Kindiki's tough task of digging out Gachagua's deep roots in Mt Kenya

By picking Prof Kithure Kindiki as his deputy, President William Ruto was sending a conciliatory symbolic gesture to placate the Mt Kenya region following the ejection from government of their son, the impeached DP Ragathi Gachagua.

It was also strategic, for Kindiki who, too, comes from the region, fitted the criteria of a loyal foot soldier who could win the confidence and support of the locals in disrupting, containing and rolling back the influence of the aggrieved, and vengeful former DP.

But containing Gachagua has proved elusive, and it is dawning on his detractors that it is a steeper and more slippery hill to climb than earlier assumed. The assignment is complicated further by the consequences of a possible strategic miscalculation as the trail of tragic anger, anxiety and deepening divisions and factions in the region threaten to derail development activities. 

Kindiki, a soft-spoken teacher of law, came into the government indicating his preference of a gentleman’s approach in dealing with fellow leaders.

But the pressure to deliver results must have rendered his theory impractical, and it was not surprising his pledge did not last long.

He soon dropped his perspective and jumped to the group-think of Gachagua bashing championed by Kapseret MP Oscar Sudi, President Ruto’s personal assistant Farouk Kibet and Majority leader Kimani Ichung’wah.

Hard-nosed

Since then, Kindiki’s footprints in the roll-back-Gachagua project are hardly evident, at least as distinctively his, save for media coverage he gets primarily by virtual of his position in the government rather than ground-breaking performance.  

On the other hand Riggy G, a political scientist who cut his teeth serving the one party rule as a district officer, later personal assistant to former KANU chairman Uhuru Kenyatta in the multiparty era and MP for Mathira during Uhuru’s presidency, came out as a hard-nosed, ruthless, and abrasive go-getter. He build the image of a fearless risk-taker who does not seek to fit in anyone’s matrix – ever ready to die fighting to create his own world.

To his detractors the impeachment was a fait accompli, perhaps the reason Kindiki had at first instance, thought of a soft, nay, empathetic approach to Gachagua who at any rate, was now an outsider who would not have capacity to cause any significant headache to the government.

Indeed in the beginning, Gachagua did not appear to have a grand plan for political comeback. However political temperatures have gone up with alliances of political parties, and influential individuals are beginning to seek his validation and more so coalescing around him. The launch of his Democracy for the People party (DCP), has given impetus to this anti-Ruto mobilization which is turning the discredited, self-declared ‘truthful man’ into a formidable force in the mountain region.

Wounded leader

Sudi, Ichung’wah and allies are going overdrive to put a brake to his blistering statements and rallies characterized by chants of wantam (one term for President Ruto), and in their apparent helplessness, they are adding a twist to the fight with calls for his arrest accusing him of orchestrating and financing the June 25 Gen Z protests across Kenya.  

What Gachagua called ‘listening to the ground’ sounded like a harmless preoccupation of a wounded leader seeking sympathies of neighbours he had rarely interacted with, and not worthy of note. It had escaped his interlocutors’ observation that the coincidental rising grievances over unmet KK administration promises, high taxation, abductions of activists and poor business environment, which the peripatetic DP had always put to rest by raising public optimism with promises of imminent actions and economic reforms President Ruto had in store for them, created unfavorable environment to start the fight.

The law expert-now-turned politician’s efforts to contain Gachagua have been scaled up with goods and money being dished out to women and youth groups in the mountain region which has generated divergent views. 

A senior Kiama kia Kiama elder from Kimende in Kiambu says ‘giakuheo gitiri gorwe’ (no harm in giving or accepting what is given). But Gachagua allies have criticized Kindiki’s economic empowerment programme as self-serving agenda questioning the source of the money being dished out. Yet others see it as a potential head start for broader socioeconomic gains. 

