Election stand-off smacks of a case of history repeating itself

President Uhuru Kenyatta addresses Nakuru residents at Afraha stadium on October 22, 2017 during a prayer rally. Jubilee regime came up with all sorts of unsubstantiated allegations around Nasa's rejection of the repeat poll. PHOTO | SILA KIPLAGAT | NATION MEDIA GROUP

What you need to know:

  • Our history shows that any time the government makes allegations of violence in the offing.
  • Jubilee regime came up with all sorts of unsubstantiated allegations around Nasa's rejection of the repeat poll.

In the early years of Independence, President Jomo Kenyatta’s political and security machinery used to concoct all sorts of propaganda targeting then Vice-President Oginga Odinga.

The leftist Vice-President was variously accused of plotting with foreign powers to undermine and overthrow the government.

On various occasions, the government manufactured and disseminated news to the effect that caches of arms intended for subversion had been found stashed at Mr Odinga’s Jogoo House office in Nairobi, aboard ships docking at Kilindini Harbour, or on trucks driving in from neighbouring countries.

FAKE NEWS

Clearly the fake news phenomenon did not start with the advent of social media or with the 2016 American presidential election that swept Donald Trump into the White House.

It was not long before Mr Odinga was ejected from Kanu in 1966, and eventually imprisoned in 1969 without being charged, tried or convicted of any offence.

The firearms and coup plot stories were all manufactured.

Jump ahead to 1975, and see similar tactics employed with deadly effect.

ASSASSINATION

The Kenyatta regime decided to kill fiery politician JM Kariuki, who was making the ruling oligarchy squirm in their seats with his attacks on their rapacious looting.

JM, as he was popularly known, was lured from the Hilton Hotel in Nairobi by Security Intelligence operatives and his mutilated body later found in the Ngong Hills.

In the interim, the security apparatus planted a series of bombs in Nairobi, one of which killed 27 innocent Kenyans on a Mombasa-bound bus.

ACTIVISM
The system spread fake news that the bombings were the work of a hitherto unknown ‘Maskini Liberation Front’.

The inference was clear: JM was the voice of the masikini, the poor and downtrodden, so the bombs must be his handiwork!

The system also manufactured a lie that the ‘missing’ JM was in Zambia, an episode that remains the darkest and most embarrassing in the otherwise glorious history of the Nation Newspapers, which splashed the fake news on the same day the MP’s body was found.

The Maskini Liberation Front was never heard of again.

MOI'S ERA
Jomo Kenyatta’s successor, Daniel arap Moi, was also adept at the dark arts of fake news around coup plots and subversion.

The thieving kleptocracy survived by perfecting a brutal police state where any dissenting voices were eliminated or silenced on accusations of plotting to overthrow the State.
A Moi speech would hardly be complete without scathing denouncement of “traitors”, “subversives” and “agents of foreign masters”, who were allegedly working at the behest of external interests to destabilise the country.

On occasion, elaborate ruses were concocted to tie targeted individuals to arms stockpiles or seditious literature, after which it was swift conviction through Kangaroo courts, indefinite detention without trial, or just disappearance and summary execution.

ELECTION
Why bring up all this ancient history? Because the disciples of Jomo Kenyatta and Daniel arap Moi are in power, and seem keen to re-introduce the tactics learnt at the feet of their mentors.

That’s the only conclusion one can draw from the outrageous statement released last week by Government Spokesman Eric Kiraithe.

In the best traditions of the Kenyatta-Moi dictatorships, the Jubilee regime came up with all sorts of wild and unsubstantiated allegations around the opposition rejection of the contentious repeat presidential election.

BRIBERY
The old foreign bogey was dredged up, alongside fairy tales of vast amounts of cash allegedly being used to drive the opposition campaign.

The barrage was designed to pre-empt any rulings by the courts or the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission, with allegations that any decisions unfavourable to Jubilee could only have been reached through bribery.

And, of course, all that follows the dramatic police raids on the residences of a key opposition supporter, with the suitable advance propaganda, which set the stage for claims of plans to employ violence.

DICTATORSHIP
Our history shows that any time the government makes allegations of violence in the offing, it goes ahead to ensure realisation of self-fulfilling prophecies in assassinations, communal violence and unleashing ethnic militias.

We saw it with the old Kenyatta and his consolidation of the one-party dictatorship.

We saw it in Moi’s one-man rule and his fight-back against the multi-party campaign. History seems to be repeating itself.

[email protected] @MachariaGaitho