Voter trading: How Paul Ngei sold his block to Mzee Jomo Kenyatta

Once upon a time, there lived a voters’ trader known as Paul Ngei. Ngei had a political party – the African People’s Party (APP). He used it well in 1963 to bargain for his place within the Jomo Kenyatta government. That way, he made sure that he was not eclipsed into political oblivion by Tom Mboya. And that gave him a ticket to do what he wanted.

Some 60 years later, Ngei’s script for the ‘third force’ has remained intact and is often used by politicians eager to get a seat at the high table. Think of Moses Wetang’ula. Kalonzo Musyoka. Gideon Moi. Musalia Mudavadi.

The only difference is that these days, unlike in 1963, we also have “certificate-parties”, “briefcase-parties”, “handbag parties” and “one-man guitars” — or whatever you call them — roaming at high tables and purporting to sign deals or coalition agreements. Those ones litter the political landscape more with noise than substance, hoping to one day rise to Ngei’s status.

Other politicians are on the scene as voter traders or as voter brokers — thanks to the Ngei script — and they legally bargain for themselves.

But we also have other small respectable parties that stand for certain social agenda, and cannot be ignored: Think of Irungu Nyakera’s Farmers Party; Mazingira Green Party, founded by Nobel Peace laureate Wangari Maathai; Mwandawiro Mghanga’s Communist Party or Boniface Mwangi’s Chama cha Ukweli, and a few others who propagate principles of social and economic justice and environment.

But there are many other parties whose officials cannot tell you what they stand for.

If you want to understand the art of bargaining in politics you have to look at the fortunes of Paul Ngei after APP.

As Kenya goes to the elections, Wiper leader Kalonzo Musyoka, who inherited chunks of the Ngei empire, has become a latter-day Ngei and ever since he polled nine per cent of the presidential votes in 2007, he has used that to bargain for a seat at the high table.

With this ex-Ngei block, Musyoka first managed to get into a coalition with President Mwai Kibaki and was appointed vice-president as Kenya plunged into the 2007/2008 post-election violence. 

Every time I watch Kalonzo make political moves — and his critics think he dramatises his importance ahead of elections — he reminds me of Ngei and his third party politics.

Bargain with Kenyatta

Let me illustrate how Ngei did it, for he laid the basis of what we see today.

In 1963, as Kanu faced Kadu in the elections, Ngei created his own party, hoping to use it to bargain with Kenyatta. Whether Ngei was pushed out of Kanu or he jumped out is not known. What we know is that Mboya, the master of backstabbing, had managed to elevate Machakos politician William Malu to district Kanu chairman ahead of the election.

Unhappy with Mboya’s arrangement, Ngei threatened to walk out of Kanu — which he did. Historian Henry Bienen has argued that Ngei “did not receive the national power and status he wanted from Kanu leaders” and he felt that the likes of Mboya had ganged up with his opponents in former Ukambani districts to finish him. To survive, he had to form his own party. While Kanu and Kadu were national parties, Dr Bienen describes APP as a “tribally-based party” though that has never been in question.

To get even with Mboya, Ngei decided to sponsor a candidate to run against Mboya in Nairobi and he picked his new secretary-general, Kanti Mandalia, a well-known Asian trader. That was in 1963. Mandalia performed well and his 8,049 votes against Mboya’s 16,084 was the best indicator that APP was a serious third force.

Finally, APP had eight elected members in the House of Representatives, two in the Senate and eight in the Regional Assembly – enough for Ngei to make a bargain.

One has to agree with Prof Myles Osborne, of Colorado University, in his 2014 book, Ethnicity and Empire in Kenya, that “despite the failure of APP (to become a national party), Ngei had proved his mettle: He had come head-to-head with Kenyatta in the public arena in a way that few others had before, or would after.”

With these numbers, Ngei moved to make some hard bargains.

Since Kenya was heading to the final Lancaster talks and political parties were supposed to take a position on the Majimbo Constitution, Ngei became the bargaining chip. He could join either the government delegation or the Opposition.

