A Political Kenya: Latest Politics and Kenya Economy News

It is clear for everyone to see that the grand coalition will not work. It is also clear for all to see that Kibaki and Raila do not give a damn about Kenyans. Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) will not be resettled in the near future. Kenyans will remain refugees in their own country in the Rift Valley for a long time.

As this happens, Raila will be seen to be very naive as he gets duped a fifth time.

He was duped in the 80s as he fought for the liberation of Kenya. He did not have a mandate from Kenyans to do this. He was under instructions from the one man whom he is still fighting for. Enough said.

Raila had his second round as he fought for the control of Ford Kenya party. He was trying to wrestle the mantle of leadership from Kijana Wamalwa. Pictures of him diving for cover at Thika National Stadium are vivid. He had to move out.

His third round was with the man he demonised since the 80s. Daniel Toroitich Arap Moi. It was the infamous KANU-NDP merger. He was angling for the mantle of leadership. It is documented history he was duped by the "professor of politics". He moved out.

He went to bed with Mwai Kibaki in 2002. They won the election. The 'gentleman' reneged on the famed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU). Raila and team fought him passionately for five years and Kibaki completed his 5-year term without a sweat. Along the way Raila had to move out. A fourth time.

In 2008, Raila is at it again. The man believes he won an election. He loves Kenya so much. Passionately so. To the point of becoming Kenya's newest kid on the block. Kenya's cry baby. The point is, Raila is about to be duped again. Musalia Mudavadi over the weekend said that Raila has made too many concessions. It was a message to Kibaki that Raila is going no further. Mudavadi is ODM's "gentleman".

Scratch the surface of Mudavadi's utterances.Actually, you will find that message was very much directed to Raila. Captain, you are about to be conned! A fifth time!

So much so that ODM cannot trust the man to have a private meeting with Kibaki. He cannot be trusted to cut a deal for ODM. He will give up too much.

Yesterday, it was Musalia Mudavadi, William Ruto, Najib Balala, Dalmas Otieno and Charity Ngilu who had to deliver ODM's message to Kibaki. Raila may give up further but ODM has reached an irreducible minimum. Raila was nowhere to be seen. The ODM captain could not do such a simple task. Lest he gives up the foreign affairs and local government and tourism and roads and transport and energy and cabinet affairs and the premiership.

Kibaki has indicated he wants to deal with Raila. He knows the captain's soft spot. To him, Raila is easy to con. Will it be a fifth time? Will he move out?

It is now 3pm in Kenya. The time that Kibaki and Raila had promised to announce the bloated 40 member cabinet. Kenya does not have a cabinet so far. Kibaki and Raila has been holed up at Harambee House since 1000HRS. Kibaki has left for lunch. He will be back at 4pm for further consultation. Or he may decide to pull a fast one and announce the cabinet from state house.

The PNU cabinet members are currently assembling at Harambee house. The pentagon members and several ODM MPs have also gone to Harambee House.

The current bone of contention revolves around local government, foreign affairs and energy ministries, among other weighty ministries.

The grand coalition may be on the edge; on the brink of collapse. ODM has said it will not concede further. Kenya may soon face the undetermined fate of collapse of the grand coalition. The National Accord and Reconciliation Act is silent on what happens when the coalition collapses. ODM insists that it should lead to a national election. PNU sympathizers say the collapse of the coalition does not mean the collapse of government. Therefore the status before the coalition will be automatically reinstated. Kibaki will continue running the government and remain as head of state.

UPDATE AT 5.45PM

Cabinet talks postponed until tomorrow, Monday 7th April, afternoon. Another Kenyan day wasted by Kibaki and Raila!!

I tend to think it will be bad. Worse than Kenyatta's or Moi's. Kibaki has been the most divisive president Kenya has ever had or will ever have. More destruction has been done in his watch. He failed to fight corruption, despite the public goodwill. Was dishonest to the people who campaigned for him when he was bedridden. Especially Raila. He reneged on a gentleman's agreement. He is now perceived as a dishonest gentleman. Treated with suspicion with those he deals with. Who cannot be taken at his word. What a paradox?

Why the protracted struggle to agree on a cabinet? Kibaki did not want to share real power. One wonders why he signed the deal. He still did not want to give ODM the weighty ministries. The die was cast. Kibaki has no choice but to share real power. It is not about PNU hardliners. What has come up is that he is the hardliner.

For now, Kibaki and Raila has agreed on cabinet formation. Both, cabinet size and portfolio balance has been agreed on. A cabinet size of 40. ODM to get weighty ministries of foreign affairs, local government, tourism, roads, transport, energy, agriculture, immigration and health. PNU to have internal security, defence, finance, provincial administration, justice and constitutional affairs, water and irrigation, information and communications and public works.

