Photo caption: President Uhuru Kenyatta and Opposition chief Raila Odinga. They both should work together for the unity of the country. (nation.co.ke)
The current political scene has been characterized by the major presidential candidates, Uhuru Kenyatta and Raila Odinga, grandstanding on issues to do with IEBC and the forthcoming October polls.
On one hand, Raila maintains that there must be reforms within IEBC before the October election while on the other hand, Uhuru maintains IEBC will conduct the election as currently constituted.
In fact, NASA walked out of a meeting convened by IEBC citing the lack of address to their irreducible minimums. This left a looming uncertainty as to whether the election will take place.
In Sierra Leone and Rwanda, it should be noted that political grandstanding plunged the countries into war whose consequences were unfathomable.
Life was lost in huge numbers and property worth millions of shillings destroyed. Economical and social activities were also affected. In Sierra Leone, the end result was a civil war of 11 years where an estimated death of 50,000 was recorded while in Rwanda, the urge for power led the Tutsi turning against the Hutu in 1994 leading to a genocide. At least 500,000 people lost their lives.
In Kenya, we had a similar incident in 2007 after the general elections. Both Raila Odinga and the then winner Mwai Kibaki maintained that they had won the presidential election. What transpired was intercommunity war that left over 1000 people dead and hundreds of thousands displaced. Both supporters of Raila and Kibaki turned against each other believing that their candidate was the right man to lead the country. Other sectors of life were also disrupted for the worst.
In 2017, the same script is taking shape. Raila Odinga and his NASA team have maintained that there are no election taking place if there are no reforms within IEBC. On the other hand, Uhuru Kenyatta and his Jubilee team has maintained that election must take place and have gone further to amend the electoral laws act.
The two political outfits have created a perception that they must lead the country. The grandstanding has led to animosity between their supporters who have resorted to attacking each other both physically and verbally. The thirst for power has seen some people call for secession where some parts of the country want to be a country of their own.
If the political tension is left to continue piling up, then the consequences might be worse than what the country experienced in 2007/08 post-election period. Both Raila and Uhuru should swallow their pride and unite Kenyans. Any person is fit to lead the country if they get elected by a majority of Kenyans. Elections in the country should not be a do or die issue now or even in the future.