How push to make Uhuru president broke Kanu’s back

A State House meeting between President Daniel Moi and leaders from Kajiado was a turning point in the 2002 succession battle, a former Kanu insider has revealed.

The Maa elders had gone to marshal support for Vice President George Saitoti, but ended up endorsing political greenhorn Uhuru Kenyatta, who was President Moi’s controversial choice, former powerful National Security minister Julius Sunkuli has told the Sunday Nation in an interview that covered politics, career and his controversial past.

In the acrimonious meeting that was punctuated by shouts and threats, some of the speakers portrayed Prof Saitoti as a “weak leader with no control of his boma”.

“It seems that this man cannot be anything on his own, leave alone being president. From today, we have to support Uhuru Kenyatta,” Mr Sunkuli recalls Mr Moi telling him after the meeting.

Mr Sunkuli, a close confidant of Moi, served in his Cabinet from 1993, first as an assistant minister and later as minister in the Office of the President, from the age of 31 until he watched the then President leave State House in 2002 in a ceremony he says had all the characteristics of a funeral after Mwai Kibaki’s Narc beat Mr Kenyatta.

SAITOTI APPRAISED

Mr Sunkuli was in 2003 replaced in the powerful ministry by Chris Murungaru.

So disdainful was the new administration, he says, that Mr Murungaru declined to attend a handing-over ceremony.

In a rare interview, Mr Sunkuli opened up on his role in Mr Kenyatta’s bumpy road to the presidency and why the decision to invite Raila Odinga and his NDP to Kanu sharply divided opinion in President Moi’s inner circle.

During the interview, Mr Sunkuli revealed to the Sunday Nation intrigues that led to the picking of Mr Kenyatta in the vicious succession battle.

Mr Sunkuli recalls that in early 2002, Mr Moi tasked him with the difficult job of preparing Prof Saitoti to take over.

“We held our first meeting at ABC Place in Westlands. I told Saitoti that Moi had sent me to him with the idea that he should be the Kanu flag-bearer. After the discussion, we decided to assemble all leaders from his Kajiado backyard for a meeting with the President at State House,” he says.

During that meeting, the politicians from Kajiado County were split right down the middle. “Whereas some leaders like former Kajiado Central MP David Sankori supported Saitoti, others said that the VP was not well-grounded to have a stab at the presidency,” he says.

VOTE BASKET

Sunkuli said President Moi was astonished by the infighting among the leaders from Kajiado.

“He (Moi) believed that for you to rule Kenya, you first had to have a political support base behind you and to have the support of Central Kenya voters. Whereas Saitoti enjoyed the support of Central Kenya, he had no control of Kajiado,” he said.

Mr Sunkuli said President Moi also told him Mr Kalonzo Musyoka, a former Kanu loyalist who is now the Wiper Democratic Movement party leader, was not fit for the job, leaving the President with a “tiny fist” to choose from.

“He (Mr Moi) simply never took him (Mr Musyoka) to be a serious candidate.” Things became more complicated for Mr Musyoka due to a split in Moi’s inner circle.

One of those who never considered a Kalonzo presidency was Dr Sally Kosgei, who had worked with him in the Foreign Affairs ministry.

Other politicians who were thought to be interested in the presidency included Mr Musalia Mudavadi, Mr Odinga, and Mr Simeon Nyachae.

Mr Sunkuli, whose powerful docket included Defence and Internal Security, added that, although President Moi had considered Mr Nyachae in an initial plan, he concluded there would be little support for his candidature beyond Gusiiland.

ALTERNATIVES

As for Mr Odinga, he could never have been “a natural choice for Moi”. “Although Moi welcomed him in Kanu, the President held the feeling that the Odingas had spent a long time fighting him,” he said.

Mr Mudavadi, he revealed, suffered the same fate as Prof Saitoti after some Western Kenya elders worked extra hard to convince Mr Moi not to endorse him.

