As you know from my previous columns I have been holding onto my congratulatory messages to President-elect Uhuru Kenyatta and his Deputy Mr William Ruto.

Not that I did not want to congratulate them, but because the queue of genuine supporters, and also sycophants and charlatans, was still too long.

Moreover I wanted my felicitations to go when it was certain they were assured of power that is what Dr Willy Mutunga and his five colleagues in Supreme Court did on Saturday.

I also withheld my salutations out of respect for the other millions of Kenyans who did not vote for them, and who believe that even if they won on numerical strength, the victory was secured and sealed with an adhesive tape called ‘tyranny of numbers’.

Ethnic clustering

Then also, though the victory is no longer contestable, there were clearly issues raised in court that many did not expect would be dismissed with a wave of the hand as you do a fly on your coat lapel. Before the ruling then, it was wiser to wait and see how things would go.

But today I am as happy as Mutunga said he was with his team in delivering his ruling, to report that I have since dispatched my letters of congratulations to Uhuru and Ruto.

If the post office is still as inefficient as it always was, then I expect they would reach them today.

If they have not received I would request patience from them and their supporters.

But just in case they have been misplaced I will say a little about the trajectory of the letters in subsequent paragraphs. Still, my piece today is official notification that they are on the way.

I am also well aware, as some of their diehard supporters dismissed me last week, that they do not need my messages but that would not in anyway stifle my right to do so as a Kenyan of goodwill.

You see, even the hyena is said to have one day greeted a rock twice and when it didn’t respond telling it, “you have heard me anyway’’.

It would nonetheless be an insult to the richness of African tradition if you were to substitute the hyena’s name with mine, so kindly keep the two as far apart as the sky and the ground we walk on.

But even as my letters are moved around in gunny-bags, I would hastily say I wish them well as they embark on the harder task — a burden heavier than that of winning elections on the basis of ethnic clustering — of uniting Kenya.

We all know what we tell our children or siblings when they graduate in college, get a new job or at the pass-out parades after circumcision.

Both Uhuru and Ruto even though older than me know these things and so will not read it to mean I am lecturing them like they are young boys. So if you want to catch their attention by deliberately twisting what I am going to say to mean it is with a condescending attitude, please work harder and get something more convincing. 

We always begin by congratulating the new graduates. We remind them where they have come from and how so few have made it to where they are. We also tell them how many were in their status one time but have fallen from grace to grass.

Unsolicited advice

We also stress that life is full of challenges and so the past only made you, but the present and the future will test you to the extreme and your success in life depends on how you handle these.

We also never forget to invoke the name of God in their successes, even though in this case it would be an insult to God to say so because the flipside would mean the same God is not for the millions who voted for Mr Raila Odinga.

Friends, we tell them about the importance of humility; never to let power either of education, wealth or moranism, get into their heads.

These and so many others little bits of unsolicited advice in the letters I sent out to my new President and deputy President.

But like Mutunga’s ruling, this is the short version and the letters like final judgment, are more elaborate.

I almost forgot to say I also told them not to kill the Opposition, to embrace and bring along the communities aggrieved by their win and later ruling, and to get political losers out of their list of Cabinet secretaries.

There were also a few paragraphs on confronting the monster of tribalism and corruption that the Kibaki administration inherited and fed so well, so much so that as he exits, it is larger than Mount Kenya.

I also asked them how long their ‘co-operation’ would last and if we are not just being treated to another 2003 National Rainbow Coalition dream that was anchored to a MoU one cunning chap never intended to keep.

On The Hague charges, I reminded them that the case is built on quick sand, and that if you Google my own name, you will find it among those that  some Party of National Unity propagandists claimed were helping Ruto and Raila burn Kenya.

Lastly, I told them unless they know something we don’t, the dozens of security men that follow them everywhere aren’t that necessary unless it is just to send out the message you are the big guys around. In which case we shall be saying there goes another of Africa’s Big Men. 

 

The writer is Managing Editor, Daily Editions, at The Standard.

ktanui@standardmedia.co.ke