Power tussles during transitions and how they claim casualties

 

A desire to protect the outgoing administration’s family and associates, a successor guaranteeing continuity of policies, and regional and international interests are factors that influence succession politics, interviews with individuals involved in past transitions have revealed.

Because of the competing interests, incumbents, either directly or through cronies and often with the assistance of intelligence services, find themselves meddling in presidential campaigns.

In every transition, there are casualties of the succession, and this time the stakes are even higher because it’s the presidency at war — President Kenyatta’s camp, with backing from opposition leader Mr Raila Odinga, is bent on stopping Deputy President William Ruto from succeeding him.

“Succession is not a joke. You have to know the individual candidates in the game and weigh them all. If you’re not careful, it can explode into chaos akin to the one in 2007,” Mr Franklin Bett, who served as State House comptroller under President Moi, told Nation.

He was referring to the post-poll chaos that followed the re-election of President Kibaki, which was disputed by his main rival, Mr Odinga of the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) party.

Kanu government

Mr Bett would know, having been an insider in the Kanu government but who in 2002 fled to the opposition National Rainbow Coalition (Narc) after he fell out with President Moi.The defection, which saw him named Narc’s chief campaigner in Rift Valley, saved him the humiliation his former Kanu associates endured after President Moi’s bid to install Mr Kenyatta as his successor boomeranged.

One day in October 2002, Dr Sally Kosgei, then Head of Public Service, drove into State House, a place she had become accustomed to as an insider in the Kanu government, but despite her diplomatic skills, the mission at hand was distressing.

President Moi was in his office, but unlike their past routine government briefings, this particular visit had some finality, perhaps the most significant in Moi’s 24-year reign.“In October 2002, it was agreed that my little group of six people overseeing a political power shift should let the President know that his party was not doing so well,” Dr Kosgei said.

She was referring to Mr Kenyatta’s poor popularity ratings, as the opposition rival, Mr Mwai Kibaki, surged ahead in the lead-up to the General Election due that December.

“Three of us went to see him and we faced a really hostile reception. He (President Moi) asked me who I was with and when I looked back, I found myself alone after my colleagues had fled,” Dr Kosgei recounted.

Eventually, Mr Kenyatta was trounced in the presidential vote. He read the concession speech flanked by Mr William Ruto, and Mr Kibaki took over as the country’s third president.

Ms Kosgei recounted the tribulations of the Kanu power brokers over the transition on February 12, last year, during the burial of the former president at his Kabarak home.

Corruption investigation

The new administration would drag her through a corruption investigation she said was intended to humiliate her. Nearly two decades later, President Kenyatta is in State House, his succession plan unravelling ahead of next year’s elections, and some of those who were by his side when he lost in 2002, now in the inner sanctums of power, working to influence the transition to the fifth President.

Jubilee vice-chairman David Murathe, a former Gatanga MP, Mr Njee Muturi, the deputy chief of staff at State House, and the President’s private secretary, Mr Jomo Gecaga, are among those who were with Mr Kenyatta when his team was vanquished, and have wielded influence since he was elected to office in 2013.

Head of Public Service Joseph Kinyua, Mr Wanyama Musiambo, the deputy head of public service, chief of staff Nzioka Waita, Ms Ruth Kagia, the deputy chief of staff, State House comptroller Kinuthia Mbugua, Mr George Kariuki, the deputy State House comptroller and Mr Andrew Wakahiu, secretary, President’s Delivery Unit, are the high ranking figures at State House.

Mr Murathe, Central Organisation of Trade Unions (Cotu) boss Francis Atwoli and political analyst Mutahi Ngunyi have emerged as the most vocal opponents of DP Ruto’s quest for the presidency, instead campaigning for Mr Odinga.

Mr Odinga’s ODM has opened pre-election coalition talks with President Kenyatta’s party, with Jubilee secretary-general Raphael Tuju among those leading the talks. The former prime minister is often in the company of the President’s allies including his brother, Mr Muhoho, who has visited the ODM leader at his Karen home accompanied by Kanu party leader Gideon Moi.

Mr Murathe has openly asked Kenyans to prepare for a Mr Odinga presidency.

 This week, Mr Zakayo Cheruiyot, an Internal Security permanent secretary in the Moi administration, recalled that he was at the centre of the 2002 transition, perhaps among the six officials with Dr Kosgei to deliver the gloomy message to the Head of State.

New administration

Mr Cheruiyot, who was among those purged by the new administration, was reluctant to discuss the challenges they witnessed at the time, including how the succession backfired, only saying that would be “a story for another day.”

“But history has recorded that we had a very peaceful handover. We did a very difficult job but managed to handover peacefully. Despite lack of any guidelines at that time, we managed to organise everything well and the country had a very peaceful transition,” said Mr Cheruiyot, who would later be dismissed by the Kibaki administration and harangued by a corruption probe before he plunged into politics.

In 2013, Mr Francis Kimemia, who had taken over in January 2012 as Head of Public Service and Secretary to the Cabinet from Mr Francis Muthaura, was among Kibaki insiders reportedly trying to influence the succession.

The coterie of power brokers with unlimited access to State House during the Kibaki presidency included Dr Joe Wanjui, then the University of Nairobi chancellor, Prof Nick Wanjohi, who served as President Kibaki’s private secretary between 2012 and 2017, and Mr Stanley Murage, who was special adviser to President Kibaki for strategic policy analysis.

During the Kibaki presidency, his business partners and old friends who joined him in government, including Mr Matere Keriri, who would serve as State House comptroller alongside other politicians like then Justice minister Kiraitu Murungi, Finance minister David Mwiraria and Internal security’s Chris Murungaru, were known as ‘the Mt Kenya Mafia’ for their influence. Mr Kimemia and Prof Wanjohi would later reportedly back Mr Musalia Mudavadi to succeed President Kibaki in the run-up to 2013 elections. 

Coalition

However, Mr Kenyatta’s coalition with Mr Ruto seemed to have complicated matters for Kibaki insiders backing Mr Mudavadi.In September 2013, barely four months after President Kenyatta took over, Mr Kimemia was replaced as Head of Civil Service by Mr Kinyua, who was Mr Kenyatta’s PS at the time he served as Finance minister. Mr Kimemia was elected Nyandarua governor in the last elections.

Last week, Mr Kimemia, who chaired the transition committee in 2013, said security is central to the transfer of power, as “it’s a national agenda that you transit from one regime to another in peace and tranquillity.”

Mr Bett said tribal considerations and incumbents wanting to protect themselves, their interests and their associates once they leave office, are other factors at play during succession.

“Money also plays a very big role (sic),” added the former Roads minister in the Grand Coalition Government. Ms Nancy Gitau, a political strategist, also played a central role in the 2013 transition and would become a powerful figure in Mr Kenyatta’s presidency.

Ms Gitau, in Jubilee’s second term, appears to have taken a back seat. Described as “calm but firm” by those who know her, she told Nation last December that she is concentrating on writing her memoires.    BY DAILY NATION