Have the hustlers finally ousted Kenya’s dynasties?, By Azu Ishiekwene

Ruto seems to have overwhelmed his masters at their very own recreation. In his first post-election speech, the place he promised to guide for God and nation, he additionally declared Odinga’s villain, the electoral fee chairman, a hero within the first spherical. However even Ruto is aware of that in Kenya’s 59-year historical past no single election has been gained or misplaced with out knife-edge drama.

One of many ironies of politics is how simply fiction turns into actuality, and actuality, precedent. Earlier than our eyes, the president-elect of Kenya, William Ruto, who has performed all sides of Kenya’s politics for at the least three many years, has simply gained an election by claiming to be an outsider.

Ruto’s electoral epic of “hustler vs. dynasty” seems to have wiped off all reminiscence of his 30-year involvement within the good and unhealthy of Kenya’s politics. This legend gained him a razor-thin victory over Raila Odinga within the August 9 presidential election.

Legends nonetheless work. Ruto is proof. It’s a tribute to the epic of this latter-day, PhD-possessing hustler that in lots of elements of the continent the place the assist of the incumbent is significant to the electoral success of a successor, particularly if each are in the identical get together, he gained regardless of the sitting president whose deputy he has been for 10 years.

This might be an inconceivable story in Nigeria. For instance, former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, additionally present flag bearer of the opposition Peoples Democractic Celebration (PDP) is operating for the fifth time. Twice his electoral distress was spectacularly difficult and finally ruined by President Olusegun Obasanjo, who as president and later as ex, swore that his deputy, Atiku, would solely grow to be president over his lifeless physique.

Within the case of Obasanjo’s eventual successor, Umaru Yar’Adua, even after he had been confirmed lifeless, his deputy Goodluck Jonathan was so afraid to step in that it required the mixed effort of the Nationwide Meeting and CSOs to steer him to take over.

And within the current get together primaries of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), the failure of Vice President Yemi Osinbajo to emerge because the get together’s flagbearer has been broadly attributed to President Muhammadu Buhari’s embarrassing ambivalence.

Even when Osinbajo might have completed a Ruto, and maybe in his quiet moments requested himself why not, it’s unthinkable that he would have jumped off the Buhari wagon with out ending up worse off than Humpty Dumpty.

The boss is a small god. Even at state stage the place governors reign, not many deputies would dare problem their governors to an open electoral contest and dwell to inform the story.

That’s what makes the Ruto story a Nigerian, if not an African, dream. Ruto, who other than being VP can also be Minister of Agriculture, didn’t solely run in defiance of Kenyatta. He has additionally actively opposed Kenyatta’s insurance policies, thumbing his nostril towards the president in March, when the Supreme Courtroom struck down the federal government’s “bridge constructing” constitutional modification that may have reintroduced the 2013 power-sharing association between a president and a primary minister.

Ruto seems to have exceeded his personal expectations by going into the race as an underdog and a first-timer towards a five-time veteran and serial loser, Raila Odinga, who ran in 1997, 2007, 2013, 2017 and now in 2022.

Defeating the dynastic alliance of the son of the primary president and son of the primary vp of the nation after independence was outstanding.

This story, nevertheless, just isn’t about Uhuru. It’s about how a person raised on the bread and water of mainstream politics managed to place himself as an “outsider” and nonetheless caught the voter’s creativeness. It’s also, after all, a few management incubation course of that has seen Kenya maintain common electoral contests and produce a roughly efficient energy transition system through the years.

For Kenya, this yr’s polls are additionally an ideal enchancment on earlier ones that had been marred by violence, which left 1,200 lifeless in 2007 and at the least 37 lifeless in 2017, with hundreds extra fleeing their houses.

Together with Tanzania, Senegal, Zambia and some others, Kenya is without doubt one of the African nations that has not skilled a navy coup in its 59-year historical past since independence from Britain.

It has retained an affordable stage of stability, regardless of the onslaught from extremist al Shabab in subsequent door Somalia, and the interior upheavals in neighbouring nations of Uganda, Rwanda and Sudan.

