End of era as last of ‘kingpins’ exits stage

The funeral of Mr William ole Ntimama might also mark exit of the last of the great ethnic political Kings, who in their heyday ruled their communities or regions with an iron fist as the designated links to central government.

It was notable that just three weeks before he died, Mr Ntimama was at the head of a Maasai delegation that visited President Uhuru Kenyatta at State House to pledge loyalty to the Jubilee regime.

Mr Ntimama was one of the key leaders that deserted President Daniel arap Moi’s Kanu ahead of the 2002 elections in protest at the handpicking Uhuru Kenyatta as the party presidential candidate.

He has since then been firmly linked to Mr Raila Odinga, and the State House visit signalled his defection from ODM.

The interesting thing is that he led the delegation despite the fact that he no longer holds elective political office after his quarter-century hold on the Narok North Parliamentary seat was brought to a halt in 2013.

The political pecking order ordinarily call for such an ethnic delegation to be led by a key elected politician, but in case figures such as Narok Senator Stephen ole Ntutu, or appointed leaders who also display ambition for Maasai leadership such as Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaissery, deferred to Mr Ntimama’s seniority.

The delegation, much in the fashion of the Moi era making a comeback under Jubilee of hosting tribal delegations, promised to rally the Maasai people behind President Kenyatta’s re-election bid.

“We Maasai have spoken and we have decided to support you and join Jubilee,” the former Narok District Kanu chairman and Cabinet Minister assured President Kenyatta, promising to seen traverse the Maa speaking regions of Narok, Kajiado, Samburu and Laikipia counties to mobilise support for Jubilee.

President Kenyatta praised the visit as a boost for Jubilee, but might have noted that at a time of changed circumstances, the delegation comprised only a small grouping of leaders, with most of the elected MPs staying away.

In the Moi days, any politician seen to have snubbed those common visits to ‘pledge loyalty’ would immediately have been denounced as a traitor and consigned to political oblivion.

Designated ethnic kingpins such as Mr Ntimama were particularly adept at doing President Moi’s bidding to remove non-conformist leaders from within their ranks.

Mr Moi was in turn adept at identifying and promoting leaders who could be relied upon to keep rule their communities with an iron fist, with a key priority being to keep all in their region within the straight and narrow Kanu path.

Mr Ntimama was amongst those who rose to great power and influence in the Moi era, others being figures such as his great rival for Maasai leadership, Mr Justus ole Tipis.

Others were figures such as Mr Shariff Nassir who ruled the Mombasa district Kanu affairs with an iron fist, the ‘King’ of the Francis Lotodo, Mr Moses Mudavadi who reigned over in western Kenya, Mr Joseph Kamotho and Mr James Njiru who were designated Kanu reference points in central Kenya.

Mr Okiki Amayo and Mr Oloo Aringo who were detailed to keep the Luo people in check, while Mr Kariuki Chotara played a similar role amongst the Kikuyu diaspora in the Rift Valley and Mr Ezekiel Barngetuny amongst the Kalenjin in the same region.

The role of ethnic kingpins did not actually originate with the Moi regime, the trend going back to the early years of independence under President Jomo Kenyatta when figures such as Mr Jackson Angaine reigned over the Meru, Mr Paul Ngei and Mr Mulu Mutisya competed to rule over the Kamba, Mr Kihika Kimani rode roughshod in Nakuru, whole Mr Njenga Karume was a sort of elder-statesman for the Kikuyu.

The difference is that the Kenyatta era kingpins were usually self-made and recognised supremo’s within the ethnic communities, while the Moi era ethnic chiefs were often figures plucked out of nowhere by then president and given the power to rule over their people as agents of his ruling system rather than genuine representatives of their communities.

Ntimama was amongst the self-made men who managed to transition from the Kenyatta system already endowed with wealth and influence. Others in this category would have included figures such as Mulu Mutisya and Paul Ngei. But under Moi they were put in their place and made to understand that they were not there to serve the interests of the communities, but to keep their people under control as agents of the single centre of power.

