1. CAN COALITION HEAL KENYA?
When the Americans get their minds fixated on an issue they can hardly abandon it. It all
started with the former President George Bush Junior and his Secretary of State Ms
Condoleezza Rice, when they brought sanity to Kenya with a grand coalition government after
the 2007 – 8 post election turmoil.
After the March 2013 elections bungled by the electoral board IEBC which conducted elections
without a bona fide voters register, and a supreme court which ignored opposition evidence on
election rigging dismissing the entire petition in two minutes of court proceedings, Kenya
missed another round of post election violence by a whisker. Thereafter the opposition chief
Raila Odinga went to American for three months and came back with another call for national
dialogue, aimed at reaching a similar arrangement to the coalition. Needless to say, this
arrangement was to salvage the country’s doomed economy. President Uhuru Kenyatta was at
first positive to this proposal and later changed his mind when his deputy William Ruto opposed
it. But a lot of water has passed under the bridge and given criminal issues that beset Ruto now
both locally and internationally, he cannot be counted seriously as having relevance in the
present and future political dispensation in Kenya.
Of late Kenya’s parliamentary speaker Mr. Justin Muturi has been unusually vocal on issues,
one of which is the need to reform the electoral body Independent Electoral and Boundaries
Commission IEBC. He has even quipped about the irrelevance of tyranny of numbers in
parliament by the ruling coalition Jubilee, and implied the need for adoption of the opposition
fronted national dialogue. Now speaker Muturi is not just another ordinary bloke. He is said to
be a close drinking buddy of Uhuru’s, having struck a rapport during their happy-go-lucky days
at Thika, Uhuru’s hometown where Muturi was a young magistrate and Uhuru was a fun-loving,
binge boozing homeboy. It is with Uhuru’s blessing that he got the house speakership, although
emotionally and in terms of impartiality he has been a near disaster, being rated as the most

2. unpolished speaker Kenya has had. But it seems what he has failed to achieve at the speaker’s
podium he is out to do at the press conference or through newspaper articles. So he has
surprised all and sundry coming up with some of the brightest and most practical proposals of
late, the greatest ones being reforms for IEBC and consideration for the national dialogue
proposal.
The United States President Barack Obama is coming to Kenya in a month’s time, and it cannot
be without purpose. Neither can it be said Uhuru Kenyatta has no vague idea about this
purpose and its implications. When Raila came back from America in 2014, after brainstorming
at Boston University for three months, and armed with the concept of national dialogue, it
could not be just a passing matter because in America Raila interacted with who is who in
President Obama’s government, including the Vice President Joe Biden. It seems that, all said
and done, the Americans were still fascinated by the concept of a grand coalition government
for Kenya. So one and a half years later when Uhuru’s inner core moots it and Obama’s visit is
on the horizon, a lot can be surmised out of it.
Without such plans it seems both the government and opposition are running out of options,
while time flies past and elections would soon be around the corner. Going to the elections
with commissioners and a chairman who are at the end of their tenure soon after and even
before elections, is not a very organized manner of conducting national business. And issues
like composing an election board cannot be a preserve of the government, hence the relevance
of Muturi’s concerns.
When Deputy President William Ruto quits the scene things might not be rosy for the
government and it will be virtually isolated as an island in the central part of the country. Under
such circumstances, even rigging elections or fake tyranny of numbers might not make sense.
Right now there is no single Luo permanent secretary in Kenya and there is only one politically

3. correct cabinet secretary or minister. A vast wealth of administrative expertise and experience
lies untapped and wasted outside the system as the country reels under inefficiency and non-
delivery of goods.
Even Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni, Uhuru Kenyatta’s hard-nosed apologist, does not
contemplate a Kenya without Raila’s input. So he suggests Raila should be Uhuru’s running
mate, controversial as that sounds. Kenya’s first attorney-general, Mr. Charles Njonjo, the most
powerful person in the land during Jomo Kenyatta’s Presidency, toyed with the idea of Uhuru
going with Raila into government, for the sake of normalcy and order, for one term and then
Raila leaves the stage for him, being older. But fierce Kikuyu pride could not allow that, coupled
with former President Daniel Moi’s resentment for Raila. Kikuyus believed that Uhuru was a
prince, Muthamaki, and in no way could serve under an opposition son of a career
oppositionist, the late Jaramogi Oginga Odinga. Now that selfish calculation did in Kenya, as
Uhuru going with Raila would have erased the Hague ICC cases since Raila would have used his
authority to bring them back to Kenya as he had insisted at the outset. But there is always
space for a new beginning. Uhuru has been given the opportunity to rule, and it has not been
found to be easy for him at all, as it is one thing enjoying pedigree status and quite another
running a system that works.
Uhuru has tried to get support outside the central region in vain. He is now busy courting
Luhyas of the west who do not have a block voting pattern. Kalenjins after Ruto’s exist can
hardly be counted on with regard to another alliance with Kikuyus, to be cheated once again.
This time round Uhuru has a more hardened Raila to deal with. Not only is he going into this
contest as a do-or-die chance, his son Fidel who always had a mollifying influence over him is
no more, and he is right back to his brusque, resolute old self. Many Kenyans hardly know him,
and even associate him with contentment or cowardice. But he had often been tied down and
prevailed upon by his wife and son. The wife Ida Odinga lived for the son, seeing so much
promise in him. Now that she seems resigned to fate and almost despairing, there might be no

4. time or interest putting Raila on leash. The worst part of it, the pig-greedy lot in government
are not the type that understand the language of surrender or cultural modesty. It is a school of
thought kneaded and strengthened by the ever hovering presence and influence of Uganda’s
Yoweri Museveni.
Even at the International Criminal Court at the Hague, Uhuru cannot be said to be really off the
hook. The prosecutor Ms Fatou Bensouda is reactivating original testimonies of witness who
were killed, bribed or intimidated into silence. Bensouda’s ruse is not just for the cases of
William Ruto and Joshua Sang. This has prompted attorney-general Githu Muigai to rush to the
Hague and beg to be allowed to contest this matter of dead and compromised witness
testimonies. But the court dismissed him as a stranger to proceedings. Then they rushed to the
African Union, pleading for help in this matter. But President Jakaya Kikwete of Tanzania, as the
current head of the East African Community of nations, has dismissed Kenya’s request and
commended the ICC for trying so hard to reduce impunity in Africa.
Should there be problems in Kenya again related to post-election violence, Uhuru stands a
worse chance since he has an existing case at the Hague. But the professional election riggers at
his corner would not listen to this, as leadership is a community entitlement. At Raila Odinga’s
corner people say they are tired of his betrayal of the 40 plus tribes of Kenya. They are fast
losing patience with him to deliver at all costs. That is the dilemma Kenya is facing without the
dialogue.
By;
FREDERICK OWINO OYARO
Email: frederickoyaro@gmail.com