Party nominations in Kenya are nothing but a farcical charade

When one with honey words

But evil mind persuades the mob, 

Great woes befall the state.

– Euripides, 480-406 BC

Greek tragedian

For the past two weeks, political parties have held primaries to elect those who will fly the party tickets for the gubernatorial, parliamentary and county assembly seats on August 9. On the surface, it all seemed a wonderful democratic exercise. But beneath the surface, it was all a farce. The parties were engaging in low-budget magic tricks. The final results had no relationship to the actual voting. In some places, there was no voting yet results were announced. 

In the primaries, we once again sowed the seeds of continued political leadership bereft of moral accountability.

Ours is a mongrel of the US and South Africa’s written constitutions, and the UK’s unwritten constitution. We drizzled up the principles and values of the three constitutions and created a salad that bedazzles the eyes but causes constipation. 

Political party primaries are a unique US experiment that we copied without the underlying moral architecture. You can't have a proper worship in a brothel.

Mercifully, our Political Parties Act attempts to create the legal parameters for conducting nomination of candidates. The wording is simple and can be understood by anyone who reached Grade Five. 

The Act obligates political parties to inform the Registrar of Political Parties in good time what method they plan to use in the nomination process, as well as the time and the venues. 

The Act provides two avenues of nominations: Direct voting by members or indirect party nomination by party delegates. Whichever process is used, only registered party members are eligible to participate.

The law makes it mandatory for the party to use a certified copy of its membership list issued by the Registrar of Political Parties. 

Each political party is required to submit its membership register to the registrar, who should maintain a register that is simple, accurate, verifiable, secure, accountable and transparent. Parties are free to update their membership by adding new members and culling expelled or resigned members. 

In the recent primaries, did any party comply with this mandatory legal requirement? The jury is out there.

The foundational objective of party primaries is to devolve power through the nominations by taking it away from party apparatchiks to the ordinary member. This devolution enables the average man and woman to elect a person they know. 

Kenyans elect villains

The intention was that the ordinary person would elect someone they could employ as their nanny, teacher, pastor or watchman. But is it always the case?

Since independence in 1963, the record shows that Kenyans elect villains and especially those who have more money than the average voter.

It seems we elect those we aspire to be like in terms of riches, regardless of the source of the money. 

Many times we elect people who we know full well got their fortune from drug trafficking, ‘wash wash’, cattle rustling, public theft and corruption.

And the more money they have made illicitly, the more alluring and sexier they appear to us.

In ancient Greek mythology, King Sisyphus of Ephyra (present-day Corinth in Greece), with hubris, attempted and successfully entered Hades alive. 

He wanted to exit the world without dying like all mortals. Only the gods had this privilege of immortality. 

The god Zeus was not amused. He gave Sisyphus eternal punishment. 

Sisyphus was brought back from Hades to earth and made to push a huge boulder up the hill. The boulder rolled back each time before reaching the top and he had to push it back ad infinitum. The gods were teaching King Sisyphus the futility of hollow hubris.

Are the gods punishing Kenyans for our hollow hubris and absence of moral compass? 

We claim to be a Christian nation as Kenya is 80 per cent Christian, yet we do not demand our leaders’ moral leadership. We do not demand of and from them accountability. 

The gods can only have so much patience. 

Direct nominations

Maybe the gods in their celestial assembly have decided that Kenya should be punished by repeatedly choosing wrong leaders from county assembly to State House. It is a Sisyphean kind of punishment.

Mercifully, the political parties law isn’t exclusive on party nominations. 

Residual power still remains with the party to use other means, including consensus building and direct nominations. 

As long as our politics is still morally bankrupt, parties should use their power to issue direct nominations to candidates with appreciation of basic normative values. 

Each political party in Kenya has attracted fiends, thieves and criminals. 

As the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission has confessed, it cannot bar the devil from contesting for any political position in Kenya.

It, therefore, behoves the party leader to implement basic moral and integrity bar for its nominees.

With time, the US political system has developed a strong two-party system. There, political leaders elected to all offices reflect the average moral qualities. Once in a while, a charlatan gets elected but institutions are so strong the country cannot be harmed. Same with the United Kingdom. 

In Kenya, our institutions are still weak and elected bad leaders take advantage of them and weaken them further.

The party primaries were a farcical charade. Kenya isn’t ready for them. We should use only direct nominations with developed and transparent parameters until such a time that we are able to elect one we can employ to take care of our children at night.

Plato, the great Greek philosopher, warned us of the dangers of being governed by degenerates and depraved. 

Our hope lies in the party leader in whose hands Kenya’s future shall be safe. Let him make amends with the gods to end our Sisyphean struggle.

Mr Kipkorir is an Advocate of the High Court of Kenya. @DonaldBKipkorir