Mr Sunkuli said Moi had a strong liking for the Kenyatta family and believed that he still owed them for his political career.

“He knew all Mzee Kenyatta’s children personally. He had watched Uhuru grow up from a young child and he believed that he was the right scion to take over. He had also mentored him for a long time and he believed that Uhuru was capable of holding the Central Kenya people together,” he said.

The discussion to pick him as a presidential candidate also involved the Mois and the Kenyattas, Sunkuli said.

“By picking Uhuru Kenyatta, Moi killed two birds with one stone. First, he handed over power to the Kenyatta family and second, he believed that Kenya could remain stable by handing over the presidency to a community which was the most dominant politically, economically and in government,” he says.

DEPARTURE

As a young ambitious man, Mr Kenyatta was initially thought to be interested in the Lari Constituency seat in 1997, but his real test came when he was beaten in his quest for the Gatundu South seat.

In October 2001, Uhuru was nominated to Parliament after Mark Too vacated his seat for him, setting the stage for his appointment to the Cabinet amid criticism from more seasoned politicians.

When, months later, President Moi announced Mr Kenyatta as his pick for the presidency, all hell broke loose in Kanu with a number of officials, led by Mr Odinga and loyalists like Prof Saitoti and Mr Musyoka, leaving to form the National Rainbow Coalition (Narc).

President Moi made Mr Sunkuli responsible for the success of "Project Uhuru", with part of his mandate including mobilising the State security apparatus to deliver the presidency in the 2002 elections.

Other leading officials of the "Project Uhuru" included Mr William Ruto, former Butere MP Amukowa Anangwe, Mwatate MP Masden Madoka, Mvita MP Shariff Nassir, Kitui West MP Francis Nyenze and Mr Yusuf Haji.

The team also included the so-called Kanu Young Turks and influential figures like former Cabinet Minister Nicholas Biwott, who stayed in the background.

Mr Sunkuli claimed he was the first leader to publicly declare that President Moi had decided on Mr Kenyatta as his successor at a meeting of Maasai leaders.

“We carried the idea of Project Uhuru with veteran politician Daniel ole Muyaa before Moi made a public announcement,” he said.

RAILA'S INGENUITY

Ole Muyaa, who died in September this year, was the influential chairman of the Olkejuado County Council.

His support for Mr Kenyatta also led to a long-running political feud with Saitoti. Mr Sunkuli believes that Mr Kenyatta was a strong candidate.

“We all believed in him. In all the meetings that I chaired, only one military general opined that Uhuru had a long way before becoming president,” he said.

He conceded that the team made mistakes which cost Mr Kenyatta the presidency in the face of a Narc onslaught.

“Everything that looked unlikely, affected us. First, we never believed that it could reach a time when Kalonzo, Saitoti and other strong Nyayo ministers could go against the word of Moi. How could they?” he posed.

Secondly, Mr Sunkuli blamed what he terms as the “political genius” of Mr Odinga for breaking the spine of Kanu.

“Raila, unlike what some people think of him, is a master political strategist. He survives by always thinking ahead of everyone,” the former Kanu Secretary General, who took over the position from Mr Odinga after he dumped Kanu, said.

COSTLY BLUNDER

Mr Sunkuli revealed that the rain started beating the independence party after they allowed Mr Odinga to join Kanu as secretary-general.

“It was such a huge mistake that to date Kanu is yet to recover from. Raila came and familiarised himself with the party and when he walked out, he left with several friends who included long-term party loyalists. Only a master tactician can do that,” he said.

Thirdly, there was the general feeling within Kanu that “Moi knew everything”.

“Because we were never accustomed to failure, many of us became complacent. We believed that Moi had figured everything out about taking Uhuru to State House,” he said.

Lastly, Mr Sunkuli blamed the lack of a think tank to create strategies for Project Uhuru campaigns, stating that the campaign was based on “hope more than strategy”.