Kibaki needs to realize that this is not the end, but the beginning. He MUST give ODM the latitude and independence to operate these ministries. He MUST know that ODM has a showbiz component that is to the extreme of his conservative and silent nature. ODM has an affinity to the public and the public has an unwavering affection to ODM. This knowledge SHOULD make him understand that ODM will run the show. Kibaki and his sidekicks SHOULD NOT stand in the way of ODM running Kenya. I think that is Kenya's fate. The sooner Kibaki and his supporters internalize this knowledge Kenya will move forward.

THEY ARE NOT HAGGLING over who gets to run the Education, Agriculture or Health ministries. No, both the parties are more interested in dockets such as Finance and Internal Security.

So it is evident that it is not about service. It is all about money and power. Kenyans have been placed in anxiety once again because the political overlords cannot resolve a stalemate that is delaying the formation of the so-called grand coalition government.

Kenya was pulled back from the brink with the historic accord between President Kibaki and Mr Raila Odinga meant to settle the post-election crisis.

And things moved speedily after that when Parliament passed in record time the necessary legislation to pave the way for a unity government.

The impasse that has since come to the fore, essentially a disagreement over who gets what in the new arrangement, threatens to undo all that has been achieved so far and send Kenya back to anarchy.

It is time our leaders were reminded that the agreement was not merely about sharing power and wealth, but about rescuing Kenyans from ethnic conflagration and a place alongside Somalia on the premier league table of African failed states.

I would like to believe President Kibaki and Mr Odinga signed the agreement, not because chief mediator Kofi Annan held a gun to their heads or because the United States and the European powers exerted tremendous diplomatic pressure, but because both finally recognised that their subjects faced mortal danger if they remained obdurate.

Why then should they both become stubborn again over what should be a minor details after the broad principles have been agreed on?

Perhaps that is a reflection of the weakness of the accord. It was strong as a statement of principle but scanty on the details, presuming probably that both the parties signed it in good faith and would respect the spirit in which it was reached.

It assumed then that both the parties were gentlemen of honour, neglecting to take into account a little history of deceit, back-stabbing, dishonoured pacts, blackmail, warmongering and lust for power.

Maybe soon enough, common sense will prevail and we will have the unity government. There could be plenty of progress if President Kibaki relented and allowed ODM to have some of the powerful ministries it craves so that there can, indeed, be a balance in portfolio sharing as stipulated in the agreement.

Balance, it should be obvious to anybody, is not just about equal numbers in the unity Cabinet, but also in the weight and power of the ministries.

AN EQUAL STAKE IN THE PROPOSED Cabinet is really not too much for ODM to demand. My bet is that if they got that, they would promptly drop their demand for a lean Cabinet and happily take their places in the monster of a 44-strong team proposed by PNU.

The size of the Cabinet is not really the issue, though it has been adroitly seized on because of the hostility to such a bloated monstrosity.

I have argued on this column before against a bloated Cabinet.

Even the 34 proposed by ODM, compared to PNU’s 44, is still too big in my view. A maximum of 18 ministers should be able to perform just as well, and certainly be more manageable, than the kind of numbers both sides are talking about.

But then we must all at some point make compromises. I am willing to settle for a bloated Cabinet if that is what, alongside portfolio balance, will unlock the stalemate.

But then, since appointment to the Cabinet is about political reward and the massaging of egos, we should recognise that those so favoured possess no particular skills or expertise, and should not really be entrusted with any serious work.

We can let them enjoy the limousines and the retinue of flunkies at taxpayers’ expense, but reinforce the role of an apolitical public service as the real nerve centre of government operations.

That will also mean, of course, that ODM drops its demands for the right to appoint its own party cadre as permanent secretaries, provincial commissioners, judges, ambassadors, parastatal chief executives, military and police top brass, school principals and other public service jobs.

But that will also have to be preceded by an exercise in which the public service is cleaned of all existing officers who might have been appointed on political considerations instead of skills, training, experience and competence.

But even if everything worked out and the grand coalition government is formed, I still fear that it will not work as a government. The kind of mutual suspicion we are witnessing can easily be carried over into a new Cabinet.

What is supposed to be a united government could collapse into an arrangement where parties in the coalition are working at cross-purposes and actively undermining one another in the power-games.

As he serves out his last term, President Kibaki has the unique opportunity to rise above the fray for a stable and prosperous Kenya — he is not looking for votes, so he should not be beholden to any politicians or ethnic, regional or other interest groups.

THE KENYA POWER AND LIGH-ting Company recently celebrated its one millionth customer by awarding her a refrigerator. Its management ought to be sacked en masse for celebrating such failure.

KPLC was established 85 years ago. It has taken that long to connect one million customers. This works out to just over 30 customers a day – for 85 years.

And this in a captive market where KPLC is the only legal electricity distributor, a market with massive growth potential that is held back only by the mediocrity that masquerades as power services from KPLC.

