ODMK NOMINATIONS IS THE REAL ISSUE DELEGATE OR CONSENSUS?

Mincing words is an art in politics but it comes a time when one cannot sell a product however sweet he packages it. I find it insincere for the ODMK luminaries to state that the issue why the party may break up is because of differences in ideology. Unfortunately every Kenyan who follows politics disagree. First, night meetings in which a particular candidate was not welcome was conducted then when they invited him, they politely requested him to step down for the rest. It is at this point when we start getting a little bit of truth when Raila becomes emotional and hit the nail in the head "Why cant Raila be allowed to lead?". This is the one million dollar question and this is the problem of ODMK. It is not consensus or delegate system, it is the fear that Raila is too close to getting it and the other candidates are becoming scared. Why? I wish Musyoka in particular would be willing to directly answer this question because he is the only one in ODMK who can tear down this wall.

If a solution is to be found and if this party is to remain united, the right question to be asked is "Why not Raila?". Why this question? It is because all the efforts being made right now, all the money being wasted and all the mobilization taking place are geared towards stopping Raila from being the next president of Kenya and the person who has spent most of his time on this is Kalonzo Musyoka. I see many hands in this. I see former president Moi through Mudavadi, Ruto and Uhuru and I see current president Kibaki's hand through Kalonzo. So if the unity of ODMK is to be a achieved, the ball is not in Raila's court, it is in the court of those who seem to have been compromised and are constantly changing goals to block Raila.

To be sincere is a virtue. After Raila poised the real question, Ruto may have seen the sense and decided the best way forward is to let others lead. I think rather than the candidates attempting to arm twist Raila to accept their position and resign and ask them to lead, the best gentlemanly action they should take is to state that they will give a chance to someone else and request that someone to lead them rather than state that that someone must resign for them. The position that Mudavadi and Kalonzo have taken is therefore arrogant and egoistic, considering that they do not have the political acumen nor experience that Raila has.

It is therefore a waste of time for the ODMK luminaries to go around attempting to sell delegate or consensus system. They should deal with one simple question and that question is "Do we block Raila or not? Or the alternative question is this "Do we choose Raila or Kalonzo". The issue of who is best placed to beat Kibaki is useless and insulting the public's intelligence. ODMK had shown that they could beat Kibaki even in the absence of a real candidate in the referendum. I do believe that I can beat Kibaki if ODMK chose me, so the nonsense that Riala cannot beat Kibaki is a package that will never sell. What sells is that Raila is a luo and Musyoka, Mudavadi and Ruto hate to see a luo president. If that is so then why do they want to bank on the luo vote?

It is time the luos think of whether they are a part of Kenya or Uganda. The luos should also think whether it is necessary to get involved in Kenyan politics at all, because at this rate the luos will always get used. Forty years is enough.

Barack Abonyo