Who will point out that the emperor is naked?

Please, please be honest to yourself ...
- Culture

Otuma Ongalo, writing in today's Standard on Saturday (Sheep mentality politics is the bane of our nation), gets it wrong with his closing line when he says, "But sympathy lies for those who tag along foolishly". Looking at William Ruto's political nomadism and the men and women who follow him like sheep to a hyena's lair, Mr Ongalo would sympathise with the sheep led by Mr Ruto for they will come to a bad end. He correctly castigates the 'leaders' who do not lead, but are content to follow in the wake of a Big Man leading them to some Canaan where milk and honey flows like the River Nile.

It is time Kenyans admitted to themselves that what Mr Ongalo has diagnosed is what ails Kenya's body politic. Not even the sainted Raila Odinga has declared what he wants for the people of Kenya, other than the fact that he knows that he is what Kenya needs in this time of transition from a flawed Constitution to one that is the promised panacea for all our ills. Listening to the presidential candidates, or at least those who have declared that they are putting themselves forward for the presidency, one is struck not so much by the fire-and-brimstone quality of their daily declarations, but by their utter lack of vision or foresight. Mr Ruto's wanderings are merely the most extreme example of the disdain with which these candidates hold Kenyans, their utter lack of respect for the needs of the peoples of Kenya.

The Republican nomination process, in which the United States' Grand Old Party is looking for the man to challenge Barack Obama in November, has thrown up issues that need to be addressed, problems that must be solved by the US by the President when he is sworn in in January 2013. Regardless of what we may think of the pronouncements of Mitt Romney, Rick Santorum, Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul or John Huntsman, no one can deny that while they are united in denouncing the presidency of Barack Obama as a failure, that is not the sum and substance of their presidential bids. They have identified what they see as the ills of the United States and have prescribed solutions which the members of their party will support and which, they hope, will stem the tide of bad tidings assailing the United States. Contrast the Republican campaign with that of any of our presidential candidates and you will weep in despair.

Characterised by platitudes and sloganeering, the statements attributed to Raila Odinga, Martha Karua, William Ruto, Uhuru Kenyatta, Peter Kenneth, Eugene Wamalwa, Bifwoli Wakoli, Moses Wetangula, George Saitoti, Kalonzo Musyoka, and the rest of them are devoid of substance. What they are determined to do is to deny any of the other candidates the presidency by all means necessary - whether hook or crook.

It is true that we have allowed the public arena to be dominated by loud calls to personality cults, and to banish the voices of reason and scepticism. This can be attributed largely to our political infantilism and ignorance engendered by four decades of one-party rule. Presidents Kenyatta and Moi fostered the cult of personality, not for the common good but to retain and enhance their hold on power. Raila Odinga and his opponents have done nothing to reverse this sorry state of affairs, and with the acquiescence of our professional and intellectual classes, the cults of personality have only grown more elaborate. It is now not uncommon to see men being installed as elders of this community or that, not to ensure that those communities grow as a people, but for political gain. Of what benefit is it to be installed as a Kaya elder if one will not help the Kaya community navigate the treacherous waters of the modern world, preserving their culture while engaging fully with the modern world to banish disease, poverty and ignorance among their people?

We have deliberately blinded ourselves to the infirmities of the proposals being made by the presidential contenders. We have refused to acknowledge that despite the promulgation of a new Constitution, these men and women are not interested in the welfare of the people but the acquisition and retention of power at all costs. Serious discussions on the state of the economy, the state of education, the state of healthcare or even the state of political institutions, including political parties, have barely received acknowledgment, let alone mention in the hundreds of hours that they have been on the stump. 

Unlike Mr Ong'alo, I am unwilling to sympathise with the sheep being led to political slaughter. They have made their beds, and they are going to force the nation to sleep in it with them. It is time they were denounced from the public political pulpit and reminded that their paid-for loyalties are the reason why Kenya, despite Vision 2030, will continue to be poor, uneducated and riven with preventable diseases. Their leaders are traitors and they all deserve a traitor's fate.