Raila Odinga and William Ruto: A tale of bitter rivals cut from the same cloth

Separated by 20 years in age, the two politicians are only a younger and older version of each other.

They started off in different political camps but came together before falling out again, now for 12 years running. Their style and substance is the same, and only differs in guise. They are mercurial, witty and charismatic. They scatter and gather followers with regard to past differences. The goal is everything.

Their significant starting moment was 1992. Raila was styled among the Young Turks in the original pressure group that was the Forum for Restoration of Democracy (Ford). Ruto was a member of the Youth for Kanu '92. Both were relatively inconspicuous, operating in the shadows of more seasoned politicos.

Walked in the shadows

Raila walked in the shadows of his father, Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, and other elder politicians in the camp. Among them were Martin Shikuku, Masinde Muliro, Ahmed Bahmariz, Philip Gachoka and Ken Matiba.

His bright future outlook, however, manifested in the fact that when the outfit began transforming into a political party, he was marked out for the position of Director of Elections. He, otherwise, played in the same youthful league with others like Prof Anyang' Nyong'o, Paul Muite and Gitobu Imanyara. His most remarkable competitor was Wanguhu Ng'ang'a, with whom they wrestled for supremacy over Nairobi.

In converse, Ruto entered politics the same year, as a YK '92 member. This formation lobbied successfully for President Daniel Moi's re-election. Led by the future MP for Lugari Cyrus Jirongo, YK '92 was the ruling party's answer for the Ford Young Turks. In the end, the Turks were vanquished in the presidential race, although many of them managed to get elected to Parliament. The titanic formations for this year's competition were already in the making, although it was not apparent then.

Ruto and Raila have got here through political scattering and gathering with uncanny resemblances.

In 2002, Raila was a part of the Narc Kenya team that won that year's presidential election, after bringing Kanu down through massive defections to the Opposition.

He was the singular prime mover in the relocations, having only recently joined up with President Moi. Their contestation and defections were factors of their rejection of the Moi led Uhuru Kenyatta for president project.

Today, Ruto is a younger and sexier version of Raila. Like Raila in 2002, Ruto has succeeded in mobilising defection from a sitting president's party. By the time Kenyans went to the polls on August 9, Ruto had run away with the Jubilee Party.

He left behind an emasculated shell that only managed a handful of election victories. This is much the same way Raila ran away with Kanu in 2002 and left President Moi with a rag tag that lost the election. Like Raila 20 years ago, Ruto has emerged on the winning side.

Choice of successor

While Jubilee bleeds and staggers the way Kanu did in 2002, it is remarkable that the sitting president's preferred choice of successor has been at the heart of the matter.

In 2002 it was President Moi's preference of Uhuru that led to the implosion of his party. In 2022 the same Uhuru's choice of Raila as his candidate has led to the present implosion of Jubilee.

Following the 9 March 2018 handshake, Ruto went to town with the message that the gesture between President Uhuru and Raila was intended to bar him from ascending to the highest office in the land.

He led what was initially a small band of politicians - christened the sky team - on an onslaught against the handshake.

The affront against the president's choice has ended up the same way the 2002 did, with the exception that in 2002 the losing candidate, Uhuru, conceded defeat while the 2022 loser is going to the Supreme Court for the last word. The Raila and Ruto campaigns also had much in common. For a start, each styled the other as an enemy of the people.

He mobilised strong animosity against the perceived enemy. Raila styled the campaign as a struggle between people he called liberators and those whom he labelled thieves. For his part, Ruto said that the campaign was between freedom and state capture. From his original bottom-up campaign, the final clarion call was 'Freedom is coming.' Conversely, Raila's homestretch slogan was 'Freedom is here.'

Bottom-up

They shared the same concern for the people living at the bottom of the Kenyan social ladder. They reeled off one promise after the other, on how they would uplift them.

Ruto called the mission ahead a bottom-up transformation of the economic and social order. Raila did not give it a name, but said the same things that Ruto was saying. They would uplift Mama Mboga, Beba-Beba and other blue collar workers. They would generate wealth, create employment and put money in people's pockets.

Both sides also promised to introduce universal health care, free education and social transfers of funds. Raila was more explicit on a monthly transfer of Sh6,000 to every family where no one had a job.

The concerns about the cost of living, unemployment and poverty were the same. So, too, were their efforts to make each other look like the cause of the problems in the country. One called it corruption and blamed it on the other. The other one called it state capture and also blamed it on the other.

They found it difficult to refer to one another by name. They employed pejorative nicknames and descriptors against each other, and promised to be done with them by 6am of the polling day.

They cobbled alliances that betrayed significant consideration for ethnic influence in the voting process. The choice of running mates from the Mt Kenya region in particular betrayed their anxiety about the regional vote. Whatever the formations were, however, they shared the electorate almost halfway.

In 1992, Ruto campaigned on the side of the government of the day. Raila was in the Opposition. Twenty years later, Ruto was in the government, but campaigned as the Opposition. In 1992 the government won.

In 2022 the government, typified by President Uhuru's support for Raila, lost. In 2002 Raila's side beat Ruto's. But by 2005 the two were in the same team.

2005 vote

Ruto and Raila beat President Mwai Kibaki in that year's November constitutional referendum.

They ran against him in the 2007 election that sunk Kenya into a mess. But by 2010 their paths had parted again. The antipathy remains. Yet, their support bases and followings suggest that Kenyans might need to rethink how the Government is formed in their country.

Election victories that results from similar campaigns in different guises do not seem to offer the country different choices, beyond the personalities involved, and the ethnic optics. They also leave the country polarised almost in half-to-half ratios. Even after the Supreme Court has pronounced itself on the ended presidential election, Kenyans may want to reflect on alternative models of forming government and exercising power, beyond the present winner takes it all model.