As described in Blaine Harden’s ‘Africa: Dispatches From a Fragile Continent’, Mr Moi liked nothing better than to take some nondescript figure and puff him up to great wealth and power, but knowing that he could easily keep him in control: Like blowing a balloon to its maximum, knowing that all it would take to destroy it is a tiny prick with a pin.

Mr Ntimama was one of the leaders who were independently wealthy and influential, but had to be kept in check until they could be used in service of the Moi system.

Thus in 1979 and 1983, Mr Ntimama, then the powerful Narok County Council chairman, was raring to take on his eternal rival, Justus ole Tipis, for the Narok North seat. On both occasions, he was forced to withdraw at the last minute because Mr Moi still favoured Mr Tipis as his point man in southern Rift Valley.

By 1988, however, things had changed. Mr Tipis was held in suspicion because he was seen as sympathetic to beleaguered Vice President Mwai Kibaki.

Mr Ntimama was given the go-ahead, and with state-backing easily cut short the long reign of his old nemesis.

In short order he became a powerful cabinet minister and Narok district Kanu boss, and earned the long sought status as ‘King’ of the Maasai.

He joined in the Moi system men who served the Kanu regime with unmatched ruthlessness, eagerly dispatching to the political wilderness real and imagined political foes.

This is a group that has progressively been left rudderless and directionless as the political landscape underwent a sea change with collapse of the one-party system in 1992 and the end of Kanu’s 4-decade hold on power in 2002.

Many of the infamous figures of those days who used proximity to power with dictatorial zeal were seen rendered irrelevant, and have been succumbing to the ravages of time largely forgotten.

Kariuki Chotara whose brutal Kanu Youth Wing made Nakuru party dictatorship died in 1988. Mulu Mutisya who made Ukambani his political fiefdom passed in in 2004, while Shariff Nassir of the ‘wapende wasipende’ infamy received his call the following year, while Ezekiel Barng’etuny’s lived on to December 2013.

Garrulous former Kanu Secretary General Joseph Kamotho who defended the party system so zealously was among the key politicians who with Ntimama walked out of the ‘mama na baba’ party ahead of the 2002 election. He died lonely and forgotten in December 2014.

His predecessor as Kanu secretary-general Moses Mudavadi, probably the last Luhya political strongman, had died earlier, in 1989 thus missed the transition to the multi-party system that befuddled many of his contemporaries.

Kirinyaga district Kanu strongman James Njiru was one of the politicians in central Kenya propped up to enforce the Kanu system in an indifferent central Kenya. He is remembered for his ‘Kanu Damu’ slogan and the period after the 1988 elections when he headed the nebulous Ministry of National Guidance and political affairs. He died in June 2013.

Central Kenya also had another colourful figure, Kuria Kanyingi, the former mechanic of limited education who was promoted Director of Motor Vehicle Inspections, and then detailed to bring down Kibaki’s successor as Vice President, Josephat Karanja, after barely an year in office in 1989.

He was a a man of immense wealth who loved nothing better than to display huge bundles of banknotes at fund-raising rallies, and liked to say that he would gladly surrender years of his life of the could be added to President Moi. Mr Kanyingi died in November 2014.

Then there was the controversial Francis Lotodo, who in the early years of the Moi regime was charged with the criminal offense of ‘promoting warlike activities’, which like treason attracts the mandatory death penalty.

The charge against the West Pokot MP never stuck, but he spent a considerable period in custody on offenses related to promoting cattle rustling and ethnic clashes between the Pokot and neighbouring communities. In Mr Lotodo was amongst a 1988 a number of West Pokot leaders expelled from Kanu., the sole legal political party, and thus consigned to political oblivion.

But not long afterwards when President Moi wanted to shore up his number in reaction to the multi-party campaign, Mr Lotodo was rehabilitated, duly returned to Parliament, and elevated to the cabinet. He died in the year 2000.