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OMWENGA: Divided opposition will guarantee Ruto a second term

If Raila and Kalonzo run as a team in 2027, then Ruto will lose.

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by The Star

Siasa14 February 2024 - 15:48
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In Summary


  • The vote against Moi’s chosen successor was so massive that it was impossible for any rigging to save the doomed candidate.
  • This is precisely what will need to happen to make Ruto a one-term President.
Wiper leader Kalonzo Musyoka and Azimio leader Raila Odinga at a funeral in Kitui on February 10, 2024.

Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga and former Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka are in a predicament, though more so for Raila. On one hand, both leaders know if they go together as a team in 2027, President William Ruto will be a one-term president on Election Day, if not the day before.

On the other hand, both leaders also know if they part ways and each seeks the presidency without the other’s help, then they would have Ruto easily win or easily rig and win a second term. The latter is what Ruto and his men are counting on.

It’s nothing new. For those too young to know or have forgotten, a divided opposition is what kept the late President Daniel Moi in power for a long time following the repeal of Section 2A.

Again, for the benefit of those too young to know, the repeal of Section 2A is what allowed us to have more than one political party after Moi made Kenya a one-party state in 1982. That meant there was only Kanu and nothing but Kanu in Kenya as a political party after that year.

Although Moi warned the country would come to regret the mushrooming of political parties formed along tribal lines, he quickly realised he could use this to his benefit by encouraging and even clandestinely sponsoring multiple presidential candidates to divide the opposition.

The idea — and one the Professor of Politics fine-tuned to near perfection, was to simply have these presidential candidates dividing the vote in areas where Moi was not popular while Moi maximised votes in his strongholds. Therefore, by the time the votes were corruptly counted, only Moi would emerge the winner each time.

The worst of it was in 1992 when Moi was declared winner for only having garnered 36 per cent of the vote, which was bad. Factoring in that number were cooked numbers, therefore many were right to conclude Moi was lucky if he got even 30 per cent of the real vote.

Yet, none of that prevented Moi from ramming through his re-election time after time until he was constitutionally time-barred in 2002.

In that year, electing Moi’s chosen successor was seen as Moi’s attempt to rule and extend his rule, this time calling the shots from his Kabarak home or wherever he was sipping his tea or milk, but the voters resoundingly said ‘no’.

The vote against Moi’s chosen successor was so massive that it was impossible for any rigging to save the doomed candidate.

This is precisely what will need to happen to make Ruto a one-term President.

Anything short of that would see Ruto limbing back to State House as our 6th head of state.

There is only one glimmer of hope for those already ready for Ruto to move on to overseeing anthropogenic activities, which is more suitable for his PhD than running a country.

That hope is having a modified repeat of 2013 when nobody won 50 per cent plus 1. Raila performed so poorly compared to 2007 or what was expected, such that the powers that be who were bracing for a run-off simply decided to do away with Round 2 and install their chosen president.

In the 2027 scenario, if Ruto, Raila, and Kalonzo are on the ballot, then nobody will get the requisite 50 per cent plus 1. In that scenario, the next president will be whoever the person who comes in third backs as his preference.

That’s the only way a divided opposition can defeat Ruto, and even that will be a long shot.

The only assured way is to simply remain united and if Kalonzo has to swallow his pride and back Raila one more time, so be it.

However, there will be no pride to swallow were Raila to back Kalonzo.

Raila backing Kalonzo would be a statesman-like thing to do and not because it is obligatory as some form of payback. Raila has earned his support and would have done just as well with or without Kalonzo but that cannot be said about Kalonzo.

Kalonzo needs Raila more than Raila needs him.

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