Raila too is a president and his party NASA also a ruling party, you can expect him to serve as head of state and official opposition at the same time.
THE OPPOSITION IN KENYA
The opposition in Kenya plays an oversight role against the ruling party. Kenya can pride herself on having active opposition from independence. Although those who form the opposition, have always in one way joined the government in what could be seen an alliance and coalition of sorts, the country’s opposition has always remained active.
However, there has been talk of the dwindling opposition. This can be attributed to the calm demeanour with which Raila Odinga- the face of the opposition- has been handling issues. The vigilance is no longer there. The press conferences have drastically reduced and the man has calmly disappeared from the public wielding evidence of murk in the government. There are no longer street protests against unpopular government policies and the general population which looked to the leaders for guidance has been left headless.
It is this disappearing bravado of the face of opposition that has suddenly started raising outcry on why there is no longer the ‘vigilante’ opposition we used to have in the 1990s. We no longer talk of Kamukunji, saba saba, and other known cul de sac places the opposition used to hold their press conferences and reveal to the masses what was wrong with the government of the day.
Admittedly, the country is in jeopardy and needs one man or woman to bravely stand like the now famous Bobby Wine and rally the mass against the Kenyatta administration. As things stand currently, the country seems to be run on the model “what Kenyatta wants is what Kenyatta gets.” If he wants an 8% tax he gets it, if he wants to win an election, we sing hurrah to the man and so the song goes.
To nip such a situation in the bud, we seriously need someone to seriously stand and speak, so that we can support them. But can we get such a guy? Maybe we can, we looked at our version of Bobby Wine in Babu Owino but now he is non-existent.
Before we could look for a new guy, let us look at why we don’t have a serious Kamukunji opposition. Firstly, the opposition has primarily been associated with a community/region in Kenya and not the people who stand against the status quo. The regions that represent the opposition in this case, have always experienced apathy from the ruling party. In most occasions, there have been systemic economic sanctions leveled against such communities that have more or less send the regions into economic stagnation hence poverty.
In Kenya, economic prosperity comes with power and power is vested among those who control the government of the day. Given that in the past half a century the country has majorly been controlled by the vast Central regions and the peripheral region have been left to contend with the opposition, the country economic development has majorly been unequal. The peripherals have lagged behind due to the reasons that they have been in the opposition and that, in the much drier regions, there has been little or no political activity.
Therefore, those who have been vocal about the government dealings may have decided it is enough to torture our people with the opposition and let them enjoy the crumbs of the national cake. The muted silence may explain this. Secondly, the very leaders may have just found a way to keep mum and devour the gains of bad governance brought forth by rampant corruption. They may have realized that they are no longer younger boys to run around crying under the smoke of teargas fighting for the rights of the oppressed as opposed to sitting at home and enjoying the gains from murky government dealings- thanks to the high levels of corruption have reached unprecedented heights in the current regime.
In as much as we want Raila to take the mantle officially bestowed upon him as the official opposition, we must also appreciate the fact that it is not just Uhuru who won the Elections last year. Raila too won. He was in fact sworn in as the people's president and therefore represent the people in the same capacity as Uhuru and therefore, he leaves the Official opposition seat vacant for any willing soul to seat on it.
Kenyan should, therefore, work towards raising a new official opposition not from Nasa or Jubilee but from the discontent voices on Twitter and Facebook. It is high time they realize that in the current regime, NASA and Jubilee won the election and the August house is made up of two governments working together to bring the nation to its knees.
So before blaming Raila or NASA or ODM look at the facts on the table and stop bickering complaining that Raila has lost his rightful position. He is the President Dammit!
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