Nevertheless it needed to wage a guerilla and bloody rebellion to power the British into conceding independence in 1963, two years after outgoing President Uhuru Kenyatta was born.

His father, Jomo Kenyatta, the primary Prime Minister of Kenya, named him Uhuru, which implies “freedom”, in anticipation of independence from Britain.

This story, nevertheless, just isn’t about Uhuru. It’s about how a person raised on the bread and water of mainstream politics managed to place himself as an “outsider” and nonetheless caught the voter’s creativeness. It’s also, after all, a few management incubation course of that has seen Kenya maintain common electoral contests and produce a roughly efficient energy transition system through the years.

Odinga who entered the race as favorite has had one other close to miss, which might effectively be his final. His 48.8% displaying on the consequence sheets is as shut because it might ever get and higher than the 43.4% he polled towards Kenyatta in 2017. At 77, that’s how shut Odinga got here behind his main challenger, who’s 21 years youthful.

Kenya’s democratic journey is getting higher and, hopefully, extra resilient. It’s almost out of the treacherous bend the place incumbents in Africa cook dinner up new constitutions anytime the tip of their tenure is close to.

The independence of the court docket can be put to the check once more. 4 of the seven electoral commissioners have rejected the outcomes of the presidential election, whereas Odinga is asking the court docket to nullify the outcomes and declare him winner.

He’s saying that it was not Ruto’s hustler epic that was at play on August 9. As an alternative, he stated, the Unbiased Electoral and Boundaries Fee (IEBC) obtained in mattress with Ruto, with testosterone provided by the digital wizardry of three Venezuelan mercenaries named in Odinga’s go well with. The consequence, the plaintiff stated in his 15-point go well with, just isn’t a brand new Kenyan electoral prince, however a child monster.

Was there one thing else Ruto may additionally have completed proper to this point, other than his salesmanship? He’s 21 years youthful than his rival and pitched his marketing campaign on the generational gear. He bought himself to the citizens as a progressive, the poster boy, not of Kenya’s previous, however of its future.

In accordance with him, the IEBC sabotaged the elections by discarding vital numbers of legitimate votes and tampering with supplies, together with digital paperwork, units and tools for the election.

He desires the court docket to authorise the graduation of legal investigations towards the Chairman of the IEBC and, above all, to declare him and his operating mate winners of the election.

A civil society community, referred to as Angaza Motion, that seems to be leaning towards Odinga, has additionally filed a petition on the Supreme Courtroom. It argues, notably, that there had been systematic breaches within the electoral know-how regulation and that the four-tier strategy of transmitting outcomes from polling stations to the constituency tallying centres after which to the nationwide tallying centre had been breached.

The final time, in 2017, the courts dominated in Odinga’s favour by annulling the election. However he boycotted the re-run and conceded the presidency to Uhuru. With Kenya’s establishments more and more asserting their authority with transparency, the result of the present judicial tussle may show much more attention-grabbing than the elections.

The consequence will check the outstanding public restraint for the reason that announcement of the results of the election on August 15.

Was there one thing else Ruto may additionally have completed proper to this point, other than his salesmanship? He’s 21 years youthful than his rival and pitched his marketing campaign on the generational gear. He bought himself to the citizens as a progressive, the poster boy, not of Kenya’s previous, however of its future.

With a inhabitants of 48 million individuals and 22 million registered voters, about 40% of whom are younger individuals, the final elections had been very aggressive, with no clear main contender after many days of vote counting.

William Ruto’s marginal win is proof of how very aggressive the method has been. However Kenyans are reaping the advantages of the 2010 amended structure, which limits presidential tenure to 5 years and two phrases.

Ruto seems to have overwhelmed his masters at their very own recreation. In his first post-election speech, the place he promised to guide for God and nation, he additionally declared Odinga’s villain, the electoral fee chairman, a hero within the first spherical. However even Ruto is aware of that in Kenya’s 59-year historical past no single election has been gained or misplaced with out knife-edge drama.

As the daddy of his rival and one of many dynastic patriarchs, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, may need stated, “It’s not but uhuru.”

Azu Ishiekwene is Editor-in-Chief of LEADERSHIP.