The ‘Murima’ region has literally and figuratively become the rocky mountain of Kenyan politics, and at the epicentre of it is Deputy President Rigathy Gachagua, the self-style “truthful men” who finds himself caught between a rock and a hard place.
The first strand of this rocky relationship between the Mountain and the Centre started soon after the 2022 election, when the Deputy President asked newly elected Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja to allocate four County Executive seats to “shareholders” from the Mt Kenya region. Mr Sakaja gave him none, instead opting to reward allies of Mr Raila Odinga, whose ODM party had more members in the county assembly.
The bad blood that started exactly two years ago today is yet to congeal. Only this week, Mr Sakaja gave potato, tomato and pineapple traders at Marikiti wholesale market hours to pack their crates and take up space at the far flung Kangundo Road Market.
The move immediately sparked a fightback, with Mr Gachagua using the X platform to ask the Governor to reconsider the decision.
According to political tarot readers, the move specifically targeting the three groups was seen as an economic assault on traders from ‘Murima’. The fact that they were required to vacate with immediate effect also raised questions about due process and it was interesting to note that an Odinga ally, Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna, was the sole politician from the metropolis to question the decision.
Mr Sifuna’s protest was significant given that there has been a push to impeach Mr Sakaja, who last week sought audience with Mr Odinga, ostensibly in the hope of getting him to prevail on MCAs allied to him to frustrate the proposed impeachment.
Mr Sifuna is the secretary-general of the ODM party, and if he appears to be differing with the governor, this is sufficient to make political observers sit up and take notice. It could mean that as much as ‘Murima’ people are seen as the one bloc fulminating against Mr Sakaja, he has opened more than one political battle front. That is a dangerous position to be in when you have an impeachment Motion coming up against you.
The other development rocking the mountain is the declaration by politicians from Mt Kenya East that Interior Cabinet Secretary Kithure Kindiki will be their spokesman going forward. This was of no political significance given that Prof Kindiki has been the presumed spokesman and ‘kingpin’ of that part of Kenya. What was significant was that about a week later, 48 MPs — mostly from the leeward side of the mountain and its Diaspora — made a similar declaration in Nyahururu.
Such declarations are rarely made in a vacuum. In my view, they point to a campaign aimed at isolating the Deputy President amid claims that he is likely to face impeachment proceedings only two years after ascending to that seat.
The import of the two declarations is that the ground is being prepared to embrace the man that Mr Gachagua floored in 2022. This is a long shot in the dark even if the impeachment Motion against the DP were to sail through.
What the politicians are yet to contend with is the storm that their declaration is likely to raise in the Mt Kenya region especially from ‘the ground’. Among those who pushed back was a representative from the council of elders, who argued that the declaration amounted to hot air because the politicians failed to consult the electorate.
Also adding his voice to the exchange was Kiambu Senator Karungo wa Thang’wa, who said on X that whereas Tharaka Nithi — where Prof Kindiki hails from — has only 230,000 voters, Kiambu County has 1.2 million.
Although Mr Thang’wa pointed out that what one does with this information is their own problem, the numbers have serious political implications. First, both Mr Gachagua and Prof Kindiki have amassed large amounts of cash — basically a political war chest — by virtue of their positions in government.
That means as far as funding a campaign is concerned, they have the wherewithal to finance a long-drawn out one. As such, the battle will be about vote numbers, and that was what Mr Thang’wa was telling Prof Kindiki’s allies in so many words.
We must now turn to the other unasked questions: Are the legislators pushing for Riggy G’s ouster and for Prof Kindiki to climb to the DP perch acting at their own behest? If they are not, on whose behalf are they acting?
And if they are doing the bidding of a third party, are they aware of the hurricane that awaits them in 2027?
In the final analysis, who between them and the DP ought to be more worried about their political future? To paraphrase Bob Dylan, “the answer, my friend, is sailing in the wind” blowing from the rocky mountain. That wind will be noisy. It will be messy. And it will leave behind a trail of casualties, to paraphrase National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula.
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