If the open kleptocracy and drift towards a criminal State is anything to go by, outraged citizens should be ready for revolution.
The people should be prepared to come out in their millions to demand an end to systemic corruption, blatant mismanagement of public resources, destruction of governance institutions, castration of the legislative and judicial arms of government, and a sure slide towards tyranny.
President William Ruto’s Kenya Kwanza regime has created the conditions that make it ripe for the people to move firmly and with resolve to set the country back on the right trajectory before it is too late.
Chances are more than even, however, that the public demonstrations called for today will turn out to be a damp squib. Participation will most likely be limited to a few opposition strongholds. Meanwhile, police and ruling party brigands can be trusted to unleash terror on any unauthorised gatherings and processions, while also going on violent looting and robbery sprees.
The reality today is that the hope seen with the Gen Z-led revolt of 2024 has largely dissipated. Kenyans are once again resigned to the terrible fate of being ruled by a criminal class whose primary agenda is self-enrichment.
It is also a fact that since opposition legend Raila Odinga took his final bow six months ago, Kenya has lost the one politician with the ardent following and the ideological standing to successfully call the people out on mass protests.
The petrol importation scandal terribly exposed the Ruto government’s kleptomaniac tendencies. However, there are serious questions whether the present opposition leadership fronted by former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua, and a backing cast headed by presidential hopefuls in former Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka and former Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i, has the moral standing, the organisational skills and the networks to accomplish anything substantial beyond some general mayhem in limited zones.
Mr Gachagua and co-travellers in the self-styled United Alternative Government do not provide much in the way of inspiration. Citizens across the country are united in anger over government missteps and misrule, but the opposition leadership is unable to channel the widespread disillusionment into a credible movement towards national renewal.
They are preoccupied with political roadshows and sterile sloganeering that offers little beyond calls for regime change without serious alternative policy prescriptions.
It is also apparent that the political strategy that must underpin the quest for change is still grounded in the same old ethnic mobilisation game of numbers already perfected by those in power.
The Gen Z-led revolt had promised to change the face of Kenyan politics with fresh new alignments that were not premised on ossified ethnic identities and domineering kingpins.
A generation that previously paid little attention to politics shook the nation with the “leaderless, tribeless, partyless” approach that in just a few days of street protests brought the Ruto government to its knees.
The heady optimism that captured global attention and admiration was put down with brute force and a terrible loss of human life, and then suffered ultimate betrayal with the Ruto-Raila political pact that gave the then-opposition a seat at the buffet table.
The political elite from different ends of the spectrum joining forces to keep out interlopers was successful, if in nothing else, disarming the Gen Z movement.
The broad-based government arrangement also succeeded in ejecting Mr Gachagua from the feeding trough into an opposition where he has succeeded Raila as the driving force; while the demise of the latter resulted in his once formidable ODM party being reduced to an appendage of President Ruto’s political machinery.
In the face of such momentous realignments on the political landscape, one would expect any movement worth its salt to also recalibrate and at least seek new solutions to old problems. Instead, one is witnessing an opposition bereft of new ideas and new thinking at a time when the Ruto government is doing everything within its power to showcase its own weaknesses.
The opposition is being gifted all the ammunition it needs to launch effective offensives against a government obsessed with nothing more than self-preservation, but no one sees evidence of any novel initiatives that will set the ground for effective challenges leading to the next elections.
The enthusiasm with which youth are driving fresh voter registration illustrates the desire for change, but that must also come with a change of approach and the emergence of fresh new faces and forces. If we remain stuck in the grip of the same old politicians, we might as well start accepting the likelihood of a second term for President Ruto.
Mr Gaitho, an independent journalist, is former NMG Managing Editor for Special Projects. [email protected] .
