The Raila Odinga -led Azimio la Umoja One Kenya Coalition move to nominate Ms Martha Karua as the presidential running mate has pushed their main competitor—Kenya Kwanza—to devise a counter attack.
This counter strategy includes portraying their alliance as the one giving women a better deal – a third of state appointments, ensuring the alliance’s women politicians have a frontline role in campaigns, a takedown of Ms Karua by digging up dirt on her and rival sloganeering that gender without agenda is a fallacy.
Deputy President William Ruto picked Mathira MP Rigathi Gachagua as his running mate, a move that the Azimio brigade has capitalised on to project the Odinga-Karua ticket as one that holds promise for women.
Already, on her campaign trail, Ms Karua has toured part of Mt Kenya region accompanied by Cabinet Secretary of Public Service and Gender Margaret Kobia, portraying the presidential candidature of Mr Odinga as the only major formation with women’s interests at heart.
“President Uhuru Kenyatta and Mr Odinga have proved to us that they have the interests of women at heart and they have rewarded us with the Number Two slot,” Prof Kobia said.
While gender activists celebrated Ms Karua’s big moment as a positive move in the country’s push for affirmative action, it is turning out to be a women versus women duel on the campaign trail.
“It goes without saying that Ms Karua is a killer card that is giving those thieves, deceitful, greedy and uncultured competitors sleepless nights owing to her track record against corruption and mediocrity in public service,” said former Gatanga MP Peter Kenneth.
Mr Gachagua said that Dr Ruto has ordered all the campaign teams to ensure they come out strongly to prove that Azimio are playing politics with women when Kenya Kwanza stands for true empowerment.
The Dr Ruto-led team has pledged to have 10 of the 22 Cabinet posts held by women, and are also promising a two-third gender rule compliant government, which they say repudiates the one appointment of Ms Karua if those gains are not ring-fenced with other appointments in government.
“We are aware that we have exposed ourselves to battering on grounds of gender. We know gender consideration is a live debate and we are hitting back. We are packaging ourselves as a formation that stands for the wholesome inclusivity of women,” said Mr Gachagua. The Mathira MP said Dr Ruto’s allies are not in any way rattled “by the deep state lie that Karua represents women and we will soon be proving that on the ground”.
“You will see us on the ground presenting real evidence that we are the wing that stands for real women empowerment. We will have women articulating their cause on our campaign trail and you will hear them give real evidence of how we are wholesomely embracing our women in critical decision-making vaults of our proposed government,” he said.
Ms Karua has picked her selling point as “representative of the women’s dream of inclusivity in power, a no-nonsense worker and carrying the aspirations of women in Africa that it is possible to rise to power through the ballot”.
Azimio publicity handlers have picked the gender line and are using it to paint Kenya Kwanza as not committed to empowering women.
“We are amused that the Kenya Kwanza brigade have completely been outfoxed in the choice of a running mate where Karua has the national appeal whereas Gachagua only resonates with Nyeri voters,” Gatanga MP Nduati Ngugi said.
Ms Karua, Mr Ngugi argues, represents the Mt Kenya hope and the national cause for women to ascend to the presidency any time soon, while Gachagua represents “the dream of going to jail owing to the court cases he has”.
The Nation has learnt that in Dr Ruto’s Kenya Kwanza, it has been made mandatory that all regions identify women to be given frontline roles in their rallies, especially in Mt Kenya and Rift Valley, where the alliance is betting on amassing the winning numbers.
“We have picked Kirinyaga Governor Anne Waiguru, Nyandarua Woman Rep Faith Gitau, Nairobi Senatorial aspirant Margaret Wanjiru, Nairobi woman rep aspirant Millicent Omanga, Kandara MP Alice Wahome, Nakuru Senator Susan Kihika, Kiambu Woman Rep Gathoni wa Muchomba, Naivasha MP Jayne Kihara and Laikipia Woman Rep Cate Waruguru as the face of gender-based campaigns in Mt Kenya and Rift Valley.
“They will be trained by a team led by Malindi MP Aisha Jumwa on how to express their points. They will team up with selected partners from Rift Valley and other regions so as to convince women in their regions that Ms Karua is just a campaign tool, not a commitment to real empowerment,” said a senior strategist in the “Hustler Nation” campaign team.
Bahati MP Kimani Ngunjiri said that there are researchers who will soon be arming the Kenya Kwanza campaign teams with safely formulated anti-Karua facts to help beat her wave.
“We do not want to give Karua the benefit of building up the gender trump card, not because she is bad, no, she is a true daughter of the soil ... but in a competition, we will not accept her to be packaged in a manipulative way that seeks to sell a lie that we are not committed to women empowerment. We will also demand that our women cease being misled that Karua represents the face of the national women’s cause,” Mr Ngunjiri said.
Murang’a Senator Irungu Kang’ata said even with the public image of being a fighter of justice and other causes, Ms Karua had shown no real results for the cause of all women.
“When we are told that she is a no-nonsense worker, we want to be fed with real evidence that she, in the span of her service to the country, empowered women to have title deeds, escape the evil of disinheritance once their husbands die and ensured high returns in their ventures. We do not want our women to be lied to,” Dr Kang’ata said.
Ms Gitau said the Kenya Kwanza women’s league will soon be demanding to know from Ms Karua what she did as minister for Justice and Constitution to help Mt Kenya landlords in Nairobi get back their rental houses that were forcibly occupied by politically incited tenants and who went ahead to refuse to pay rent.
“We are not against Ms Karua as a woman. She is a fantastic woman. But we are concerned that she is being packaged as a political missile to destroy many women through falsehoods and confrontational politics as well as being fronted as the point of reference to spread propaganda that Dr Ruto does not care for women,” Ms Gitau said.
