi battled for three decades for the top job held by only 4 men from 2 tribes with Ruto now becoming the 5th transition president.
At 83, even some of Odinga’s staunch aides argue that he will be too old to battle with the much younger Ruto controlling state machinery an argument that keeps enraging the ODM leader who has of late acquired top of the range limousines that have caused quite a stir in the eyes of the public.
The man who keeps dying his grey hair picth black and dresses in trendy matching outfits appears to be a contrast with Uganda’s long ruling President Yoweri Museveni, his age-mate at 78.
Museveni has been known to suddenly do push ups and kick football to show that he is still agile and far from an old man weakened by advancing age. On his part Odinga has been dancing at political campaign rallies in 2022 like a young men even assuming acrobatic postures that left supporters roaring in applause!
But many say however that advancing age is already playing tricks with the memory of these leaders. For example Raila has repeatedly been talking of elections held on August 8 when in fact they were held on August 9!
On his part while in Mombasa on a state visit President Museveni speaking in broken swahili failed to the right word for “jigger” and called it “infunsa” which is Luganda until he was corrected that it is “funza”!
In his last days Zimbabwe’s strongman the late Robert Mugabe had started reading the same speech twice at totally different functions confounding his speech writers. The man who went on to marry his secretary half his age would oiften defy his 93 years of age with his spare frame and indeed cuased a stir at a heads of state summit in Nairobi in 2016.
Mugabe who managed to lead for 31 years was among Africa’s strongmen with little time for the opposition. The man with seven degrees and a marxist Lenist left wing politician subject opposition leader Tsvanganrai also long gone to his maker, to consistent bullying and holding fraudulent elections.
Odinga would later hit at Mugabe triggering one of the fiercest exchanges the Kenyan leader had received in recent years. The Mugabe regime told off Raila blaming him for the 2007 post election violence that claimed 1350 lives and displaced 650,000, adding that he was the last man who should comment about good governance. Raila was further linked to the aborted 1982 Kenya airforce coup that killed more than 50 people mainly his luo tribe.
But Odinga attended burial for Mugabe and praised him■
