Individual officials, not the IEBC, could be the problem

The difference between an institution and its managers sticks out like Nairobi’s Kenyatta International Convention Centre. Highly knowledgeable since they are in social science, Raila Odinga, Kalonzo Musyoka and Moses Wetang’ula should know this a little more than they reveal in their utterances.

Yet a sardonic English storyteller would have recognised Kenya’s opposition chiefs as Three Men in a Boat (Not to Mention the Dog), this being the ever faithful follower of their Cord confederation).

For, in their boat mentality, the trio want Kenyans to believe that there is no difference between the national election body – as a standing institution – and the individuals who may be in charge of it from time to time.

As everybody knows, however, although, on paper, a political institution may promise you the man in the moon, the promised ideal may prove achievable only so long as the individuals implementing them possess certain technical abilities and ethical qualities.

In a word, Kenya’s perennial election problems seem to stem, not necessarily from the supervisory body itself (as an institution) but only from those who manage that body (as individuals). In other words, in its present criticism of the government, the opposition alliance should clearly distinguish between the institution and the individuals who run it.

That thought invades my mind every time the chiefs of the opposition alliance open their mouths to demand that the election body be scrapped.

To my mind, such a demand powerfully demonstrates our failure to distinguish between an ideal and what a human society may be practising in the name of that ideal.

PRESIDENCY MUST GO

The question is thus inevitable: According to the opposition chiefs, why must the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) be disbanded? Simply because the oppositionists are not happy with the way the IEBC handled the last national polls. In truth, even I and many other Kenyans were not happy with the IEBC’s performance at all levels of that exercise.

The difference is that I wouldn’t demand the IEBC’s scrapping in such vague terms. To do so is like saying that even the presidency must go just because one is not happy with the performance of the present occupant of State House.

In other words, if it is the President’s performance that disappoints you, please say so, for there may be ways of dealing with your complaint.
But do not be vague. Do not say “the presidency” when what you mean is only the president. As long as he or she remains popular, the President can serve only two terms (of five years each).

What is permanent is only the presidential chair. The chairperson, the President, may be ousted from election to election. What cannot be ousted is the chair itself, namely, the presidency.

In a word, you must distinguish between an institution and the person who heads it during any given time and place. Most of our institutions are permanent. But there are clear rules – both administrative and ethical – by which, from time to time, the individuals who head them must be replaced by other individuals.

In other words, an inquiry may reveal that, even as it is constituted, the IEBC is not necessarily the problem. The problem may not necessary be due to any individual’s deliberate attempt to disappoint Kenyans in their deeply emotive expectations of clean and fair polls.

The problem may lie only in the fact that the President, a deeply self-interested party, also enjoys the right to appoint all the election commissioners.

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