Opinion: Why NASA is nothing but a leaking pot difficult to mend

Lately, NASA has become like a leaking pot. It is a vessel held together by weak ‘kirakas’. And when a broken section is patched up, another crack develops immediately after. It is almost as though the coalition has upset the gods of politics, and is facing their wrath at every turn.

The NASA chronicle is playing out like the story of the 50 daughters of Danaus in Greek mythology. Danaus had 50 daughters betrothed to 50 sons of the King of Egypt.

But under their fathers wicked instruction, the brides killed their grooms on their wedding night. For this, they were condemned to spend the rest of their days in futility. They were doomed to carry water in a permanently perforated vessel. The NASA quartet, like the ‘Kenyan daughters of Danaus’, seemed to be locked in the same fruitless fate. What they did to deserve it, I don’t know.

When they fill their pot with the liquid hope of unity and electoral victory, they only go two steps forward and then pop!; one patch breaks at its fragile seams and bursts open. Their coalition vessel has perpetual perforations. And I make this analogy for a few reasons.

The first reason is the perforation in the form of Kalonzo’s ‘tantrum tactic’. It must be noted that it worked incredibly well for Kalonzo, but not for the coalition. When Kalonzo blitzed around saying this time round he would be the top dog come-what-may, and that he will play second fiddle to no one, - he knew what he was doing. He was securing himself the running mate position. What he was working hard against was being left out of the ‘top two’ configuration altogether.

This was nothing but a pre-emptive strategy. He was showing the others, but specifically Raila, that if his name did not appear in the ‘NASA political book of life’, he would make them curse the day they mentioned the word ‘coalition’ to him.

In the end, it worked. When Kalonzo was certain he would be part of the top two, he began to passionately declare his commitment to NASA once again. The gaping hole on the NASA pot was therefore fixed, and so the super alliance thought they could keep marching forward.

But lo and behold, another pop! the second perforation is drilled by none other than Mudavadi.

A bit late in the game, he realises that the ‘tantrum tactic’ was a stroke of genius. So he decided to ‘do a Kalonzo’, but slightly differently.

His tactic was to use the good people of his locality, his Western hometurf, to stage a mini-protest with placards reading ‘We want Mudavadi’ and ‘Chief Minister ni Wewe’- a disdainful rejection of the coalition’s agreement that was ‘accidentally’ divulged by ODM.

Once again, the pot was leaking. Repair work was urgently needed. To this end, Baba tried to do some emergency patchwork by deflecting this perforation to a party outside of the coalition. He put the blame squarely on none other than the National Intelligence Service (NIS).

According to Raila, the government spies approached the willing people of Western and persuaded them to picket against NASA for not including Mudavadi in the presidential configuration. And as evidence, Raila noted that the placards could not possibly have been put together by these ‘fake’ Mudavadi supporters. Was he saying that it is beyond the industrial people of Kakamega to come up with simple placards? That Mudavadi’s supporters are not resourceful enough? Who knows.

But there is a permanent hole on the NASA pot that will remain unfixed for a while. This is the nagging question: Who is the coalition presidential flag bearer? It seems to fall on poor Raila to permanently try and cover this hole.

His latest response was one of a man fed up. Baba is particularly irritated by the press asking them to go on with life instead of bothering the coalition about the presidential line up. And I agree with him, I mean it is quite rude to follow someone who is clearly struggling with a leaking pot and constantly pointing out to them that their pot is broken.

But we can’t help it, we need to know! How will they fix the ‘Kiraka coalition’? Is it fixable in the first place, seeing as the cracks are made by stubborn egos, trickery and sub-optimal action? In the benevolent spirit of Easter, I pray that NASA will find a good fundi soon.

- The writer is a Ph.D candidate in Political Economy at SMC University, Switzerland and a Research Fellow at the Fort Hall School of Government.

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