In the past week, two senior officials of government have ‘goofed’ in the most callous ways that actually illuminated the overarching priority problem – the ‘truth speakers’ were Interior CS Kipchumba Murkomen and National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula.
The first was Murkomen, the policy chief of the country’s security sector. Responding to the August 16 vicious gang attacks on the Linda Mwananchi caravan in Homa Bay county, Murkomen shockingly asked “Once you have been warned that goons await you, why do you still go there?”
I am certain that everyone who watched the clip rewound it several times to be sure the CS was actually saying that! Murkomen surprises me a lot. Placed in charge of possibly the most powerful ministry, he tends to let his tongue lead his work, even when calm, strategic action is the better option.
In response to Murkomen’s management style, former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua has repeatedly branded the Interior CS “childish” and asked President William Ruto to replace him with “someone from your community, if that’s what you want”.
The Homa Bay violence was preceded by sickening rhetoric from leaders of that county, chiefly Governor Gladys Wanga and Homa Bay Town MP Peter Kaluma. In some cases, the threats of harm were ICC-level criminal talk for which, in a civilised society, someone should have been made to answer, especially after the savagery visited on Linda Mwananchi leaders.
Instead, the CS thought the opposition was at fault by actually going ahead with the visit.
For any watching investors, international development partners and everyone else who plays any role in supporting the sociopolitical and economic stability of Kenya, Murkomen missed the point by miles.
Obviously, in the mind of the Cabinet Secretary, if the thugs are largely pro-government, then it is safe to ignore them and let the criminal acts slide.
But this presupposes that such acts are a one-off. Unfortunately, they are not. Every single act of thuggery that goes unpunished only breeds a culture of free-for-all that, along the road, potentially grows into a cancer of instability.
However, the Interior CS has a boss in the form of the President, who has neither castigated him for his comments nor made any remarks about the Homa Bay violence.
Indeed, the overall picture of instability and the ripple effect created by the growing goon culture should be an indictment of the President as Commander in Chief, especially as he seeks re-election in about 11 months.
It is impossible, it seems, for his surrogates to fully comprehend the gravity of potential instability before what should be a very consequential election.
The other goof in the past week came from a rather predictable quarter: National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula. First, it is simply bizarre that the head of the third arm of government has so willingly surrendered to the Executive in the manner in which he has.
If anything, Parliament, as the people’s representative, is meant to be a safeguard of the country’s democracy, and its leader the high priest of this pursuit of legislative independence.
Unfortunately, the desire to be the regime’s foremost praise-singer has turned Wetang’ula and his charges in Parliament into largely an appendage of the state.
The verbal gaffe by the Speaker about gifted employment letters doesn’t qualify as a goof. It was simply an uncharacteristic moment of truth-telling.
Wetang’ula, while addressing a rally, lamented that after he took some MPs to the President, who issued each of them 10 TSC employment letters, some legislators sold the coveted documents to poor citizens.
It was difficult to tell who was worse. Was it the President who bestowed documents that should have come from the relevant state agency after a competitive hiring process? Or the MPs who sold them?
Part of my gripe with the Ruto regime is related to the place of state institutions in the greater scheme of national governance. Because of the widely acknowledged character of the President as one who micromanages most stuff, the net effect is that his surrogates and state institutions tend to be subservient to his whims.
The Teachers Service Commission is not even the only one – but that is a story for another day. However, this habit has the effect of causing a steady decline in the influence, effectiveness and credibility of state institutions charged with tasks such as recruitment.
One might even argue that the wanton dishing out of appointment letters, from different national sectors, through state cronyism and government networks, has been with us since Independence. That is largely true. Except that by its very nature, it is meant to be a below-the-surface operation involving just a fraction of the overall total slots on offer.
But when no less a person than the Speaker publicly announces that such a practice exists, and, indeed, is a channel for widespread favouritism, that means advertising for vacancies is a mere formality that masks state capture of public institutions.
The Murkomen and Wetang’ula statements reminded me of the trending debate between President Ruto and the opposition, especially the Linda Mwananchi brigade led by Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna.
The President in recent days has repeatedly called the opposition a collection of individuals who lack any agenda for national development and growth, branding them all “brainless”.
In response, the opposition keeps reminding the President that the bigger problem with the country is a “software” issue, not a “hardware” problem.
According to Linda Mwananchi, and they are right, the fundamentals of nationhood, including the rule of law and sovereignty of the people enshrined in the constitution, should be more influential in governance than Ruto’s “shiny things” like brick and mortar development projects.
Yet, each time the President is challenged on this, he flaunts roads, stadia and markets constructed by administration as evidence of growth made possible by his regime. The President appears unable to comprehend how people can fail to see this.
Yet in some cases, such priorities appear off when juxtaposed against citizens’ needs. During a recent Linda Mwananchi rally in Voi, Taita Taveta county, residents bemoaned the ongoing construction of a stadium in the town.
They said the magnificent sports facility should have taken second place to dependable mass water supply infrastructure in a county suffering a painful water shortage.
But beyond this comparison of priorities, the overall picture that emerges from the values debate is that the regime sees its concrete-based projects as strong enough to build a case for reelection.
Murkomen’s trivialising of the violence and deaths in Homa Bay, and Wetangula’s revelations of employment letters handed over from State House are just a fraction of how the “software” isn’t working in the Ruto government.
When Gen Z stormed the streets in June 2024, everything they demanded were software issues. The high cost of living, taxation, rising national debt, police brutality and parliamentary reforms were among their top issues.
Those who died on the streets over these ideals were clear that national development had to be preceded by an environment of freedom and justice. As a popular politician likes to say, even dictators build shiny concrete things, but none of these can replace the right to life, freedom and liberty.
President Ruto appears increasingly frustrated that large parts of the populace are unable to embrace the shiny things bestowed by his regime. But by missing the software angle pushed by many citizens, the head of state and his regime will remain at odds with the needs and desires of large sections of Kenya’s citizenry.
The writer is a political commentator
