Corruption issues expected to dominate election campaigns

Corruption scandals, dating back to Goldenberg, are expected to take centre stage in the election campaigns.

A hint that corruption may determine which side wins the August elections was witnessed on Friday and Saturday when Jubilee and National Super Alliance leaders went at each other’s jugular, naming scandals their rivals were reportedly involved in.

On Sunday, Prof Larry Gumbe, an opposition leaning analyst, said corruption and failure of the Jubilee administration to fulfil promises would form the campaign platform for the opposition.

“It (campaign theme) is going to be corruption and the ineptitude of the government. It has broken every promise made to Kenyans, has allowed corruption to lead to high cost of living and yet they look at Kenyans in the eye and lie to them,” he said by phone.

Not done with his claims against Nasa principals on Saturday, National Assembly Majority Leader Aden Duale said Jubilee had made the issue of corruption an agenda in the campaigns.

“Our campaign is to present to Kenyans the other side of Nasa principals. We want to tell the country that the corruption propaganda they are peddling is false. We are saying they also have a history,” he said on phone.

It has emerged that each side has a built a dossier on corruption on its rival and will unleash it in the remaining two and half months of the campaigns.

While Nasa has dug deep into scandals like Eurobond and National Youth Service whose whole story is yet to be told, Jubilee has files on opposition alliance chiefs.

It is significant to note that election campaigns in Kenya from the 1990s have been driven with one agenda.

Between 1997 and 2007, delivery of a new Constitution was the main agenda while the International Criminal Court cases against President Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto were the themes in 2013.

Signs that corruption would top the campaign agenda were clear on Friday when opposition presidential candidate Raila Odinga, who was being endorsed by ODM delegates, said Jubilee presided over theft of public resources and should be shown the door.

“We are seeking to uproot Jubilee, which has made corruption our second name and nature, that has sent the cost of living beyond reach; that has turned tribalism and nepotism into government policy and denied youths the opportunity to get jobs,” he said.

The following day at Bomas of Kenya during President Kenyatta’s endorsement as Jubilee flagbearer, Mr Duale said Mr Kalonzo Musyoka was a beneficiary of illegally-acquired NYS land in Yatta while Mr Musalia Mudavadi was named in a corruption dossier on Goldenberg and a cemetery land.

Mr Duale said Mr Moses Wetang’ula was linked to the illegal sale of Kenya’s embassy in Japan.

Jubilee vice chairman David Murathe said corruption had permeated society to an extent that it was difficult to make it a campaign agenda.