The Opportunist

Stephen Kalonzo Musyoka, the eponymous Vice-President, cannot win. Countless times he has broadcast the message that he stands in solidarity with the DPM and Eldoret North MP. Did he not embark on a foolhardy mission to stave off the ICC trials for them? Did he not declare that he would challenge them to a fair fight in the nomination process to field the best candidate to face PM Odinga? Yet somehow, every time he opens his mouth, the doubts about his sincerity magnify. 

Things are not helped much when his party's Secretary-General proclaims with legal and constitutional certainty that the two other legs of the apparently dead KKK Alliance are ineligible to stand for high office. Not only must the Veep walk back such politically untenable statements from the bowels of his party, he must fight perceptions that this is his true position, being a lawyer too. He must fight the perception that he is secretly happy to benefit from the legal problems assailing his colleagues. The kupita kati kati business of four years ago has come back to haunt him.

Mutahi Ngunyi and every other pundit describe him as a political opportunist, reaping where he has not sowed. In 2007 he was a presidential candidate, in his mind the equal of the incumbent president, Mwai Kibaki, and the leader of ODM, Raila Odinga. At every opportunity he declared that he was not looking for a consolation prize; he wanted the top job and nothing was going to prevent him from taking it. Then Kenyans started killing each other and to put an end to the mayhem, he not only agreed to back the doubtfully elected Mwai Kibaki, but agreed to form an alliance with him to beat back the ODM claims of poll irregularities. After all, so it emerged, he really did want the V-P's post. So it should not surprise him that his erstwhile allies are suspicious of his loud support for them in their hour of need. Perhaps it is a strategy to mop up their political support and votes when they are eventually carted off to The Hague to stand trial for international crimes. He will have managed kupita kati kati once again. Fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

Even when declaring that the PNU alliance is the vehicle to beat, he is busily strengthening the stupidly re-named and re-branded Wiper Democratic Party. Even when he stands shoulder to shoulder with Ruto and Co, he is busily ensuring that he does not get ensnared by the ICC dragnet. Even while he is declaring that he will concede to a duly chosen flag-bearer come the general election, he is busily ensuring that he is Wiper's presidential candidate. That he is not alone in these maneuvres makes it twice as hurtful that he is the only one accused of opportunism. Mr Ruto has moved from KANU to NARC to ODM to UDM and has now settled on URP. His is the quintessential opportunism Mr Kalonzo is being accused of. Compared to Mr Musyoka's relatively short road to Wiper, Mr Ruto has travelled far to get to where he is today. As has the PM from FORD to Ford Kenya to NDP to KANU to LDP to NAK to NARC to ODM. So why is the tag of 'opportunist' only applied to the Veep?

When difficult choices must be made, Mr Musyoka has consistently failed to make the right choice. As Secretary-General of KANU, he was privy to the growing irrationality of the Moi decision-making process. In 2005, when the Orange Movement was at its height, he had already decided to set himself up as the next president, regardless of the democratic principles that the Movement claimed to espouse. When Kenya was ablaze in 2008, rather than demand that the vote tally be re-done, he decided to set himself up as the balance that would tip the scales in favour of the incumbent president. In 2011, despite the fact that he must have known that it would be futile, he engaged in a flurry of activity, ostensibly on behalf of the Ocampo Six, to have their trials conducted in Kenya rather than at The Hague. 

Mr Musyoka knows that regardless of what the political pundits and law commentators state, it will be very difficult for Mr Kenyatta and Mr Ruto to stand for the presidency at the next general elections. He hopes to use their political infirmity to his advantage and to the defeat of the PM. What he forgets is that once a public perception is created of a person, it is very difficult to reverse, and every one knows him to be an opportunist. His chances of winning over Messrs Kenyatta's and Ruto's vote-banks recede by the day.