President William Ruto and ODM party leader Raila Odinga.
The launch of a registration drive targeting an ambitious 6.3 million new entries in the voters’ roll seems to have coincided with a flurry of political activities.
Retired President Uhuru Kenyatta came out of his shell to signal a revamp of his largely moribund Jubilee Party, and for the first time since his exit, publicly hurled broadsides at the leadership of his successor William Ruto.
Elsewhere on the opposition front, People’s Liberation Party leader Martha Karua used the occasion of her party delegates conference to restate her presidential bid.
And former opposition chief Raila Odinga, at a series of events marking the ODM party’s 20th anniversary, emphasised that the political marriage with President Ruto that birthed the broad-based government did not extend to his party backing the incumbent at the next elections.
From the other side, Ruto must have been looking on with a mixture of emotions, ranging from quiet satisfaction to outright alarm.
He would have taken the two rival opposition events as a Godsend. Uhuru’s entry flanked by his presumed choice for the presidential ticket, former Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i, indicated his determination to make Jubilee a major factor in the next elections. However, it also signalled rivalry in the opposition ranks, and particularly in the vote-rich Mt Kenya region where Uhuru has ceded ground to former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua.
Ruto’s headache
The absence of Jubilee leaders at Ms Karua’s party event was notable. The host and her key guests—including Gachagua, Kalonzo Musyoka and Eugene Wamalwa—all spent their time on the podium pledging a united opposition, but the absence of Jubilee leaders, holding their own function elsewhere, was telling.
Gachagua has emerged as a first amongst equals in the new alliance courtesy of his hold on the Mt Kenya vote. He has signalled that he is looking to swing that vote to Musyoka, but re-emergence of Uhuru to pledge the same basket to Matiang’i already indicates a split in the region, which eases Ruto’s headache after losing the stronghold that supplied nearly 50 per cent of his tally at the 2022 elections.
It is also significant that Karua, who as Raila’s running-mate in 2022 faced-off against Gachagua who was on the same ticket with Ruto, declared a presidential bid that will also be seeking the Mt Kenya voting base.
It could become a crowded field from the populous region as controversial tycoon and political wheeler-dealer Jimmy Wanjigi has also announced his own presidential bid from outside the main opposition coalition, as has civil society activist Boniface Mwangi. Former CS Moses Kuria, who in July made a cordial exit as Ruto’s senior economic advisor, is also widely expected to enter the presidential race, but most likely as a spoiler to split the Mt Kenya vote.
These are just the kind of divisions in Mt Kenya, and the wider opposition, that could greatly work in Ruto’s favour.
An increasingly crowded field has also seen presidential aspirations from outside Mt Kenya declared by former Chief Justice David Maraga and Busia Senator Okiya Omtatah.
Ruto’s survival
Ruto will be looking on with great pleasure at the divisions in opposition ranks now manifested by open sniping between the Gachagua and Uhuru camps, but he must also be deeply concerned at Raila’s restatement of ODM’s continuing presidential ambitions.
Murmurs within ODM against the broad-based government arrangement have always seemed like a minor rebellion by a small handful of figures led by party secretary-general Edwin Sifuna.
Key party stalwarts close to Raila, including his elder brother Senator Oburu Oginga, Homa Bay Governor Gladys Wanga and the direct beneficiaries of the dalliance with Ruto’s UDA, including Treasury CS John Mbadi and Energy counterpart Opiyo Wandayi, have become key cheerleaders for Ruto’s re-election bid.
Invited to offer guidance, Raila has limited himself to inviting perusal of the MoU between the two parties, which makes no reference to 2027 alliances, but has in the past declined to expressly state whether or not ODM would support Ruto.
His weekend affirmation that nothing stops ODM form fielding a candidate was thus significant. Having lost Mt Kenya, Ruto’s survival is wholly dependent on Raila and the vast base he controls. Without Raila’s backing, his re-election prospects drastically diminish.
It is probable that Raila was just speaking to placate a restive base, and maybe also displaying the aces he holds in ongoing political bargaining, but his pronouncement could have sent alarm bells among Ruto loyalists who see that 2027 support cannot be taken for granted.
[email protected]; @MachariaGaitho
