KABATESI: Biased, amateur media gets it wrong on Mudavadi, what he said and what it means

The media shouldn’t be an appendage of attempts to dictate people’s choice of a president in the coming elections.

Media must remain protectors of political rights and freedoms to associate freely and hold differing opinions. It should call out intimidation and coercion for what they are, and not support such development. Indeed, why are some governors so meek they must be counted as supporting one specific political formation?

Since the ANC NDC did what it promised on Sunday– caused a political earthquake whose tremors are still rumbling – some journalists, like their compatriots in politics who had already assumed partisan positions, haven’t accepted the new reality is happening.

They have instead taken refuge in inventing fake biased narratives they pass on as researched news.

The big news out of Sunday is what ANC leader Musalia Mudavadi said. It will take researchers quite a while to find comparisons to that erudite. say-it, speech. It's easy rendition was the systemic earthquake as it rumbles underneath the earth for tremors to tilt the land. When that is found, I doubt the comparison will be from any Kenyan or East African.

But the big story was the formation of Kenya Kwanza Coalition (KeKwaCo or Kenya Kwako). All media missed that angle with such amateur spins that “Musalia had joined Ruto” taking over.

I, therefore, take this opportunity to highlight and correct some major media gaffes with the hope that colleagues in media will take cue and abide by the ethic of accurate information and correct attribution. 

The ANC ADC held two sessions that had four key agenda. In the first session there was the ratification of the resolutions of the ANC Council of members into the National Executive Council, which included deputy party leaders and the secretary general; the adoption and ratification of the proposal for Musalia Mudavadi to be ANC's presidential candidate in August; and the launch of the Uchumi Bora, Pea Mfukoni ANC Manifesto 2022.

The second session was reserved for the presidential candidate nominee to present his acceptance speech.  This was held in the Bomas main auditorium, while the former was in a separate hall.

It is a fact  the Oka principals attended the first session but a section of them chose to walk away from the acceptance speech. This act was in bad taste unbefitting the statesmen they purport to be.

How can they purport to want decide for ANC whom to invite to its NDC? Yet, these who adopt a holier than thou attitude failed to reciprocate Mudavadi’s attendance of their own NDCs populated by ANC enemies.  

Then there is the comedy of errors by the same fellows who have been pulling Oka back; to purport to dismiss ANC from Oka.

ANC didn’t join Oka by invitation and has left without permission. Sour grapes won’t bring back Oka. In any case, ANC rejected Oka being made a holding ground for Azimio.

Indeed, the person who should have felt slighted should be Mudavadi after discovery that one of these same principals recently paid for ANC MPs to defect. 

Then there is deliberately misplaced reportage of what transpired at Bomas.

Some media known for their partisanship in the presidential race intermittently contradicted their own lies that an alliance was created at Bomas or that ANC had joined UDA.

Of course, none of this is true or legally factual, and those journalists penning such fake renditions know too well they are pandering to ANC distractors.

Some media, without proof, have accused Mudavadi through faceless and nameless sources of double-standards for criticising, yet he is now cruising with Ruto.

It is ironical that Mudavadi has never relented railing against the Jubilee government for economic mismanagement, yet he has not been criticised for meeting President Uhuru Kenyatta at the same time. If boldness were defined, then Mudavadi was it. It takes rare courage to tell Ruto to his face that the government he’s part of has done badly.

Another spin is Mudavadi recently criticising the bottom-up model yet now embracing Ruto. Politics is never about saying there is nothing wrong. But if a sin was committed in criticising and talking between leaders, then the handshake couple are guilty as hell and should be the first to be crucified.

Media also erroneously twirled against Mudavadi’s statement of fact that Azimio and therefore Raila is a state project through which Uhuru wants to manage his succession. 

On this, some demand Mudavadi substantiates the obvious — billionaires who control Kenya’s budget managing the campaign, state largesse expended at rallies, briefcase ethnic parties created and ethnic warlords at State House luncheons — bespeak a project.

Your guess is as good as mine on who felt the tremor when Musalia delivered the following gems:

• “It is true, let us not lie to one another. For so long, Kenyans have lived on a political diet of lies, deceit and betrayal. Those in leadership have failed to place any useful premium on the words that leave their lips.”
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• “We are here to begin the journey of destroying personality cults and elevating the national discourse, national agendas and national values.”
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• “Let me state the obvious. Kenya is broke, na tusindanganyane. It was the great American, Abraham Lincoln, who taught humankind that “truth is your truest friend, no matter what the circumstances are.” So, the truth must be told, no matter how uncomfortable it may be. Tusindanganyane”.
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• “Kenya’s public debt it galloping towards the Sh9 trillion ceiling against a GNP of Sh11trillion. Yet we are all the time told by faceless people, yaani Team Ndanganya Wakenya, not to speak about this to Kenyans. I, Musalia Mudavadi, have refused to board that boat of lies!”
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• “And because we are on the verge of bankruptcy, the retiring government has resorted to scorched earth tax policies; punitive heavy taxation is applied to anything and everything. Shouldn’t Kenyans know why they are buying cheaper eggs, milk, maize, sugar and tomatoes from neighbouring countries?”
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• “The government Fuliza has turned Kenya into a Fuliza Now, every other Kenyan is a fugitive from Fuliza, with several disguised phone numbers. Kwa hivyo Tusindanganyane. Kwa Ground ni kubaya.”
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• "We have formalised corruption through “budgeted corruption”. We have allowed the criminal mind to take over the budgeting process. This is because revenue and loans are acquired for the singular purpose of being stolen.”
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• “I am not among those who might take the oath to preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution but whose intentions are to “take an oath to get power, and break the oath in using power”.
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• “Look for quality in leadership and abandon those with a trust deficit and deceit. As we close in on the critical moment when Kenyans must decide, I caution my compatriots to beware those who can never be trusted.”
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• “We shall no longer countenance the company of those who cannot be trusted. For avoidance of doubt, the specter called Azimio is not an option when it comes to partnerships. Indeed, this thing is neither an Azimio, nor about is it unity. It is about self-aggrandisement.”
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• “It behooves any leader in this country to lead Kenyans in nurturing our nascent democracy. But there is a sinister counter-democracy insurgency creeping into our governance system. These shenanigans are aimed at subverting free, fair and verifiable elections by crippling political parties.”
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• “It is tragic that the robust labour movement that played a sterling role in securing Kenya’s independence has been vandalised and cannibalised by a clueless and clownish self-serving leadership. Under my watch, labour will not be a clownish cowboy club that labours for a few individuals who openly boast of and display the trappings of massive wealth, whose sources remain smoky and mysterious.”

(Edited by V. Graham)