Busia County Senator Okiya Omtatah.
Busia Senator Okiya Okoiti Omtatah’s early declaration for the 2027 presidential race presents intriguing possibilities. Kenya’s political space has always been dominated by powerful and wealthy types who can count on the support of populous ethnic formations.
Mr Omtatah is not a wealthy man, at least by the Kenyan political standards. And he is not an ethnic chieftain, far from it. While he hails from the populous Luhyia conglomerate of western Kenya, his roots are in the minority Teso sub-group that straddles the Kenya-Uganda border.
The Teso can hardly claim a powerful regional voice. In fact, the chairman of the Iteso Council of Elders, Wycliffe Oprong, and Mr Fredrick Adungo, the Kenyan community representative of the Uganda-based traditional King Sande Emolot, have been quoted expressing scepticism on the presidential bid. Both said he had not sought the endorsement of the community.
Yet that he does not fit into the normal parameters might be Mr Omtatah’s greatest asset. People are yearning for change. The Gen Z-led revolt in June and July this year against high taxation and corrupt leadership was powerful testimony that the youth, a clear majority of the voting pool, are fed up.
The revolt shook President William Ruto’s government to the core, and forced him into an unlikely alliance with opposition chieftain Raila Odinga. The new union and the brutal crackdown in which scores of youth were killed may have crushed the protests, but anger still runs deep, and has spread beyond the youth to virtually all demographics.
Guerilla campaigns
The Gen Z may have been forced off the streets, but they have been running guerilla campaigns on social media, churches, civil society groupings, universities and other platforms that the authorities have been unable stifle. Intensive civil education campaigns are being waged underground, taking advantage of the ‘leaderless, tribeless, partyless, fearless’ tag to befuddle security agencies.
The cardinal message is that there must be a change come 2027. It is that President Ruto and Kenya Kwanza regime must be sent home, together with Mr Odinga’s formation that has gone to bed with the oppressor.
Everybody hoping to make an impact in 2027 is feverishly scrambling to capture the angry youth vote. The remaining opposition Azimio coalition led by Wiper party leader Kalonzo Musyoka and DAP-K leader Eugene Wamalwa, Mr Odinga’s 2022 running-mate Martha Karua, and Dr Ruto’s recently impeached Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua, are all in the scramble to capitalise on widespread youth discontent.
But the reality is that even if out of government, they are all part of the system, having served in powerful positions in various governments. The youth might most likely see them as part of the problem rather than part of the solution.
The cry is for an outsider, one who comes unblemished by present or past association and service with government, established political alliances or ethnic coalitions.
Gen Z movement
The Gen Z movement has been playing its cards close to the chest. Efforts to seek out their plans in terms of a formal political movement and leadership, as well as preferred candidates for president and other elective seats in 2027 draw a blank.
But even before Mr Omtatah signalled his intentions with unveiling of a presidential campaign exploratory committee just over a fortnight ago, there were already whispers that he was emerging as a strong contender for the Gen Z vote. But there was no affirmation that the movement, which in any case has no centralised leadership or command structure, had even contemplated endorsing him or any other claimant.
In any case Mr Omtatah, at the age of 60 years, is far outside the Gen Z demographic of 12 to 27 years or any other age-set that can claim to speak for the youth.
But he has in him powerful credentials as a social justice legend who made his name as a serial litigant against misuse of power. Operating as a lone crusader outside the established legal and civil society platforms, he has prosecuted, as a layman, and secured victories in a large number of public interest cases.
His capturing the Busia Senate seat in 2022 on a ticket of the largely unknown National Reconstruction Alliance in a field expected to be fiercely fought between the Raila and Ruto camps buttressed his standing as an outsider able to buck the system.
However, outsiders have never made any impact on Kenyan presidential contests since re-introduction of the multi-party system in 1992. He might well be the one to buck the trend if general discontent demands a shift from politics dominated by wealthy, corrupt, greedy ethnic kingpins.
[email protected]; @MachariaGaitho
