Nyanza must think long and hard before settling on a political suitor

ODM leader Raila Odinga after being installed as a Luo elder at Jomo Kenyatta International stadium in Kisumu. [File., Standard]

If there is anyone out there who doubts that the UDA marriage is irretrievable then let them look for the video clips of the Deputy President at Wakulima market last Friday. Accusations and counter-accusations have been exchanged in the last couple of months and this takes me to the uncomfortable Kenyan conventional wisdom that when any two major ethnic groups combine, they they can tilt the national political competition into their favour. For avoidance of doubt, the three major tribes have been the Gema communities counted as one voting bloc, the Rift Valley communities sometimes mischievously referred to as Kamatusa by the political class to mean kalenjin, Maasai, Turkana and Samburu then there is Luo Nyanza.

When Luo Nyanza combined efforts with Mt Kenya in early '90s, the repressive section 2A cracked like a cookie. When they came together again in 2002, the Narc dream materialised. When Luo Nyanza and the Rift Valley came together in 2007, an incumbent was beaten so thoroughly that the electoral body had to 'dance Ndombolo with the results' of the presidential election to save his skin but at a huge cost to the country.