Matiba’s sin was that when multiparty movement needed a leader, he took charge

The more I have read about the inspiring rise and tragic fall and now death of Kenneth Stanley Njindo Matiba, the more I have become persuaded that 1988 was, and remains, Kenya’s annus horribilis yet it should not have been.

It was the year the country celebrated its Silver Jubilee of independence and President Moi’s 10th anniversary, yet it was also the year the sixth General Election was rigged with sinister impunity and on an industrial scale.

It was also the year Kanu, the only political party in the land, held its shambolic internal elections that were also rigged on an unprecedented scale. There was, however, method and motive in the madness.

OPERATIVE

The General Election of March 21 and Kanu’s internal polls beginning September were designed to rid the political landscape of alternative or independent voices and impose uniformity of thought on the players and populace.

But it was not enough for Kanu’s high command that the election produced the country’s most weak-kneed Parliament ever. A Ministry of National Guidance and Political Affairs was created and Kirinyaga lickspittle operative James Njiru installed in it to enforce the new political order.

It was difficult even for mildly dissenting voices to get elected or have a voice in the politics, let alone government. If they survived the queue voting that served as preliminaries in the General Election, their next bottleneck was the secret ballot.

EMBITTERED

If they somehow managed to beat the system here, Kanu polls were lying in wait for them and their teams and, of course, Njiru would be watching and waiting as newly minted commissar.

Matiba easily won the Kiharu constituency seat, but he would not be allowed to lead Kanu in Murang’a. Embittered he criticised the conduct of the polls and promptly incurred the wrath of loquacious Kanu chairman and Education minister Oloo Aringo and Njiru.

As he told it, Matiba was convinced he could no longer sit in the Cabinet with Mr Aringo and the late Njiru. He asked lawyer Paul Muite to draft his letter of resignation as minister for Transport on December 8, just four days to Jamhuri (Independence) Day. He was swiftly expelled from Kanu and stripped of his parliamentary seat.

HEADSTRONG

It has since emerged that Matiba had consulted Mwai Kibaki, who had been demoted from vice-president to minister for Health, on quitting together but the former changed his mind midstream. Was Mr Kibaki calculating or was Matiba petulant and headstrong?

I throw in my lot with those who argue that Matiba was indeed angry but he quit on principle. And that is why he was different.

It is also why I hold that he was always going to run for president but at a time of his choosing. However, the events of 1988 tragically altered the trajectory of his disciplined, patience-based politics and entering races as red-hot favourite rather than favoured underdog.

PRINCIPLED

Matiba was different and principled because through the 1960s and 1970s when the people of Mbiri wanted him to run for Parliament he declined. Taking on a titan and icon of independence and education in Gikonyo Kiano demanded substantial preparedness, planning and resources. In the 1979 battle of titans he felled Kiano.

He was then a household name. He had been the successful chairman of the Kenya Football Federation, the administrator of Kenya’s most popular sport, and had painstakingly and scrupulously earned a fortune as owner of high-end tourist hotels, high-cost schools and a thriving export-based horticulture business.

Again, as Matiba told it, he quit public service because most of his senior colleagues were making fortunes from taking bribes and kickbacks and cutting corners. He went into the private sector and into business to earn his money.

DETENTION

Did a hitherto low-profile Matiba want to topple the government when in 1990 he teamed up with Charles Rubia to demand the return of multiparty politics? Matiba’s sin was that when Kenya’s growing clamour for political freedom needed leadership, he stepped up to the plate.

There were just three problems. One, beleaguered Kanu now had the head of the snake causing commotion in its house of political monopoly and it was payback time for shaming it in 1988. Two, Matiba and Rubia grossly underestimated Kanu’s fear of, and loathing for, alternative leadership. Last, Matiba would no longer be in control of his destiny. In detention, any ailment was used against an inmate especially one as important as Kenneth Stanley Njindo Matiba. Are you there, David Murathe?

Opanga is a commentator with a bias for politics [email protected]