Will Uhuru go for broke and defy ICC?

When Mr Uhuru Kenyatta contested the presidency in 2002 as outgoing President Daniel arap Moi’s hand-picked successor on the Kanu ticket, he sought to project himself as the young, modern, cosmopolitan, detribalised, dotcom candidate.

He was up against Narc’s Mwai Kibaki, who his campaign naturally depicted as representing the old order of ageing Gema tribal elders, befuddled and lost in the new era of cyberspace.

Mr Kenyatta’s 180-degree turn was completed on Friday when Gema leaders repeated their endorsement of his political leadership for the Kikuyu, Embu and Meru communities.

The leaders implicitly crowned Mr Kenyatta as the community’s supreme political leader and anointed successor to President Kibaki.

But the meeting of the Gema Cultural Association was about much more than those present hand-picking their candidate for the Kibaki succession.

It was more about the Kikuyu community building a defensive laager around Mr Kenyatta over his indictment by the International Criminal Court on charges of crimes against humanity arising out of the post-2007 election violence.

The Limuru II Declaration and fighting rhetoric from various speakers — including retired Bishops Lawi Imathiu and Peter Njenga — presented the spectre of a Kikuyu community under siege and uniting to wage war against common enemies.

Speeches made it clear that the common enemy alluded to was Prime Minister Raila Odinga, the ICC and western governments, particularly Britain.

The common thread was that there was some grand conspiracy involving the ICC and the former colonial master, Britain, to keep Mr Kenyatta from the ballot come the next elections so that Mr Odinga could have an easy ride to State House in succeeding another Gema hero, President Kibaki.

In their keynote speeches, both Bishops Imathiu and Njenga liberally made reference to contentious document presented in Parliament aimed at proving such a plot, pointedly ignoring the fact that it was widely believed to have been a forgery.

They also played up Mr Kenyatta’s nationalist credential as part of a narrative harking back to the Mau Mau war of liberation and Britain’s supposedly continuing quest to reclaim its role as Kenya’s colonial master.

In his speech, Mr Kenyatta was adamant that he will be on the ballot, Hague or no Hague, and that ties in with the resolution to push for postponement of the ICC trials until after the elections.

The argument is that the next elections cannot be free and fair if Mr Kenyatta is denied the right to stand because he may be in the dock at the ICC.

If the planned petition to the ICC and the United Nations makes no headway, then what?

It is likely that left unsaid at the meeting was that if the Kikuyu community does not recognise the “foreign, imperialist, neo-colonial” judicial process in the far-off Dutch town, then Mr Kenyatta will not be obliged to travel to The Hague for trial.

That is the message that has been spread across the Kikuyu community where Mr Kenyatta is being likened to a reincarnation of his father, founding President Mzee Jomo Kenyatta, who led valiant battle against the colonial regime.

Mr Kenyatta has already exploited his ICC troubles to great effect in shoring up his political hold on the Kikuyu community.

That is why on the evening prior to the Gema parley, he reacted so angrily to a headline in the Star newspaper claiming that he and ICC co-accused William Ruto would drop out of the presidential race and unite their forces behind Deputy Prime Minister Musalia Mudavadi.

The latter has already caused ripples in ODM with a challenge for the presidential nomination that has shaken Mr Odinga’s hold on the party.

It serves Mr Mudavadi well to convince his supporters that he has a large major endorsement coming, but at the same time Mr Kenyatta dare not show his own supporters that he has given up the fight.

All indications are that Mr Kenyatta intends to remain in the race come what may.

As Mr Kenyatta supporters are primed to increasingly hold the ICC in suspicion, feeling seem to be growing that he does not stand any chances of a fair trial, hence it might be better to go for broke and defy the international court.

Such an act of defiance would of course be greatly bolstered if he was safely seated at State House, and, like President al-Bashir of Sudan, shielded from the clutches of the court.

Mr Gaitho is the Special Projects Managing Editor at Nation Media Group. Email: [email protected]