SAKAJA RUNS FOR THE HILLS AS NAIROBI SENATE BID HITS TURBULENCE
For a man so relentless at inspecting guards of honor mounted by his very own parade of awards and achievements, Johnson Kiptum Sakaja was one slippery customer when it came to the prospect of a face to face debate encounter with Lawyer Edwin Sifuna. Jittery and skittish, the jubilee mascot arrived late for the JKL show on Citizen TV, perhaps nervous of the prospect of Sifuna storming his meticulously choreographed sham ‘debate’ with Makueni’s Mutula Kilonzo Jr.
The slick haired host rightly had to clarify before commencement of the charade that it was not a ‘debate’ about Nairobi County. Given his way, he would have us believe that a month to the elections, his show is all about hosting random chat sessions between eclectic and arbitrary candidates featuring him in a starring role as master matchmaker and moderator. The visibly irritated host purported to chastise the ‘excessive chatter on twitter’ demanding that a real debate be held.
The offhand costume worn by Mutula Jr. was pitch perfect in juxtaposition to the meant be flattering suit thrown over Sakaja’s convex abdomen. To be sure, Sakaja leaned back into his seat, and smugly assumed a left foot over right knee position while Mutula meekly crossed his ankles and obediently held his hands in his lap. This was more of a master and apprentice session. It was a classic set up. It was a stage for Sakaja to relive the past. The exalted and boxlike son of Sabaot was all set to dominate and domineer over the pixyish and decidedly uxorial Mutula Jr.
Not that many were fooled. After the show was over, body language experts returned their verdict which pointed to an emotionally disturbed Kiptum sneaking upward glances for any sign of divine intervention to keep his stuttering ambition from disappearing into thin air. It remains to be seen if the increasingly downward spiraling Kiptum can steady his sinking ship and stay afloat in time for the count on August 8th. All polls point to a whitewash for a man who just two months ago shelved his ambition to be Nairobi Governor, thinking the Senatorial post was going to be a walkover. And as he is about to learn the hard way, politics is no arena for easy pickings.
Somebody needs to tell him to ever so once in a while lower the decibels on his trumpet. There is a limit to how musical such shrill blowing can be. Sakaja seems to have created his own make believe world where he is the recipient of all the awards and wins everything. Psychologists call this a sense of entitlement. Given a choice of six other candidates vying for the Nairobi senate seat, he chose the one vying for as senater seat in Makueni. That was delusional.
The fire extinguisher, a flamboyant prop on JKL, was more in danger of freezing solid rather than being used to put out flames on the bench. Such was the regrettable caliber of the so called debate.
In the end, it came miserably undone for Kiptum, who could only whimper that his opponents had engineered his epic fail on the opinion poll of whether he was electable. Sakaja left JKL a shattered man.
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