Gichuke Rigathi, an aspirant of Kinangop parliamentary seat, says ‘it is hypocrisy’ since Kindiki and his allies are learned enough to know the answers to poverty of those scrambling for rice and beans donated at rallies. 

“Kenya should be in the Third Liberation, which is to roll back ignorance, disease and poverty but Kindiki’s program is ‘typical of politician’s dishonesty of treating symptoms of a disease so that the patient remains vulnerable and keeps coming back to a manipulative and exploitative doctor,” he says.   

Karanja Geche, former MCA of Kahawa Sukari and a university lecturer says Kindiki’s goodies perpetuate political patronage. “Proper empowerment gives people ability to grow food on their own, and creates awareness of ‘how to’ survive on their own,” says Karanja. 

However Dr Juliet Kimemia, an official of the National Chamber of Commerce and Industry says there is no conflict. “Gachagua had fought alcoholism. Kindiki has activated structured women and youth groups. Gachagua laid the ground including legal framework on tea and coffee and Kindiki is mobilizing youth and women to process and export tea and coffee from factory level,” she argues.  

An ODM Nyeri branch official Zachary Machira notes that some factors at play predate Ruto government. The devolved government’s hierarchy had given rise to two classes of Kenyans: one extremely rich on top, and another one comprising the majority voiceless poor at the bottom. The leadership had abandoned the people, Machira says, explaining that when Gachagua came back home claiming ‘to listen to the ground’ he drew instant attention of those seeking to be heard, and when he appointed himself as the voice of the voiceless, the people embraced him in the initial excitement ‘for they needed a voice … any voice’.

Liberator colours

Before long Gachagua had exploited the leadership - people vacuum to become the mundu uria unyitete mbogo hia (the man holding the buffalo by the horns) thus jolting the hope of the suffering majority to which the disillusioned public reciprocated by propelling him to higher status than they had ever accorded him while he was the DP.

A Nyeri Kanu official says that hostility towards the government has increased at the grassroots, and Kindiki is the bogeyman while support for Gachagua, who is sailing in the colours of liberator, has deepened to hysterical levels. “Even ODM or KANU Nyeri branch cannot dare criticize him to avoid hostile reactions,” he says.

Other observers cite the predicament of the musicians who visited  Kindiki at his Karen residence in June.  The artistes had to issue public apology for “betrayal of the community” as Gachagua termed it. The Standard confirmed this fear and anxiety when three pro-Kindiki interviewees refused to be quoted saying the ground was “too hot”. Even MPs who are perceived as anti-Gachagua can hardly mingle with the people or sleep in their rural homes, the sources said to illustrate the risk facing those who have contrary views.

Kindiki came in through an appointment, and the public read the tag of loyalty to the president rather than to the  people and relevance to the region, some critics said. “The ‘perception of being used”, according to Peter Munga, former Secretary of the Kikuyu Council of Elders, “is Kindiki’s Achilles heels.”

Gachagua Kindiki fight has had the effect of  polarizing the region, which though cheered on by their respective allies, they violate their duty as leaders, and undermine development over issues that can be sorted out through consultation, says Wachira wa Kiago the KCA chairman.  

Although pro-Gachagua leaders have worked hard to get buy-in of the view that his exit from government was a mark of Ruto’s thanklessness and “contempt for the region” that voted for him to the last man, Peter Mbae, a lecturer at Embu University says that the point to note is that Kindiki-Gachagua war is motivated by personal and selfish struggle for survival in view of the mutating political scene.

‘While Gachagua wants to disconnect the Mt Kenya region from Government alliance, Kindiki fights to retain it the same way Gachagua did while in government. Both are pursuing personal goals clothed in public interest.”

According to Maina Munyua, former secretary of the Kenya Small Scale Tea Farmers Union, the government appointed Gachagua to head tea and coffee reforms but not much was achieved. 

As the fight continues, at least for now, Gachagua is the man of the moment. One has to either swim with him or sink with Kindiki but politics is dynamic and time will tell what the future holds.