We thrive on lies and scare stories every election year

To anyone who doubts the potency of the post-reason and post-fact political world, where politics, like football, demands absolute unquestioning devotion to your team whatever its defects, I have three words for you, Donald J Trump.

The celebrity billionaire now sits in the world’s most powerful office as the President of the US after his inauguration on Friday. Anyone who watched the American presidential campaigns must have been shocked at how voters on the right were willing to believe anything evil about Hillary Clinton, even from obviously fake news-sites, while their opponents on the left were committed to despise anything Trump even when he supported causes they believed in. Goodbye to facts. Goodbye to reason.

You were either for Trump or Hillary, all the way, or none of the way. That post-reason political season has arrived in Kenya with all its manifestations as we head to our elections in seven short months. I am amazed at how even the most brilliant minds among us will believe and propagate the most preposterous stories as long as they assist their team to look good and the opponents look evil. They will believe that all is well with their political side even where facts clearly show impending disaster.

Some of the most obvious examples of this post-truth world have been the debate on the Eurobond and the fallacy of the Jubilee merger. On Eurobond, some of the most brilliant economists that I otherwise respect had no quibbles about propagating a story that they must by now know to be false.

 The story that the American government, through its Central Bank equivalent, had essentially colluded with Kenya’s corruption cartels, with the tacit involvement of some of America’s largest banks, to steal the Eurobond proceeds long before they reached Kenya is ridiculous. It is painful to watch bright minds try to justify this position. Even when undeniable facts were presented, they stuck to their version because a concession that they were wrong would have conceded a goal against their political team.

For the record, my position is not that there were no Eurobond funds pilfered, but that would only have been after they got to Kenya. I wish we had utilised our energies in investigating this aspect instead of the tail chasing business of inter alia sending the Auditor General to the US Federal Reserve Bank to inspect the accounts there! While the facts clearly show that the entire proceeds did actually get to Kenya, ask any CORD supporter, from the villager in Magarini to the professor in the University, they know for sure that Eurobond billions were stolen long before they got to Kenya. Do not confuse them with the facts! On the other political side, the tendency to reject obvious negative truths about one’s political side is best exemplified by the Jubilee merger narrative.

There is no question for example that other than the razzmatazz in Kasarani, the Jubilee merger, coupled with the “no party hopping” edict, while a progressive political move at any other time, was a political disaster in an election year. While a cabal of party hawks were probably incentivised to join Jubilee, supporters in many regions are unhappy with the acquisition. In Central Kenya, the merger/no party-hopping edict will definitely depress Jubilee numbers.

In many “swing states”, to borrow American lexicon, which Jubilee is courting, being herded into Jubilee has left a bad taste and is depressing support. Yet if you listen to Jubilee diehards, the merger is the ultimate political brilliance destined to decimate CORD. Any other view is rubbished even where facts strongly confirm the view. What gives me comfort is that this tragedy is not unique to Kenya. All we can do is pray that the irrationality season will be short, and hope to outlive it, remembering that we will need to be fact based and rational in all other areas in our lives, especially once the political silly season is over.