The tale of the corporation hides some details: for, with KPLC, getting connected and staying connected to the power grid are rather different matters. Virtually all KPLC customers incur extra costs to ensure continuity in the face of the corporation’s erratic services.

The power consumer has effectively had to develop a lifestyle that presumes at least a few hours of “power rationing” every day. It is virtually unheard of to have a full week of uninterrupted power.

The KPLC story is parallel to that of the Kenya Posts and Telecommunications Corporation and its successors.

Initially set up as part of the East African Posts and Telecommunications Corporation, KPTC became independent after the break-up of the EAC in 1977.

Faced with eventual collapse, the parastatal was eventually broken up into Telkom Kenya, the Postal Corporation of Kenya, and the Communications Commission of Kenya – to provide telecommunications, postal and regulatory services, respectively.

However, it was only the liberalisation of the mobile phone sector in the late 1990s, and the entry of private, service-driven and market-oriented companies, that allowed the majority of Kenyans to access and enjoy telephone services.

KPLC’s development has mirrored this path – to a point. Originally part of the East Africa Power and Lighting Corporation, the company became KPLC when the EAC broke up.

THERE FOLLOWED AN EXTENDED period of dormancy, in which KPLC became a byword for corruption.

Eventually, KPLC was broken up into KenGen, KPLC itself, and a regulatory body. But, unlike the telecoms sector, the power sector has not been taken fully down the path to liberalisation.

The Government continues to dither as the State utility sets ridiculously low targets for itself, and then fails to meet them.

The statistics are embarrassing. With demand expected to top 1500 MW by 2010, KPLC/KenGen’s installed generating capacity is little over that “in normal weather conditions”.

This means that a little drought starves consumers of power, while system losses in transmission and distribution mean that the effective capacity of our power sector is actually less than 60 per cent of the installed capacity.

And as the absurd “celebration” in Mombasa points out, KPLC is way behind target: a mere 16 per cent of Kenyans have access to power. KPLC answers such concerns with a silly excuse: that “KPLC only distributes what KenGen and other producers sell it”.

This raises questions which the Government has so far failed to answer: how to speed up the electrification of Kenya, and how to ensure stability of power supplies throughout the country.

The answer is obvious: increasing efficiency and supplies by fully liberalising the power generation and distribution.

In response to pressure from the World Bank, the government allowed a few Independent Power Producers into the sector when Kenya faced severe power shortages a few years back. But even these are a mere drop.

What is required is a complete removal of the monopolies enjoyed by both KPLC and KenGen.

Mr Wanyonyi is an information systems professional working in the Middle East.

THERE’S NO DOUBT KENYA IS healing. Slowly, we are emerging from the darkest period of our independent history. Everyone is talking peace – even notoriously hawkish politicians now strive to sound nice.

There are great expectations of the new grand coalition government, a general feeling that the post-election carnage should become truly a turning point in our national life.

For Christians, the nation’s majority, this is also a most appropriate time for soul-searching. Politicians have rethought their agendas and methods and, for the sake of the nation, made compromises unimaginable a few months ago.

One of the happiest outcomes of the negotiations is dismantling of the ‘‘imperial presidency’’, condemned for years by advocates of democratic reform, including the Church, as the foundation of dictatorship and corruption.

It is no longer business as usual in the political arena. What about the Church? Are not changes needed there too?

As professed followers of the Prince of Peace whose law is love, Christians turned on their neighbours with demonic barbarity. They killed, maimed, looted, raped, torched and evicted. They fuelled hate through telephone and email messages, and laughed at their ethnicity. They became agents of evil.

What can possibly explain this blatant hypocrisy? Poor Church leadership? Already, Protestant and evangelical pastors publicly admitted that their voice was “swallowed up by the cacophony of those of other vested interests.” They urged “Church leaders to recapture their strategic position as the moral authority of the nation.”

Bishop Peter Kairo, expressed similar sentiments at Easter. “I accept that we have come from trying moments where at times it was hard to keep to our Christian values. But I urge you to come back to Christ and beg for forgiveness.”

But the problem appears to be deep-rooted, not merely a lapse of judgment on the part of the clergy and the faithful in the heat of political passions.

DESPITE THE HUGE CHRISTIAN numbers, people’s daily lives generally do not seem to be sufficiently influenced by the faith. Some theologians have concluded that it is because African converts to Christianity never received a positively transformative evangelisation. They were taught only to “pray and obey.”

The evangelisation also destroyed African cultural identity and disempowered the people by disconnecting the Gospel from the deep human desire for holistic development.

Believers were not taught that salvation also meant liberation from every form of oppression; that authentic Christian living included not only going to church, but also demanding it for everyone from the holders of authority.

