Don't bet on it.

Do you ever wonder what goes on in the Deputy President's mind when people underestimate him at every time. If anyone had told you that the political fixer of 2002 would become the Deputy President of 2015, would you have believed them? What he has done, at every twist and turn of his remarkable story, is to embody the moxie that defines Kenyans, the super-endurance and patience that defines our pride and joy that are our marathoners. If there is anyone in politics who demonstrates the anything-is-possible story, it is the Deputy President.

I wonder why he wept at that church service after the electoral victory of 2013. He must have known that victory was in his and his running-mate's hands. There couldn't have been any doubt. They had run a disciplined campaign, the rival coalition had disintegrated into a nest of pro-this and anti-that vipers, the people were tired of grey-haired fogies. Their victory was assured the day the Registrar of Political Parties announced the total memberships of each party and the Deputy President's alliance commanded a sizable share of the voting population. I am curious about those tears. Perhaps it was his way of humanising his hard-charging political operative persona that had rubbed many people the wrong way in 2002.

There shouldn't be any doubt too, that no matter what the International Criminal Court decides, he is still going to come out on top. Ever since the trial commenced, many Kenyans have lived with the mistaken idea that the Deputy President has been set up for sacrifice at the altar of the ICC. He has done nothing to tamp down this kind of talk. He hasn't allowed it to turn into a bonfire either, but he knows that it is underdogs who everyone with a heart roots for. For whatever reason, he wants to be seen as an underdog while he is the Deputy President.

He has his core base, which the likes of the Bomet governor and the Nandi Hills MP think they can wrestle out of his orbit. They are in the ascendant, taking their cue from a resurgent Baringo senator and KANU. They underestimate the Deputy President and this shall be at their terrible peril. He will suffer the snipes and snarks of the whisper campaign against him, timidly responding now and again, biding his time. When he brings down the boom, I wonder how many who have entered the senatorial orbit will still be standing.

It takes a bold one to take on the Deputy President without doing their homework. It takes a bold and foolish one to take him without doing their homework or noticing that he seems cornered by the political pressures of the day. Very bold and very foolish. Those wailing louder than the "stepped-aside" Cabinet Secretaries about the "unfairness of it all" and the "waning influence of the DP in the ;alliance" will suffer terribly when he triumphs over them all. When all is said and done, there are very long odds that the senatorial whispering campaign against the Deputy President will be triumphant. I wouldn't put money down.