A new and vicious political battle looms between Deputy President William Ruto and Opposition Chief Raila Odinga, just two weeks after the latter agreed to a ceasefire with President Uhuru Kenyatta.
The Star has established there are growing concerns in ODM that Ruto is taking advantage of the truce between the ex-Prime Minister and President Kenyatta to raid Raila’s lieutenants and reposition himself.
The DP has been on a massive charm offensive to expand his political base amid disquiet in his inner circle that the Uhuru-Raila handshake is designed to place roadblocks on his path to power. He has also been reaching out to political kingpins associated with the Opposition.
Read: Is UhuRuto marriage ending before 2022?
Details of the cold war between the two emerged on the day Raila met US Ambassador Robert Godec at his Upper Hill office.
Godec has been leading diplomatic efforts to mediate between the Opposition and Jubilee over the post-election standoff. Raila accused him of taking sides in the political dispute after he criticised his mock swearing-in on January 30 as the ‘People’s President’. The Opposition countered that he was supporting Jubilee because a US company had been awarded a major contract to build the proposed Nairobi-Mombasa expressway, which Godec denied.
The Uhuru-Raila handshake has shaken the political scene, with politicians repositioning themselves for an uncertain future. Last weekend, for the first time since the election, Opposition NASA politicians hobnobbed with Ruto when he visited Kwale to launch a major road, with some endorsing his 2022 bid.
The proclamations of support angered Orange House, ODM headquarters, which dispatched a press statement stating that the party’s position is “that we will not discuss 2022 politics.”
“We are focused on electoral justice, which is a subject of the proposed dialogue between HE Raila Odinga and Uhuru Kenyatta and further on getting justice for the victims of police brutality following the 2017 elections,” said ODM Secretary General Edwin Sifuna.
The party was furious with some MPs, especially Malindi MP Aisha Jumwa, who was made to understand that her recent appointment to the influential Parliamentary Service Commission was on the line.
“Jumwa was told that the PSC slot could be handed over to Mishi Mboko [Likoni MP] who has been more loyal to ODM,” a source familiar with the details said.
Jumwa, previously seen as among Raila's fiercest foot soldiers, had on Sunday made an abrupt U-turn and announced she will back Ruto in 2022.
“We cannot stop an idea whose time has come. In 2022 there is no other candidate for President other than the Deputy President,” she stated.
Other leaders who supported Ruto included Taita Taveta Governor Granton Samboja and MPs Jones Mlolwa (Voi), Ali Mbogo (Kisauni) and Danson Mwashako (Wundanyi).
But 24 hours later, Jumwa beat a retreat and met Raila to pledge her loyalty.
Pressure was mounting on both sides behind the scenes. Ruto reportedly fired a warning salvo at an MP who castigated his ODM colleagues for supporting him.
“Whom do you think you are,” a furious DP reportedly told off one MP in a text message.
A determined Ruto, stung by the handshake, has unleashed his political acumen. On the one hand, he is commending the two for being statesmen but at the same time intensifying his schemes to defend his turf and tap into the chaos in the Opposition NASA
On Tuesday, he called a meeting of all the 17 MPs in Nairobi, JP and NASA, at his Karen home in what analysts say was yet another bid to raid the Opposition.
However, ODM MPs snubbed the meeting for fear of political consequences after ODM issued a gag order for its legislators on the 2022 presidential campaigns.
Makadara MP George Aladwa confirmed that they were indeed invited for the meeting but claimed they only skipped it because it was on short notice.
“How could we refuse and we are now working together? But we were also being invited by the wrong person. The invite was delivered through Lang’ata MP Nixon Korir,” said Aladwa, who is also the ODM Nairobi Chairman.
The agenda of the Karen meeting remains unclear.
Ruto's Communication Secretary David Mugonyi described the meeting as an initiative of the MPs.
“Yusuf [Kamukunji MP] is the chairman of Jubilee MPs in Nairobi and he is the one who coordinated it and asked to see the Deputy President,” Mugonyi told the Star yesterday.
DISQUIET
There has been disquiet over the handshake in Ruto's camp and his allies have resolved to tread carefully in private while publicly giving lip-service support for the deal. Last week, Senate Majority leader Kipchumba Murkomen was full of praise for Raila’s decision when the NASA chief attended a burial in his Elgeyo Marakwet County.
But this week, a video that has gone viral captures Murkomen warning Uhuru in the Kalenjin vernacular to avoid giving Raila a responsibility that will make him roam around Kenya.
“We have accepted and spoken to the President to open for this Mzee [Raila] a big office in Nairobi and give him very many workers, but his job is to travel to Addis Ababa, Geneva and New York. We don’t want him to roam in Kenya,” Murkomen is recorded saying.
In the same video, Ainabkoi MP William Chepkut states: “I tell all Kalenjins let’s bring this person [Raila] closer but be very afraid.”
The apparent suspicion of the Uhuru-Raila deal on Tuesday prompted ODM Executive Director Oduor Ong’wen to release a statement unpacking what he claimed was the intent of the deal.
“The initiative is not about a wind-assisted dash to the 2022 presidential election finish line for some politicians, nor is it about placing hurdles in the tracks of those with 2022 ambitions,” Ong’wen said. “It is about preventing Kenya from joining the ranks of failed states.”
In a telling statement, Ong’wen said the deal is not a State-driven project but a commitment by the two leaders “to unclog Kenya's political arteries.”
“The leaders have committed to jointly raise funds for the implementation of the initiative. This means Kenyans’ tax money will not be used in its implementation,” Ong’wen stated.
He said the initiative is a personal undertaking between the two leaders and Kenyatta is a leader who “symbolises the many ways in which the country has gone full circle in its divisions. They are determined to break the circle.”
For the first time, Mount Kenya politicians, who have been viciously attacking Raila, have made a sharp about-turn and now admit the deal is a political game changer.
“Raila is a smart politician. A lot of people have started to warm towards him. You never know what happens if he decides to vie in 2022, because I think the dynamics have changed,” Murang’a Woman representative Sabina Chege said last week.
Some analysts now say the truce will help Uhuru kill two birds with one stone — secure his legacy in his last term and tactfully open the race for his succession without taking the blame for it.
Unfortunately for Ruto, the deal came when a section of Mount Kenya politicians had been sending mixed signals on whether the region will support him in 2022 or not.
Political analyst Herman Manyora alleged the possibility that Uhuru could have pledged to back Raila for the presidency in 2022 as part of the new pact.
“I suspect strongly, but I could be wrong, that Uhuru must have agreed with Raila he would support him in 2022,” Manyora said.
Such a deal would, analysts say, seal the animosity between the two communities and pay back a political debt that the Kenyattas owe the Odingas from Independence.
However, whether such a plan exists remains to be seen. While the communiqué signed by the two leaders traced the nation’s disunity to acute political competition and diversity, it also hinted at the responsibility of the two to heal the country for posterity. Details of the deal remain scant as the country awaits the two-man taskforce of Paul Mwangi and Martin Kimani presenting their report of the terms of reference.
Read: Ruto seeks new allies over 2022 fear of ‘betrayal’
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