Public distaste
They should worry because a friend of agents of the status quo is an enemy of the people and change. They should worry because a compromise candidate for vested interests is the enemy of wananchi.
After decades of waiting, a business-as-usual and lackluster presidency is not what Kenyans expect in the post-new Constitution era.
Presidential aspirants better take note before the project tag spins out of control. Aspirants who are salivating for President Kibaki’s endorsement should be aware of public distaste for all kinds of projects.
For anyone who accepts to be a project of a minority is not good enough to lead, without the helping hand of the grandmaster. What’s more, anyone who imposes a project would be treated as having something to hide. The endorsee and the kingmaker shall suffer the fate of the mongoose. They should know a project is a project by any other name. And mongooses are alike and usually suffer the tragedy of being killed on behalf of the other. Any aspirant naïve and selfish enough to agree to carry the burden of a project tag, would most likely face the tragedy of the mongoose at the hands of right thinking voters.
With a Constitution that protects individual and public interest, voters are called upon to be right thinking. Tell manipulative politicians you have not eaten what they got from the candy shops of their masters.
Politicians who insist that a homeboy should replace President Kibaki should also prepare to suffer the tragedy of the mongoose. Any power deals on the Kibaki succession plotted at golf and nightclubs, shall be treated as assault on the intelligence of the electorate.
Now this mongoose business is familiar to chicken farmers. One day a farmer woke up to find that the chicken coop had been raided.
A hunt was organised for the offending mongoose.
The chicken farmer knew where the hunt would begin. Many times a herd of mongoose had been sighted in the neighbourhood. For the farmer and his friends any mongoose would be guilty as charged.
The writer is The Standard’s Managing Editor Quality and Production.
kendo@standardmedia.co.ke
