Same old David but with a Ndii-fferent sling
Behold, there was Dr David Mwangi Ndii, a renowned economist who became a household name through pointing out the weaknesses of th Jubilee government of Uhuru Kenyatta and William Ruto.
Like David in the bible, this David often took on his enemies with a sling but his favourite sling fired words. One day, this David asked Kenyans to sign a petition so that a number of tribes, except those of Mr Kenyatta and Mr Ruto, would secede.
He called it a petition for self-determination. Kenya, to him, was in a cruel marriage that needed a divorce. But these tirades did not land clean on the Goliath that was the Jubilee government.
With his hardline stance against the government, he found favour with the opposition's National Super Alliance (Nasa) coalition, which made him its strategist.
The handshake
Nasa, he continued working his sling, which even led to his arrest and detention for more than 48 hours in 2017.
Now, this David did not grow to become king as the David of old.
Mr Kenyatta, brushing off a repeat presidential poll controversy, would later mend bridges with Mr Odinga, who had then been sworn in as the people’s president, through a famous handshake.
Dr Ndii initially welcomed it but he soon jumped ship. Then came the road to Damascus. This David, an erstwhile critic of Deputy President William Ruto, soon found himself playing in the DP's side as a strategist.
The ills he had described in detail before were now confined to the dustbins of history. In any case, he once argued, none of the top leaders in Kenya is clean. His new line of argument, nay sling, was that he was out to fight dynasties from the hustlers’ side.
His change of heart shocked many.
Lawyer Makau Mutua dedicated a column to this new David who was once “an important cog in Nasa’s political warehouse”.
“If Dr Ndii wants a real hustler, I advise him to embrace Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko, who would later be impeached,” Prof Mutua wrote.
Systemic corruption
But behold, Dr Ndii was then, and still is, firmly in Dr Ruto’s camp.
He has continued to use his sling on one Goliath or another, and recently he aimed at the elephant in the room that is systemic corruption. He wanted an amnesty for all past corruption cases, even though his current friends have denied any links to the vice.
“It is time for us to talk about drawing a line between past corruptions,” he told TV 47 early last week.
“I don’t think we are going to be able to actually allow our institutions to fight corruption if we keep sort of having this vicious cycle of weaponising corruption for politics.”
Coming from a man who recently said some corruption scandals have been a ploy to taint Dr Ruto’s name, this did not shock many, but there were some who could not help wondering how fervently pro-Ruto Dr Ndii had become.
