Mt Kenya: New opposition stronghold in Kenya

By SAM OMWENGA

No one would have ever predicted a time when the Mt Kenya region would be reduced to an opposition stronghold no less than Nyanza has been since independence. Yet, even without the inevitable being done with the impeachment of Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua—or his resignation, it is clear the region will never be the same.

To be clear, ‘Mt Kenya region’ means the Agikuyu community and their cousins from the region. These communities in the decades past were influential, powerful and dominant, and formed what was known as Gikuyu, Embu, Meru and Akamba.  It was a foregone conclusion following independence that the country’s politics and governance would be controlled and dominated by the House of Mumbi, the “G” in the GEMA composition.

However, what is fascinating—and partially explains what is unfolding before our own eyes now—is that there was once a clique around the first president who felt so entitled and confident of their ability to cling to power that they promised that power would never cross the Chania River to Murang’a and Nyeri districts.

In other words, in view and belief of this clique, forget about power ever leaving the House of Mumbi, but within the House of Mumbi, power would only be kept and maintained in Kiambu, the homestead of the first president.

There was only one problem: the constitution then provided that the vice president automatically succeeded the president for 90 days if there was a vacancy in the president's office. This meant that, were something to happen to Jomo Kenyatta, Daniel Arap Moi was to be sworn as president for a period of 90 days, which, as everyone knew, was enough to make sure he was formally elected or rigged in to continue serving as president.

The efforts of the same Kiambu clique to ensure that did not happen were thwarted in large part by the brilliant intervention and assistance of then Attorney General Charles Njonjo, who played a big role in paving the way for Moi to succeed Kenyatta when he passed on in 1978.

Moi would then embark on a process to dismantle GEMA systematically during his 24-year reign, but interestingly—Moi decided to quickly groom and attempt to have then little known son of Jomo Kenyatta to succeed him in 2002.

Whatever the reason or motivation, Moi’s effort to impose his chosen successor was overwhelmingly rejected. Instead, we had the quasi-coronation of Mwai Kibaki as president after opposition doyen Raila Odinga made the famous Kibaki Tosha declaration.

Kibaki’s election so jubilated the nation and brought with it such high hopes that no one saw the fallout coming between Kibaki and Raila, let alone the country nearly plunging into a civil war following the fallout and face-off in the tragic 2007 election.

In efforts that I am happy to have been a part of, we managed to secure peace and the formation of a coalition government of Kibaki and Raila. The 2007 election and PEV had the victims of the violence, but it also gave rise to something else that we are in the middle of presently.

When Raila made it possible for Kibaki to be overwhelmingly elected in 2002, hardly anything was ever said about Kibaki also defeating the Kiambu clique, which had made it known that power would never cross the Chania River to Nyeri or Murang’a, let alone anywhere else in Kenya.

However, following PEV and especially following the peace accord, it was no doubt agreed among the ones pulling the strings and calling the shots to have a unity of purpose in expanding the hold of power to say the presidency should never leave the larger Mt Kenya region.

Uhuru tried but failed to break this backward belief. His vision was to help Raila get elected and help heal the wounds of the past. That would not come to pass.

Ruto appears to be making ground on this front, and if he succeeds as he is poised to, those opposed from the region will be relegated to being a vocal opposition without much else to write home about.