The hyena, traditionally portrayed in folklore as a greedy scavenger that laughs while feeding on the remains of another animal’s kill, is being stripped of its old meaning and given a new political identity.
Health Cabinet Secretary Aden Duale has found himself in a political fix after his “hyena” remark was interpreted as a slur against Mt Kenya communities over their political preferences. What was apparently intended as an expression of contempt is rapidly becoming a symbol of defiance.
Politicians led by former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua have seized upon the insult, turning an ill-judged metaphor into a political weapon, and a fresh rallying cry against the Kenya Kwanza administration.
Democracy for the Citizens Party (DCP) leader and former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua.
Photo credit: Dennis Onsongo | Nation Media Group
T-shirts, memes, caricatures and songs have followed.
There is a curious international parallel to Duale’s remark. In India, an equally despised creature, the cockroach, recently emerged as an unlikely political superstar. It followed controversial remarks attributed to Chief Justice Surya Kant, who allegedly likened unemployed young people turning to journalism and activism to cockroaches and parasites.
As a result, the comment triggered an outrage, and jokes and a Cockroach Janta Party (Cockroach People's Party), a parody of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which has been in power since 2014.
While neither the hyena nor the cockroach would ordinarily be considered suitable for a campaign poster, it appears that in both cases the intended targets embraced the insult and turned it against the authors to become an emblem of solidarity and resistance.
In India, and within days, millions had followed the CJP movement online. The hashtag Main Bhi Cockroach—“I too am a cockroach”—spread across social media. Volunteers appeared at demonstrations and clean-up exercises dressed as cockroaches. Artificial intelligence supplied images of cockroach politicians behind podiums, cockroach ministers holding press conferences and cockroach citizens demanding recognition.
By the time the chief justice clarified that he was referring to people using fake academic qualifications, not to India’s unemployed youth generally, the insult had entered the wild world of social media, where context is usually the first casualty.
In Kenya, Duale has come under mounting pressure to apologise, with some political leaders demanding his resignation. But the Health CS has remained defiant.
“I am not going to apologise,” he said, arguing that there was no greater example of hate speech than describing the government as a preserve of “shareholders” which was previously attributed to Gachagua when he was in power.
Gachagua, however, claimed that the hyena remark was calculated to drive a wedge between the Mt Kenya and Somali communities and alleged that Duale was “sent” by President Ruto. Wiper leader Kalonzo Musyoka went further, demanding Duale’s resignation and declaring him unfit to hold public office.
Kenya’s hyena moment began in Lafey, Mandera County, where Duale was defending the Kenya Kwanza administration and celebrating the removal of discriminatory barriers that had made it difficult for residents of Northeastern Kenya to acquire identity cards. But somewhere between celebrating that achievement and attacking the government’s political opponents, Duale appeared to accuse Mt Kenya communities of believing that nobody else should prosper in Kenya before invoking the image of a hyena.
Within hours, the animal had escaped from Duale’s proverb. Artificial intelligence generated videos of hyenas speaking Gikuyu. Memes showed well-dressed hyenas preparing for political meetings. Songs, comic skits and images appeared. Some hyenas announced their Gikuyu names.
At a Mugithi event, entertainer Mbote Njogu reportedly greeted the audience as hyenas and asked those who accepted the identity to raise their hands. The crowd responded enthusiastically. A term that had caused anger was becoming theatre, amusement and communal defiance.
Cabinet Secretary for Health Aden Duale when he appeared before the Senate Health Committee at Bunge Tower in Nairobi on May 7, 2026.
Photo credit: Dennis Onsongo | Nation Media Group
The same had happened in India where Abhijeet Dipke, a young political communications strategist studying at Boston University, asked a devastatingly simple question: “What if all cockroaches come together?”
From that question emerged the Cockroach Janta Party, or CJP which captured the mood of a generation that was educated but encountered unemployment, examination scandals, inequality and a political system dominated by older men. The movement later attached itself to anger over leaked examination papers, youth unemployment and the absence of accountability and eventually forced the resignation of Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan. By this week, the Cockroach Janta Party’s Instagram account had 26.9 million followers.
Speaking in Mbeere South, the former Deputy President told supporters that the community had accepted the label: Tumekubali sisi ni mafisi , meaning we have accepted that we are hyenas. He then turned the supposed appetite of the hyena into an electoral warning, declaring that the animals would devour the Kenya Kwanza administration at the ballot box in 2027.
While Duale had meant to question what he regarded as entrenched privilege, Gachagua converted the statement into evidence that the Ruto administration despised the people of Mt Kenya.
Duale’s remarks were made in the context of the Ol Kalou by-election where the ruling United Democratic Alliance suffered a humiliating defeat.
Gachagua’s Democracy for the Citizens Party candidate Sammy Kamau Waweru received 35,440 votes against UDA’s 5,450, a result widely interpreted as evidence that President Ruto had lost considerable ground in Mt Kenya. Duale explained that he had used a Somali proverb to describe how difficult it is to dislodge entrenched habits and long-enjoyed advantages. He insisted that the proverb had not been directed at any community, though remained unapologetic.
In both India’s cockroach controversy and Kenya’s hyena quarrel, political actors have seized upon an insult as an opportunity for mobilisation. Gachagua and his opposition allies appear determined to use Duale’s remark to cultivate a siege mentality in Mt Kenya, which is a powerful instrument for consolidating a community around a shared sense of humiliation and grievance.
The danger, pundits warn, is that the confrontation between Gachagua and Duale could drag Kenya back into the politics of ethnic siege, in which one community is portrayed as demanding more than its fair share while another is persuaded that its interests, dignity and political future are under attack.
While the hyena may rally Mt Kenya, it cannot, by itself, explain how DCP would revive the economy, address public debt, create employment, reform taxation or unite a country of more than forty communities.
India’s CJP has survived its initial joke because it attached the cockroach to identifiable demands. Its supporters wanted examination reform, political accountability and the resignation of a minister. The Kenyan hyena will similarly have to stand for something larger than communal injury. Otherwise, it will remain an entertaining episode in the long history of Kenya’s ethnic quarrels.
