We’re paying the price for locking party leaders out of Parliament
What you need to know:
- It would, indeed, be wonderful if all Kenyans agreed that things were going badly in the country and appended their signatures. What is there to lose?
- The way things look, by the end of this referendum fever, they will be divided right down the middle, which is not at all healthy.
Well, it looks like last year’s election losers have decided to re-group, only this time they won’t be “lone rangers” as they were described by Jubilee diehards when they sought the presidency.
This time, they decided to do their thing under the Cord umbrella.
When Ms Martha Karua broke her long silence on Wednesday to endorse Cord’s agitation for a referendum, she made instant news, almost outshining the million-signature launching ceremony.
But her stand was understandable. She never really did hide her disdain for Jubilee and, while campaigning for the presidency, appeared to be running against candidate Uhuru Kenyatta exclusively. So, no surprise there.
What was perhaps surprising was Mr Peter Kenneth’s endorsement. He was a level-headed and focused contender for the presidency, and it is sad that we rarely hear from him now because he has no avenue in which to express himself, except as a private individual.
Indeed, it is a pity that the Constitution, which has been praised to high heaven, contrived to lock out both Ms Karua and Mr Kenneth from public office. This country is all the poorer for it. More on that later.
In the meantime, where are the other contestants? What says Prof James ole Kiyiapi? And the excitingly down-to-earth Abduba Dida? Could Paul Muite spare some time from his valiant labours in Malili and give his stand?
PRESIDENTIAL AGE LIMIT
I believe they should all come forward and join the bandwagon. Indeed, on this issue of the referendum, I’ll play the Devil’s Advocate and ask what is holding anybody back. They should all join up once the issues at hand are clearly spelled out by the Committee of Experts appointed by the Cord Alliance.
Come to think of it, if the agitation for a referendum is not meant to pluck the Jubilee administration from power, I do not understand why its leaders should also not seek to be incorporated in the quest.
It would, indeed, be wonderful if all Kenyans agreed that things were going badly in the country and appended their signatures. What is there to lose?
The worst that could happen would be to emasculate the National Government by forcing it to hand over half the money it collects from us to governors, but no price is too high to pay for constitutional amendments.
For that reason, I am asking the Jubilee administration to join the push for the referendum en masse. If it did that, and asked its followers at the grassroots to follow suit, then instead of one million signatures, there would be 10 million.
In fact, Jubilee could even insert one or two points in the referendum agenda, one of them being reducing the presidential age limit to 65.
There would be an added advantage to this: Kenyans would be more united than ever before. The way things look, by the end of this referendum fever, they will be divided right down the middle, which is not at all healthy.
IN THE POLITICAL COLD
In fact, it will be a replica of the fallout from the first referendum, which was to lead to the 2007/2008 post-election violence.
On another front, perhaps many Kenyans would have liked to know what Governor Karua would have done for Kirinyaga County or whether Governor Kenneth ange-wesmake, only this time at the county level.
They would have liked to know what Cord leader Raila Odinga would have done were he in the National Assembly as the Leader of the Opposition.
But these things were not to be because of a clause in the Constitution, which says a President cannot be an MP, meaning that all the contenders who failed were thrown out into the political cold for five years.
Now, at least five million Kenyans look upon Mr Odinga as their political leader. How can he accept to be a cypher, one without a platform on which to articulate his opposition to government policies and his vision for the future?
Is it any wonder that he has to create such a platform, be it called National Dialogue or referendum?
If I were to change anything in the Constitution, this is one I would amend immediately. Excluding the leaders of half the population of voters from governance will always lead to calls for change – and to trouble.
