Azimio leader Raila Odinga (left) and President William Ruto.
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Battle of titans as Raila Odinga, President Ruto clash over protests
Azimio la Umoja One Kenya coalition has planned intense anti-government protests to run for three consecutive days beginning Wednesday, even as the government drew a line in the sand, vowing to thwart any such attempts.
Both Azimio leader Raila Odinga and President William Ruto have stood their ground, with the former insisting the protests are within Kenyans’ constitutional rights, while the Head of State has warned that his administration will not condone such demonstrations which, he noted, have been a recipe for chaos.
The results of the three-day protests — expected to run from Wednesday all through to Friday — could, however, spell doom for the country after MPs allied to the President vowed to mobilise their supporters to impede the processions.
President Ruto has publicly accused his predecessor Uhuru Kenyatta, the chairman of Azimio Council, of funding Mr Odinga, but the opposition insists the protests are about Kenyans whose lives have become unbearable due to the high cost of living under Dr Ruto’s administration.
“I want to tell my friend Uhuru Kenyatta to stop funding this old man. You have been a President, please be a gentleman. You supported this man of riddles (Mr Odinga) and we beat him. Achana na yeye na usipoachana na yeye ata wewe tutakusafirisha na huyo kitendawili wako (Leave him alone but if you don’t, we shall send both of you packing,” the President said.
Mr Odinga has since accused the President of unleashing a killer police squad on Kenyans who are exercising their constitutional rights.
“Kenya Kwanza has embedded a trained killer squad in the name of Operation Support Unity into the official security agencies and unleashed it on Kenyans,” he said.
Mr Odinga’s troops have crafted an elaborate plan for the protests across the country, with the organisation in Nairobi left under his command.
The leaders are expected to converge at Kamukunji grounds, dubbed ‘Kamukunji Three’, before the procession begins.
On Sunday, Azimio coalition principal Eugene Wamalwa declared that Kenyans will not retreat or surrender.
He accused President Ruto of being divisive and using unpresidential language by threatening Kenyans.
“Ruto’s language is unpresidential because, under Article 131, he’s supposed to be the symbol of national unity. For him to threaten fellow citizens goes against the calling of that high office,’ Mr Wamalwa said.
He faulted the President, his deputy Rigathi Gachagua and Interior Cabinet Secretary Kithure Kindiki over remarks that there will be no more protests, saying the move is tantamount to suspending the Constitution, contrary to Article 37.
“They have no such powers because the enjoyment of those rights does not depend on their generosity,” Mr Wamalwa said.
ODM Secretary-General Edwin Sifuna said everyone has a right to protest. “We welcome the decision by UDA MPs to also have maandamano in their areas. We urge them to make sure their supporters are peaceful and do not engage in any violence,” he said.
ODM National Treasurer Timothy Bosire said Kenyans are not divided on the issue of the high cost of living.
“The UDA MPs will find themselves in trouble with the voters. They will be beaten outright and chased away. This is a desperate solution which is not well informed. Ruto has lost touch with reality and he, with his team, are drunk with power,” Mr Bosire said.
Jubilee vice chairman David Murathe said mobilising Kenyans to fight their fellow Kenyans ‘is a recipe for devolved chaos’.
“They should address the real issues of the cost of living. Are they saying that their constituents are not feeling the pain?” he posed.
National Assembly Minority leader Opiyo Wandayi said the move by UDA leaders will ‘simply escalate the conflict by creating an uncontrollable state of anarchy and lawlessness’.
“It will not end well for the regime’s planners. The regime will be the biggest loser. When pushed to the corner, the peaceful demonstrators will naturally exercise their right to self-defence,” he said.
Machakos Deputy Governor Francis Mwangangi, whose county bore the brunt of last week’s protests, insists the perpetrators of the violent demos were ‘outsiders’.
“Nobody is against peaceful demonstrations, but we are against demonstrations that are not peaceful and orderly. What we witnessed is uncalled for,” Mr Mwangangi said.
“You cannot import people from other parts of the country to come and cause mayhem. Kambas are peace-loving people and we condemn the action in the strongest terms possible,” he said.
The opposition leadership insists that the protests and its civil disobedience campaign will continue running concurrently with its 15 million signatures collection drive.
ODM National Chairman John Mbadi said their end-game will be more apparent in the coming days.
He noted that by netting at least 10 million signatures, which is above 7.1 million votes President Ruto got in the last election, “it’s enough vote of no confidence against the President and the courts will interpret it because that’s a constitutional matter within their mandate”.
Kakamega Deputy Governor Ayub Savula said President Ruto has no option but to address the high cost of living. “Signature collection signifies a vote of no confidence on the President and MPs who betrayed Kenyans on the Finance Bill,” Mr Savula said.
Political analyst and governance expert Javas Bigambo, however, argues that Azimio has run out of strategies for post-election loss recovery.
“The opposition is now clutching at maandamano as the straws for political relevance. The demos are right to be pursued as a democratic tool and constitutional right, but if their primary object is to orchestrate a socio-economic crisis to enable bipartisan talks and have the Ruto administration engage with Raila, then it may easily be a lost cause,” said Mr Bigambo.
He argues that President Ruto seems disinterested in engaging with Mr Odinga and ‘looks too settled to be worried’.
“Raila, on the other hand, is carrying the dead weight of Azimio principals who have run out of energy, are not inspired and have no new ideas of countering the government. The net effect is an opposition that has not found a way of being indeed an effective opposition coalition.”