First, he had two days of intense discussion with Ronald Ngala, the president of Kadu, in the hope that he would be accommodated as a member of the official Opposition. While Kanu was entitled to 11 delegates, Kadu was entitled to four — though it was not automatic they had to include APP.

Kenyatta knew that if he got Ngei to his side, he would have 12 delegates and the Opposition’s would be reduced to three! The pressure was actually on Ngei to make a quick decision and intelligence reported that he held meetings with Minister of State Joseph Murumbi and Oginga Odinga, even as he was talking to Ngala.

Five-hour party meeting

Initially, Ngala had allowed Ngei to be in the Kadu delegation to London, but after a meeting at State House (then Government House) he announced that Ngei would be replaced by Robert Matano for the final constitutional talks. 

“This is because Mr Ngei does not really believe in the Regional Constitution. I do not want the Opposition to be represented by somebody who is just bluffing,” said Ngala.

Ngei, it is now known, had tried to up his stakes and Ngala felt that his demands were not tenable. Again, Ngei was casual on Majimbo.

Time was running out for Lancaster preparations and Kenyatta wrote a secret letter to Governor Malcolm MacDonald begging him to ask Secretary of State for the Colonies Duncan Sandys to accept the expansion of the government delegation to 12 and the Opposition to five “because of certain tribal considerations”. This was to accommodate Ngei while retaining the Kanu delegation.

Kanu’s demand to Ngei was that he had to fold his party before the final Lancaster talks. Ngei’s publicly stated condition was that Prime Minister Kenyatta and Odinga were to hold a rally in Machakos and welcome him officially and in public. But that was not all — there was another under-the-table deal.

On Sunday, September 8, 1963, Ngei convened a five-hour party meeting in Machakos town, which was attended by his party MPs and officials from Machakos and Kitui. They considered what they were told was Odinga’s offer to rejoin Kanu. It is this meeting that gave Ngei the full mandate to make a decision “on the political stand of the Akamba”.

On Friday, September 14, Ngei’s party crossed over from the Opposition to the government side and he asked the Speaker, Humphrey Slade, for a chance to make a statement.

“We do not want Kenya to go the Congo way because of small kingdoms or because of individual political ambitions,” he said.

On September 16, Kenyatta drove to Machakos and announced that Ngei would be in the government delegation to Lancaster.

Change Constitution

He said: “I am overjoyed today to … welcome Mr Ngei with all his APP followers to Kanu. I have always been shocked to see Mr Ngei, with whom I suffered for many years, sitting in Parliament with those who oppose us.”

Ngei said that the Kamba people do not want to play the game of ‘wait and see’” and were determined to be in the government.

By adding his weight to the Kanu side, Ngei had given Jomo’s party a total of 94 seats against Kadu’s 30 and Kanu now had enough members to change the Constitution — at any time.

During the London meeting to finalise the constitutional arrangements ahead of the independence of Kenya, Jomo spoke with vigour, buoyed by the numbers he had. “We cannot agree that merely because the present Constitution was the result of agreements at the Lancaster Conference, it is sacrosanct. Nor can we agree that the Constitution needs to be tried for so many years to discover its weaknesses.” 

He dismissed the Majimbo constitution as full of “artificial feelings” and “mistrust” and said that “it must be amended”.

Back home, Kenyatta appointed Ngei the chairman of the Maize Marketing Board and later on as Minister for Housing. 

Ngei then appointed his wife as “personal secretary”, was caught up in a major maize scandal and he is alleged to have taken a Mercedes Benz from a Nairobi dealer and refused to pay.

Back in Machakos, he continued in his attempts to take the party office. What is remembered of the Ngei-Malu drama is their July 1, 1968 physical fight outside the Kanu office. Ngei, then an untouchable brute, was wrestled to the ground as he attempted to take over.

Ngei had shown that in politics, even small numbers matter. Without him, Kenyatta would have struggled to change the Constitution. Now, look at how history is repeating itself.

[email protected] @johnkamau1