Raila Odinga during the African Union Chairmanship debate at African Union Headquarters in Addis Ababa.
One thing I will say about Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga during this campaign for the African Union Commission Chairman: he has not gone negative on his main rival, Mahamoud Ali Youssouf, not even once.
Not to my knowledge anyway, and I concede I might miss some things, being Mr Odinga’s shameless cheerleader in this election.
On the other hand, I have seen X posts attributed to Mr Youssouf going quite low, attacking Mr Odinga’s age and claiming that his candidacy is an extension of domestic Kenyan politics. Er, largely irrelevant, if not utterly factually untrue.
Besides, the important thing is not what is happening internally in Kenya, but what type of leadership Mr Odinga promises.
The election is tomorrow and Kenyans have different expectations. The Zoomers, their supporters and government opponents hope that Mr Odinga loses as a way of throwing a spanner in the works for whatever political gymnastics President Ruto is cooking for the election in 2027.
For Gen Z, there is some unresolved business about Mr Odinga’s role in quashing their revolution.
The Luo, to a man, and I are of course rooting for Mr Odinga. I genuinely believe that the African Union could benefit from a real dyed-in-the-wool pan-Africanist of Mr Odinga’s stature. It is true that
Mr Odinga is oldish and slurry-ish, but on the last encounter I had with him, the old hyena was vigorous and as coherent as ever, razor sharp and with a cavern of a memory. If you bore him, he will start dozing off on you, but that’s nothing new.
Same thing used to happen 15 years ago. All sleep-deprived powerful men will doze off if you bore them, including some who are 30 years younger than Mr Odinga.
Mr Odinga comes with a programme of development for the continent which is intended to benefit and propel Africa forward and not necessarily to please external powers, though Mr Odinga has highly developed diplomatic depth and can manage big powers on Africa’s behalf.
Raila Odinga at Mjadala Africa rehearsals at the Africa Union Headquarters in Addis Ababa.
He will not be using the platform to negotiate foreign military bases for Kenya – we don’t want them – or to advance some irredentist agenda. Secondly, Mr Odinga is not a mere retainer or junior staff, he will relate to African presidents on an equal footing and will therefore be able to persuade and get commitments for continental projects.
And he will represent Africa well to the world, making our case – and demands – for us implacably and strongly, or seductively and persuasively, as the situation might demand. He is the right guy for the job.
And from what I hear, he is the front runner – by an English mile – mainly because he has approached the contest with typical political guile and tireless campaigning, visiting at least 44 countries, while the other candidates were mumbling French into telephones.
There is very hopeful material doing the rounds on social media – I hope I don’t end up believing our own propaganda – but if it is anything to go by, Mr Odinga is poised to take the thing. Out of the 49 voting countries, he has the support of 28, needing only six votes to make the 34 for a two-thirds victory.
The 10 countries that are yet to endorse any candidate are either totally neutral or leaning towards Mr Odinga, I hear.
The young, multilingual comrade French, on the other hand, with 16 confirmed votes, needs to convince the uncommitted 10 and take eight out of Mr Odinga’s confirmed votes for a round one victory.
Former prime minister Raila Odinga speaks to journalists at his Capitol Hill offices in Nairobi on November 15, 2024.
The more likely scenario is that Mr Odinga will win in the first round. Barring that, he will take it in the second.
Now, the world of politics is murky; the world of diplomacy is treacherous.
When you combine the two you create a world with more snakes than Makandune, very unpredictable, twisting, turning, hissing with fangs on the ready.
You must have heard from the social media analyses about the five blocs along which Africans vote at the African Union: Southern Africa, East Africa, Central Africa, West Africa, and North Africa. And then there are the linguistic cantons: Francophone and Anglophone.
There is even a religious group, the Organisation of Islamic States, to which Uganda and Tanzania belong. Countries are in many groups, but it is the local, geographic groups which seem to carry a little more weight. Now, North Africa, which also hunts with Francophone Africa, is believed to be angling for the position of Deputy Chairman of AUC.
As a student of calculus and algebra, this tells me that the most plausible scenario to sell is for the chairmanship to go Anglophone (read Odinga) while the deputy and pending commissioners go Francophone/OIS which works out very nicely for our guy.
I have been here before, with sheaves of paper and a calculator, waiting for Kasipul-Kabondo and Ugenya to report... Only this time, it’s going to be different, I swear.
Mr Mathiu, a media consultant at Steward-Africa, is a former Editor-in-Chief of Nation Media Group. [email protected].
