Re: Kibaki will win this Year's Elections

William Munene wrote:

Dear Kenyans:



It looks increasingly like President Kibaki will run and win a second term. Kibaki’s victory will be a triumph of pragmatism and progress over ethnic division and hatred. We could even simplify this further and say that it will be a triumph of good over evil.

By this I do not mean to label the opposition evil, opposition is a central and necessary ingredient in a healthy democracy. The evil is in the tactics adopted by the most virulent section of the opposition. This section led by LDP base their campaign against the President on fanning the flames of ethnic hatred and regionalism.

LDP and their de-facto leader Raila Odinga were once members of the ruling coalition NARC. Soon after NARC came into power LDP devised a plan to take over power for themselves, seeking what Raila Odinga referred to as “a luo presidency”. Early on in the new goverment LDP was introducing a tribal or ethnic component to its politics. In LDP’s agenda published shortly after NARC came to power, LDP stated “4. The government must be isolated and shown as a Mt. Kenya backed government without national appeal.” This simple statement signaled LDP’s intention to create regional division and to ride the consequent wave of ethnic hatred to power(Raila’s tsunami).

But is this evil you may ask. The answer is a blunt yes. The deadliest conflicts in the twentieth century all occurred in areas of great ethnic diversity, where politicians exploited ethnicity as a weapon to achieve political power. The byproduct in all these areas has been a paroxysm or “tsunami” of ethnic violence and ethnic cleansing that left millions dead. So when LDP lights the match of tribalism and tosses it into the tinderbox that is Kenya, they are displaying a callous disregard for life in their gluttonous quest for power.

Ethnic hatred is a powerful weapon and that is why LDP chose that route to power. But how are they deploying it and why won’t it work. The first thing that LDP’s and their apologists have done is to try and paint the government as a Mount Kenya affair just like their agenda plotted.

LDP have used lies like the cabinet and civil service are mostly from the Kikuyu tribe of President Mwai Kibaki even though this is public information and easily disproved. LDP has beaten this drum repeatedly raising ethnic sensitivity to unrealistic levels especially among their supporter. The result is that any Kikuyu or other Kenyan with a Kikuyu sounding name who happens to be in government is viewed as proof of Kibaki’s tribalism. By promoting this view LDP seeks to create ethnic grievance and therefore try to isolate Kikuyus and rally other tribes behind their leader Raila.

There have been a myriad other lies promoted by LDP all designed to promote a sense of ethnic grievance and all thoroughly debunked but yet repeated endlessly by LDP’s tribal warriors. We all know allegations that the majority of government scholarships go to Kikuyus easily debunked when the list was produced in Parliament. The allegation that 70% of DC’s are Kikuyus , that only Kikuyus are benefiting from the economy, that Nyanza failed KCPE because education money was allocated to central province and not Nyanza. That Kikuyus are stealing and robbing the country blind and a thousand other pernicious lies.

Interestingly at the height of LDP’s ethnic campaign they accuse the President some saying “Kibaki has never missed a chance to remind us of his intense tribal leanings”. Despite this kind of patently false statements the LDP ethnic hatred campaign is coming to naught. Even though LDP have succeeded in polarizing the country along tribal lines they have been unable to harness that tribal hatred they have generated to propel Raila to power. Instead other regions have come up with their own champions and it is not clear that they will support Raila in the end.

A major problem with LDP’s ethnic campaign is that it is based on lies. It generates ethnic division but destroys Raila and LDP’s credibility. LDP has maintained that Kibaki has done nothing for Kenya, he has been asleep, incompetent etc. LDP has persisted in this fiction for almost 5 years but in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary they appear increasingly delusional.

Recently LDP leader Raila Odinga has been forced to grudgingly admit the gains the government has made. Raila lauds govt development effort an incongruous statement on Raila’s part. Raila did not recently discover what the government had done, rather his lies were becoming increasingly exposed in the face of unassailable evidence of economic and social progress.

Now Raila’s is treating us to ridiculous contortionist tricks as he tries to lay claim to the governments development record even as he trashes the President. Lang’ata MP Raila Odinga wants some of the achievements made by the Government credited to ODM-K.. Obviously ODM-K has never been in goverment so he must be reffering to LDP. If ODM-K (LDP) want to claim the governments successes are they willing to claim it’s failures?

Even the Presidents staunchest and most unfair critics the Standard Newspaper were forced by the weight of facts to admit the governments great progress. Economy promising despite political heat . It is the cognitive dissonance between LDP’s message of hatred and ethnic grievance and actual events that is responsible for the failure of LDP’s campaign against the goverment.

Recent polls indicate that a majority of Kenyans support the President and recognize the governments achievements. This will be a unique occurrence in the world finally pragmatism will defeat the forces of ethnic prejudice. Another incredible triumph for the man from Othaya who has all along preached hard work and a Working Nation while leading the way by keeping his mouth shut and his foot on the pedal..

Have a great Weekend!!