On August 9, 2022, Kenya will hold what will be a highly contentious presidential election that will decide the future of the country’s political system. While the election will see into electing various individuals into Kenya high political positions such as the chairmanship, National Assembly, and Senate, the presidential seat which is the highest political seat of the land has now been shaping up to a keenly contested race, with two political heavyweights as the pacemakers – William Ruto, Kenya’s present deputy president, and Raila Odinga, Kenya’s former prime minister.
Ruto, who is a former ally and now adversary of Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta is running his campaign under the theme “hustler nation” in an attempt to paint himself as an average Kenyan who achieved great success by working his way up the political ladder, while Odinga who has grown to become one of Kenyatta’s closest allies in recent years relied on his wealth of political experience and a social welfare platform. According to him, he will ensure the actualization of social welfare initiatives where Kenyan poor households will be earning Sh6, 000 monthly stipends.
He said, “I will deliver on the promise because it is possible. Many other countries are doing it and so can Kenya. I will ensure that every Kenyan who is poor gets the monthly stipend”.
Some other personalities in Kenya hoping to jump on the contest in August 2022 includes Wiper party leader, Kalonzo Musyoka, Kenya’s National Assembly Speaker, Justin Muturi, and Mukhisa Kituyi, a former Secretary-General at the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development.
Fear in The Forthcoming Elections
Just like the recently reported cases of coups and anti coups, civil conflicts, electoral and political violence making way backs and causing setbacks to the democratic progress in Mali, Guinea, Uganda, Ethiopia and Chad, Kenya too since the return of multiparty politics, has had a share of electoral violence, especially in presidential elections cases, with history and records of pre and post-election demonstrations repeating itself and culminating into constant regular practices. A fitting feature that characterized this recurring violence is the Kenyatta-Odinga rivalry that spans two decades of the Kenyan election. The political heavyweights disagreed fiercely on election results, which influenced the incidents that happened in both the 2007/2008 and 2017/18 highly contested elections. According to Human Rights Watch, the elections led to a deadly post-election crisis and violence resulted in the death of more than 1,300 people and displacement of about 50,000.
Given this report, it remains unclear whether the forthcoming elections will prove just as divisive as what came before. There have been growing fears among Kenyans that until and unless the current political discourse is toned down and the nature of electoral processes re-imagined, Kenya will once again descend into violence in the run-up to August elections
Not the First Time of Election Rivalry
The election feud between President Uhuru Kenyatta and Raila Odinga could be regarded as a feud that repeated itself. The clash echoes that of their fathers, who were the country’s first president and vice president following independence in 1963.
Explaining how the two Kenyan political icons became rivals, governor of Kenya’s Vihiga County, Wilber Otichilo said “During those early ’60s, there was a big rivalry between the west and the east, and after one year of Odinga being vice president, Jomo Kenyatta fired Jaramogi Odinga from his government. And that’s how he formed the opposition which was later banned.”
As the sons do, the two men disagreed on general ideology, power, and resource allocation issues. Mr. Jommo Kenyatta wanted to sell the British settler lands to Influential Kenyans and to concentrate political power in the presidency. Mr. Odinga, on the other hand, sought to redistribute land among those who had been marginalized by the colonial authority, as well as create a decentralized power system that would give neglected regions more autonomy and a piece of the state’s finances.
These differences ultimately influenced the cracked down on harassment and jailing of opposition figures and democracy advocates, censoring the press during in 1978 the administration of Daniel Arap Moi – Mr. Jommo Kenyatta’s handpicked successor.
Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) and the Hope for Peace
Despite this narrative, president Kenyatta in a statement has assured that the forthcoming election will be competitive and not violently disruptive as imagined.
However, It is reported that the outgoing President Kenyatta and rival Odinga are now formalizing a political coalition, and as a matter of fact, both were captured recently having a handshake. While this signaled an impression for peace, unity, and security, it has also led to the initiation of the “Building Bridges Initiative (BBI)” which was launched in October 2020 and aimed at laying the background for national healing, inclusive of the agreement to end historical and electoral injustices that will unite all Kenyans. The initiative according to its steering committee will amend the different aspects of the Kenyan constitution. This initiative is an indication of the fact that the previous precedents of electoral violence are unlikely to happen in the August 9 forthcoming elections.
Meanwhile, William Ruto has regarded the whole BBI initiative as a way of blocking his presidential ambition. In a public issued criticism, William Ruto and his supporters said the whole ideology is to secure advanced executive positions for current leaders, rather than a political inclusionary reform. They also claim it will affect the country’s judiciary autonomy, and scatter the harmonized populated regions of the country.
