The new year seems to herald a new political dispensation as there is reawakening to the fact that time is not on the side of those waiting to be handed over the baton.
The baton is increasingly becoming a tool to be used as a bait to lure gullible opposition to President Uhuru Kenyatta’s corner to help him finish his term smoothly while his cards are tucked under the table.
The opposition chief and his party, ODM, are already feeling betrayal if the recent remarks by the likes of Siaya Senator James Orengo are anything to go by. Stung by the loss in Msambweni and a surge by the new kids in the block, who coalesce around the Deputy President William Ruto, ODM seems to have gotten a perfect excuse to reclaim its identity.
Whether they succeed or not is a matter of conjecture. What is clear though is that they are coming to terms with the mantra that power abhors a vacuum.
Many Kenyans had relied on the opposition to vent their frustrations with the government. When the opposition joined hands with the power that be, even acting as its most dependable defence on matters of great state transgressions and abuse, Kenyans had no option but to quickly rally around whomever they saw as filling that void.
That’s the birth of the hustler nation which, apart from embodying the aspirations of those who feel abandoned and oppressed, gives a strong pitch to the less known and less fortunate that their dreams of one day being leaders are valid. It’s also the reason class politics is proving a strong revolutionary idea than the tribe the president recently alluded to.
Economic and political analyst
