Gerson Uaripi Tjihenuna

Facing Mount Kenya, first published in 1938, is an anthropological study of the people of the Kikuyu ethnicity of central Kenya. It was written by native Kikuyu and future Kenyan President Jomo Kenyatta, aka Johnstone Kamau. Mount Kenya was a sacred mountain in the Kikuyu folklore, and all their religious rituals revolved around that. Kenya, as a country, was named after this sacred mountain.

If the recent national elections are anything to go by, then it seems that the people of Kenya are facing Mount Kenya at this point in time of their, otherwise, colourful history. 

Kenya was a one-party state since independence in 1963 up to 1992, with the Kenya African National Union (KANU) dominating the political landscape. With the wave of democratisation sweeping across Africa in the early 1990s, multi-party politics was reintroduced in Kenya, together with the direct election of the president. 

General elections took place in 1992, and saw KANU retain control of the government, with President Daniel arap Moi re-elected with 36% of the vote, and KANU winning 100 of the 188 seats in the National Assembly. Moi was re-elected again in 1997 with 40% of the vote, whilst KANU retained its parliamentary majority, taking 107 of the 210 seats.

The 2002 elections saw KANU’s first defeat; Moi stood down, and KANU candidate Uhuru Kenyatta was defeated by Mwai Kibaki of the National Rainbow Coalition (NAR) alliance. NARC also won a majority in the National Assembly. However, the coalition fell apart and Kibaki’s former ally, Raila Odinga, became his principal opponent in the 2007 elections. 

Although Kibaki was declared the winner in the presidential contest, opposition parties won a majority of seats in the National Assembly. Accusations of electoral fraud were made, resulting in violence. The aftermath of the December 2007 contest led to months of heavy ethno-political violence that is estimated to have killed 1,200 people and forced more than 500,000 others to flee their homes (BBC, 2010). 

This violence primarily impacted multi-ethnic, low-income areas; and it mainly pitched the two biggest ethnic groups – the Kikuyus and the Luos - against each other. 

The Kikuyus, which the Kenyatta political dynasty hails from, are Bantus. The Luos, which is the ethnic group of the historically rival political dynasty Odinga, are Nilotic people.  

In 2008, the National Accord and Reconciliation Act was passed, and Odinga became the first Prime Minister since 1964. This was a way of trying to calm down the “political hot waters” after the 2007 political riots.

A new constitution was introduced in 2010, and the first elections were held under it in 2013.  Running as the Jubilee Alliance candidate, Uhuru Kenyatta defeated Odinga, receiving 50.5% of the vote. Although Kenyatta’s National Alliance emerged as the largest party in the re-established Senate, Odinga’s Orange Democratic Movement won the most seats in the National Assembly, with 96 of the 349 seats.

The constitution bars incumbent President Uhuru Kenyatta from running again, after two five-year terms. In a surprising move, Kenyatta had thrown his weight behind veteran opposition leader Raila Odinga, putting an end to a bitter family feud between two of Kenya’s wealthiest and most prominent political families. 

Odinga, 77, ran under the ticket of the Azimio la Umoja-One Kenya Coalition. It was his fifth attempt after defeats in 1997, 2007, 2013 and 2017.  Odinga’s main rival, Vice President William Ruto, 55, (a Kalenjin) was a candidate for the Kenya Kwanza political alliance. He is believed to have built a power base among the country’s largest ethnic group, the Kikuyu, despite not being from the community himself. The competition between the two leading candidates was very close.

Ethnicity did not influence voters, as much as it has in the past. However, as in previous elections, corruption and the economy were the key issues. The enormous fortunes accumulated by the political elite, including presidential hopefuls, was a hot topic as well.

Kenya is East Africa’s main economic hub, and has registered strong growth under Kenyatta’s rule. But the Covid-19 pandemic, Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, and drought have pushed up prices for food and fuel (Mwakideu Chrispin, 2022). Furthermore, a third of the country’s youth is unemployed, and the nation is struggling with a major debt crisis.

But with the importance of ethnicity now receding into the background and less emphasis placed on the issue during the campaign than in the past, no significant violence was reported in the 2022 national elections.

Kenya is a key partner in the global fight against terrorism, and is considered an anchor of stability by the West in a fragile region beset by strife. The fact that the US has a military base in Kenya shows why Kenya is considered a strategic partner of the West in the geopolitical grand scheme of things in East Africa. With a civil war in Ethiopia, the militant Islamic terrorist group Al-Shaabab’s presence in Somalia and instability in South Sudan, the strategic importance of Kenya, as far as the western interests are concerned, cannot be under-estimated.  

In the recent elections held on 09 August 2022, Kenyans did not only elect a new president, but also a new parliament and county governors. Most eyes were, however, firmly set on the fiercely-contested presidential race, which featured dramatic shifts of alliances. 

After a “nail-biting” period of waiting, the results were announced on Monday (15t August 2022) and William Ruto was declared the winner, having garnered 50.49% of the vote, while Odinga captured 48.85% of the vote. 

It took the Independent Electoral and Boundary Commission (IEBC) five days to announce the results; and when they did, four electoral commissioners, out of seven, distanced themselves from the presidential results. That is a red flag, and it was therefore no small wonder that Odinga’s supporters took to the streets in protest. The possibility of Odinga challenging the results in the Supreme Court of Kenya can, therefore, not be ruled out.

As the political baton was almost passed from Uhuru Kenyatta to Raila Odinga, signifying an end to the feud between two of Kenya’s most prominent, yet rival political dynasties, the burning question is: why did the two eventually agree to break bread? Time and space would not allow me to answer that question.

I “borrowed” the heading of this opinion piece from the title of Mzee Kenyata’s book, Facing Mount Kenya; and that was by deliberate design.  It is, therefore, only proper to end the piece by “borrowing” from the title of Jaramogi Oginga Ondinga’s book, Not yet Uhuru (uhuru means freedom in Kiswahili), which was first published in 1967. In that autobiography, the author counters the British propaganda to distort the history of Kenya. 

As the Kenyans are currently “facing Mount Kenya”, I do not want to answer for them whether “…it is yet uhuru or not….” I leave that to them.

* Gerson Uaripi Tjihenuna is a commissioner of elections in Namibia. However, the views expressed here are his own, and not those of the ECN.