Mr DP Gachagua, clean up your act or you could soon come to regret

Today I will offer some well-meaning advice to Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua.

Take it or leave it. You talk too much, without reflecting. I can understand why you are in a hurry to stamp your imprint in Central Kenya. However, you are going about it the wrong way. 

For starters, why are you always so bitter? It’s eating you raw. Drop it. Must you obsess with Uhuru Kenyatta endlessly? You blame him for everything.

From what you call a “dilapidated” economy to “state capture”. Uhuru is no longer in office. It’s UDA’s time now. Stop the blame game.

Work and deliver what you promised. Didn’t you know the economy was “dilapidated” when you were making your fantasy campaign promises? You sound so angry and vengeful.

"Disgraceful speech"

The speech you gave at Kasarani on September 13 when you were being sworn in was disgraceful. The expressions on the faces of the invited Heads of State said it all. Tame your mouth, for your own good.

And forget that campaign talk of comparing your UDA government with Mwai Kibaki’s. You’ve nothing in common, whatsoever. Daniel arap Moi had messed up everything. Kibaki didn’t go wailing everywhere he went about how he had inherited a mess.

He quietly went to work to rectify things. He never mentioned Moi. Or blamed him for failure to achieve his own goals even though he found the economy comatose. With you, it’s politics, politics, politics all day. Not too long ago you made a public invitation to Uhuru to join UDA. Would Kibaki have bothered to ask Moi to join Narc? 

People who run their mouths faster than is wise are always getting themselves into trouble. And public ridicule. Soon after your swearing-in as DP, you started ranting that UDA found only Sh93 million in the Treasury.

You immediately exposed yourself as having zero comprehension of how the government runs its finances. The outgoing Finance CS Ukur Yattani felt compelled to educate you: Government funds are not kept in a savings account that keeps accumulating deposits. Money is collected and spent every day, to meet the many needs and commitments of the government.

Bwana DP, I suspect what is the source of your hatred for Uhuru. You blame him for being locked up in police cells for a weekend by former DCI George Kinoti when he was investigating you in a corruption case.

Have you forgotten there were people who were entirely innocent but suffered genuine state persecution? Like those who got jailed simply for campaigning against Moi's misgovernance? They don’t exhibit the rabid bitterness you show. That time if I remember well, you were still suckling on Kanu’s bountiful teats. 

Stolen money

According to you, Mr DP, every UDA figure who faced a court case during Uhuru’s presidency was being framed. Come on, Gachagua, we aren’t naive.

There was confirmed stolen money or properties held by many of those arrested, and real dead bodies from those accused of murder. In any case, if the offences were fabricated, wouldn’t it have been better to go for full trials and win acquittals? 

Another thing. Don’t keep elevating hustlers into some kind of divine theology. Jomo Kenyatta, Moi and Kibaki were born hustlers too. They went to school without shoes just as you claim you did.

There’s nothing special about your circumstances. Incidentally, you’re forever preaching to us how the UDA hustler leadership is God-ordained. Do you know Jesus was not a hustler but from a dynasty? Have you ever heard of the House of David? Read your Bible well. 

Gachagua takes the ‘bottom-up’ thing UDA advocates literally. Quite literally. It’s amusing. During the campaigns, I observed him at Githurai along Thika highway dishing out chapatis to some fellas who were crowding around his car. That told me how he simplistically understands that bottom-up stuff.

I guess he had bought the chapatis somewhere on the roadside so as to gift them away at Githurai. (But wasn't that kind of 'top-down', him giving away chapatis to hustlers?) Talking of food, there’s been a comment on how in public he should eat in a more decorous manner than he does. Get video footage of how he looked munching roasted maize during the launch of the Hustler Fund at Green Park last November. 

Now, to the spat with Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja over his plan to relocate matatus from the CBD. The planning headaches of the city have defeated City Hall time and again in the past, and I’m not betting on Sakaja succeeding. Still, Gachagua should refrain from capitalising on the standoff to gain himself mileage in Central Kenya. Sakaja’s response to him was classic: “Nairobi cannot be run like Karatina.”

To rub it in, he called the DP a “village politician”. In fact the DP didn’t “make” Sakaja governor as he insinuated. Sakaja benefited from Mt Kenya’s toxic anti-Azimio mass hysteria that had nothing to do with Gachagua, or indeed the governor. 

I don’t wish you ill, Mr DP, but I can see your career getting unstuck if you continue behaving like a bumpkin. When the types of Oscar Sudi will be let loose on you, know your goose is cooked. See how Luhya MPs reacted angrily to your threats against Sakaja?

In fact, one of them, Bumula’s Jack Wamboka, threatened to table your impeachment. Recently I saw a funny online photo of you praying facing the Mountain, arms uplifted. You’ll need more such prayers when things really get hot. By the way, were your parents really Mau Mau as you claim? The jury is out on that. 

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POSTSCRIPT: Gachagua’s latest scheme is to invite his boss soon to Sagana Lodge and proclaim him “King” of the Mountain. That’s when it hit me this is a total political wreck. Beyond repair. People want services, not kings. 

[email protected]; @GitauWarigi