By Real Wesonga and Onyikwa Onyankundi
Ababu moves to Jubilee, Raila grabs Wanjala.
Wetangula moves close to Ruto, Raila goes for Mukhisa.
Ojaamong goes to Ruto, Raila goes for Otuoma.
You surely know where casualties will fall.
One of the most valuable political lessons that Raila Odinga seems to have learned from his father the late and great doyen Adonijah Ajuma Oginga Odinga is the value of brains in leadership, and importance of assembling a formidable team of them. After constituting the’Pentagon’ of kina Masinde Muliro, Shikuku, Bahmariz and Co., the old man went about surrounding himself with the brightest young professionals from every profession, ethnic community, gender, race and religion that he could get.
Dr. Oki Ooko Ombaka, Pheroze Nowrojee, Gitobu Imanyara, Prof. Anyang Nyong’o, Martha Karua, Prof. Ouma Muga, Japhet Shamalla, Kamau Kuria, James Orengo, Kijana Wamalwa, George Kapten, Otieno Kajwang, Henry Obwocha, Paul Muite, Raila Odinga, Mukhisa Kituyi, Farah Maalim and several others came to be collectively known as ‘The Young Turks’ and those old enough to recall their role and place in the fight for the ‘Second Liberation’ would attest to the fact that they were perhaps the most important cog in Mzee Odinga’s arsenal, and the ‘Second Liberation’ would never have been realised without them.
Fast forward to the NARC Cabinet, and later the ‘Nusu Mkate’ one that Raila and Kibaki put together and you see so many of them including Anyang Nyongo, Dr. Mukhisa Kituyi, Otieno Kajwang, Martha Karua and James Orengo flying the Kenyan flag and bringing their exceptional brains to bear on our economic recovery, social fabric, constitutional order and general wellbeing that in just 10 short years, they literally reversed all the damage that Kenyatta and Moi had inflicted on us. But that is just about as far as we managed to get because in 2013 the ‘Uhuruto calamity’ hit us, and it has been downhill ever since.
The first thing that Uhuruto did upon fraudulently assuming power was to surround themselves with idiots, ignoramuses, ‘yes men’, clowns, slay queens, thugs, thieves such other lowlifes. Sonko, Baba Yao, Itumbi, Kutuny, Murkomen, Duale and the ilk became the drivers of ideology and policy. Thinking was outlawed, and intellect and intellectualism frowned upon. We begun to hear such expressions as ‘Kizungu Mingi’ spat out in a manner to suggest that presenting a well argued, coherent and factual argument was a crime. Idiocy begun to be celebrated. Even on social media!
But all that is set to change if the team that Raila Odinga is quietly putting together to help him treat and heal our injured country from 2020 onwards is anything to go by. Just imagine a Cabinet meeting that has Prof. Anyang Nyongo, Dr. David Ndii and Dr. Mukhisa Kituyi discussing economic recovery, and contrast that with another Cabinet meeting that has Rashid Echesa, Ben Chumo and Naisula Lesuda discussing the same subject! The difference is clearer than day and night!
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