What team Ruto and Azimio must agree on first

It’s been nearly a year since we parted in this space. I left you in these pages with the words of the poet George Gordon, aka Lord Byron, where he said, “So we’ll go no more a roving, so late into the night; though the heart be still as loving, and the moon be still as bright.”

It’s a rolling stone that gathers no moss. “For the sword outwears its sheath, and the soul wears out the breast. The heart must pause to breathe, and love itself have rest.” 

We return, older and wiser, even if a little sadder. For, the first year of the Kenya Kwanza government is up –  a noisy and messy affair, full of sound and fury, as the poet would say.

It is thanks to President William Ruto’s detractors’ determination to disrupt and derail him. They desire to send his government into paralysis for its entire term. 

Today, August 13, was the day Team Odinga planned to celebrate victory at KICC. But a little bird whispered to them that things were bad. Two days later, Ruto was declared the winner. 

Team Odinga rejected the presidential election results, even before they were announced. Their agenda for the next five years swung into motion, right there at the Bomas of Kenya.

The “maandamano” began, right there, on live national TV. They have never stopped. They morph from one guise to another.

Even when Team Azimio is not in the streets, Kenyans stay reminded that Azimio marauders could burst into their lives anytime, “if the Ruto government will not listen to them.” 

In sum, it has been a riotous year. Looking into the seeds of time, indications are it is set to be more uproarious before it can be still. Yes, talks have begun between the two belligerent sides.

But talks conducted with the gun on people’s heads never yielded fruit. Azimio has promised to return. Kenya Kwanza’s response to Azimio has been, “Shoot! What are you waiting for?” 

It is an unhealthy state of affairs. Meanwhile, those who stand on self-styled holy ground urge Odinga and President Ruto to “sit down and talk.”

All through, however, I have not understood what the talks are supposed to be about. Less still, I have failed to understand why people’s day-to-day life and activities should be held at ransom. 

What is the big question? Azimio’s grievances have been mercurial, where they are not fluid and chameleonic.

They have mutated with ease; from an alleged stolen election to an alleged “corrupt Judiciary,” to the “need to reinstate three IEBC commissioners” who resigned in the face of a tribunal, and a fourth removed by the tribunal. 

When it has not been this, it has been about the allegations of a smoky, faceless whistleblower; alleged to have given to Azimio presidential results that indicate Mr Odinga won the election.

Odinga and his team then asked President Ruto to open IEBC servers. At some point they promised “to storm State House, to reclaim their stolen victory.”

They moved swiftly into other spaces and grievances. Migration of Jubilee MPs from Azimio to Kenya Kwanza. IEBC. Inclusivity in government. The national sovereign debt and need to stop borrowing. The tax burden. The cost of fuel. The cost of living. 

For the country to move forward; for any dialogue to bear fruit Odinga must first come to terms with the fact that he lost the election. He must unequivocally concede defeat.

Then, and only then, can the country have modicum of dialogue. If not, then expect only to hear mutually noisy and malicious resentment. 

-The writer is a strategic communications adviser.

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