It is apparent that consciences still remain largely untouched by the social justice dimension of the faith. On their part, Christian political rulers in Africa took advantage of infused obeisance and went on to become dictators who drove their people to great misery.

Though the Church has played a role in the advancement of good governance in Africa, that role has mostly been limited to outspokenness of the clergy, and not “conscientising and mobilising the masses into political activism in the mould of the biblical prophets,” as Father Iheanyi Enwerem says in an article in the current issue of the Catholic journal, African Ecclesial Review.

In mostly Christian Kenya, for instance, the Church’s involvement in civic education has not boosted public awareness of governance issues.

Ugandan theologian, Fr Dr Deusdedit Nkurunziza, also writing in the African Ecclesial Review, calls for a paradigm shift, “not just to prolong and repeat day after day, year after year, the evangelisation inherited from European missionaries,” but to restore the identity and dignity of Africans, “with emphasis on the right to development.”

To that end, Fr Nkurunzuza proposes inclusion of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the African Charter for Human and People’s Rights in African catechisms.

I DON’T KNOW ABOUT YOU, BUT I am getting rather fed up of seeing our politicians revert to the bad old days of showing off their power through symbols of wealth, such as armoured cars, golfing jaunts and corteges of security personnel (who have a tendency to fly out of moving cars in a show of bravado).

It is almost as if they are completely unaware that thousands of women and children are still living in deplorable camps around the country and that almost the entire country is in a state of depression.

Frankly, most Kenyans don’t care if their politicians drive the latest Mercedes 500S or an old, beaten-up Toyota pick-up.

In fact, given that inequality has been cited as one of the root causes of the recent violence, it appears odd that the leading proponents of equity and justice should now become such blatantly conspicuous consumers of luxury goods.

Perhaps this is not so surprising. As Kalundi Serumaga, a Ugandan film producer who lived as a refugee in Kenya in the 1980s, has said, Kenya has a unique capacity to “normalise the abnormal”.

How else can we explain the fact that a country where half the population cannot afford to eat more than one meal a day is one of the biggest client bases of the Daimler-Benz corporation?

Or that people with an acre of land are killed for their property while those holding on to thousands of acres are not only left alone, but elected to Parliament?

I have yet to hear a politician speak about passing a Bill to cut politicians’ salaries – a sore point with many Kenyans – or talking about the reforms that need to be accelerated now that we have a coalition government.

All we have heard since February 28 is speculation about who might get which ministerial post and whether each tribe will be represented.

Talk about de-ethnicising Kenya has already been forgotten: our politicians, from both sides of the divide, have ensured that ethnicity remains the main criterion for a Government post.

In other more developed countries, it is not unusual to see heads of state mingling with ordinary folk or even using public transport.( I was stunned recently to see a photo of Gordon Brown using the London Underground.)

This is not to say that politicians don’t deserve security or a relatively comfortable standard of living; the point is, these luxuries should be commensurate with a country’s GDP.

So instead of having 100 security officers following them around, why do these leaders not settle for say, 10? Why do they act as if they are running some kind of superpower?

AFRICAN LEADERS HAVE NO HANG-ups about hogging taxpayers’ money at the expense of their own populations, the majority of whom are poor.

They face no moral dilemmas as they squander their nations’ wealth to make their own lives more comfortable, or to build self-glorifying monuments.

This culture of self-aggrandisement has become an epidemic on the continent. Remember Mobutu Sese Seko who built himself eleven “palaces” while his people starved? Or how about the unforgettable Jean-Bedel Bokassa who declared himself “Emperor” of the Central African Republic, and then spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on a coronation ceremony?

Is it not a shame that the poorest region in the world has produced some of the most extravagant leaders?

When a country goes through a revolution, one of the first things the revolution’s leaders do is to institute reforms immediately in order to capitalise on the changed mood in the country.

For instance, when Fidel Castro took over Cuba from the gluttonous General Fulgencio Batista in 1959, the first thing he did was to institute rural land reforms and to make access to health and education the birthright of every Cuban.

Whether or not his policies were the right ones is debatable, but through these reforms, Castro managed to gain the loyalty and support of millions of Cubans who were living in grinding poverty.

Apart from the implementation of free primary education, no significant reforms took place after Kenya’s 2002 revolution.

The moment and the goodwill of Kenyans were wasted as politicians jostled for power or consolidated their personal or political interests.

The 2008 revolution, if I may call it that, has also left a bitter taste in the mouths of many Kenyans, who expected to see genuine commitment among leaders to address historical injustices and to bring about greater equity.

This may still happen, but the momentum is probably already lost, as it was in 2002.

What Kenyans don’t want to see is the establishment of dozens of lengthy, money draining commissions of inquiry, as was done in 2003, which will serve only to gloss over – and bury – some of the more painful truths about how this country has been governed in the last 40 years.