After rigged primaries fears of violence in main act mounting

Schools are planning for post-election violence.

Their worst case scenario is that candidates might be unable to attend school normally after the election until October, just in time for the exams.

I was astounded. I am not faulting the schools for being sensible, I am just aghast at the fact that we learnt nothing – absolutely zero – in 2007 and we might be prepared to go that route again.

The party primaries provided little comfort: Political parties rigged their own nominations.

If they do the same in the main election, who is to stop them?

POLITICAL INSTABILITY
In 2007, I completely missed the signs of the looming meltdown.

I had a foolish faith in Kenyans and their good sense.

I remember then US President George Bush coming to Tanzania to discuss, among other issues, the prospect of violence in the then impending Kenyan election.

I might have written some dismissive piece advising then Tanzanian President Jakaya Kikwete to mind the political instability of his own country.

So are we going to have post-election violence or are those schools being skittish?

NO JUSTICE
The country is deeply divided; there isn’t the same level of “ngo’a sangari” and “bring out the Mungiki” incitement as there was in 2007, but there is an army of hate mongering inciters online, all allied to one or the other political dispensation.

There is widespread impunity and weak law enforcement.

Jubilee politicians can say almost anything they like, perhaps even buy and distribute machetes, and get away with it.

The opposition can move from one end of the country to the other preaching that the election is already rigged, being rigged or will be rigged and offer not an iota of proof, and go completely unmolested by the law.

Politicians are emboldened; they are in the mood to do something foolish.

The ICC and the massacres are a distant memory.

Jubilee has been particularly exclusivist and arrogant in the way it has wielded power and while some bosses and their friends have made fortunes through tenders and other shenanigans, opposition politicians and their elite ticks have been blocked from the feeding trough and have been swallowing saliva for five years.

RIGGING

They are like vampires after a long period of hibernation; viciously thirsty for deals.

If the country is a powder keg, there is an army of bloggers, activists, commentators, bots, vacuum-headed mercenaries and even well-meaning (but soft-brained) idealists playing with matches.

Twitter is the new radio, only now there are a thousand Sangs.

One wrote: “Jubilee must know they don’t own the monopoly of rigging and MUST not underestimate Nasa ability to beat them at their own game. 2017!” 

To which another replied: “Nasa should also know they don’t own monopoly to violence incase (sic) you’re defeated.”

In Kenya today, there is no honest broker; the credibility of the Supreme Court has been called to question, Dr Willy Mutunga has since retired and the new IEBC chairman is an unknown quantity.

COMPROMISED ELECTIONS

Can he bring to heel the political tribe when its blood is up, its nostrils filled with the enticing smell of corruption?

Who will talk sense into the heads of our reckless, hate-mongering and power hungry, desperate leaders?

As a country, we do not know how to do an election very well. We are almost incurably dishonest, we have no respect for the rules and we have the morals of alley cats.

We have no time for fairness and we will not grant others the rights we claim.

We never accept defeat, we are sore losers, we don’t give up even when the common good demands it.

It’s as if God engineered us to be election riggers.

The primaries were an exercise in how not to do it. Folks entrusted with the job of procuring materials reportedly ate the money in some cases and only bought three ballot papers to be shared by the whole country.

BINDING AGREEMENT

In other cases, relatives of top party officials were declared winners even though everyone, including the returning officer, knew they had performed abominably.

And, of course, if you had a loose Sh30 million to “donate”, you didn’t have to go through anybody’s nomination.

Will the August 8 General Election be any different?

Finally, like in 2007, this could be a near run thing, a contest in which the contenders are separated only by a hundred or two hundred thousand votes.

In that election, both sides had engaged in such brazen irregularities that the experts concluded it was actually not possible to tell who won.

The solution would be for the IEBC to call the parties and have them sign a binding agreement as a condition for taking part: We will not rig, we will accept the result of the election as declared by the IEBC and we will not call for mass action or demand the sacking of commissioners if we lose.

Of course, the IEBC will do no such thing. As a clearing agent, preparing to fleece the hell out of me, once told me: “Tuombe mungu”.

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