Cord winning 2017 presidential elections, a nightmare of the century

The much anticipated 2017 elections has been met by much criticism, especially from the opinion shapers of the two main coalitions; Jubilee and CORD. With both sides taking advantage of the weaknesses of each other, a lot has been said. The Cord coalition has termed the body charged with running elections in Kenya, Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) as being incompetent and one sided. This comes after IEBC rejected the OKOA Kenya proposal to amend the constitution on March 22nd, 2016. Led by the Commission Chairman Ahmed Isaac Hassan, IEBC gave a report that after a critical analysis of the data presented by the Coalition for reforms and Democracy (CORD) showed that the proposal had not met the required threshold of a million signatures. Nevertheless, only 891,598 registered voters supported the initiative from the signatures presented. 

The CORD coalition led by its Co-principals, Raila Odinga, Kalonzo Musyoka and Moses Wetangula has since accused IEBC for colluding with government officials to undermine their efforts. They went as far as organizing a demo which was aimed at forcefully ejecting IEBC officials from their offices at Anniversary towers. However, their plan to eject IEBC commissioners from office was thwarted by police. 

As a matter of fact, it was unlawful for the CORD coalition to plan such an act; we are past the Saba Saba error. IEBC is a constitutional commission just like the judicial service Commission mandated by law to conduct its activities just like any other commission and the law stipulates the steps that should be followed in disbanding it, I bet forceful eviction is not one of them. It’s unfortunate to note that some of the key opposition leaders who are for the idea that IEBC should be disbanded played a key role in the constitution making process and they know very well its content word by word. Forceful eviction is the rule of the jungle and that is exactly where it applies not in a civilized society like Kenya.

For many years now the opposition team in Kenya has been related to cases of criticism, and I think this is the best time to change things. Positive criticism is good, but for CORD they are in their own class, a class that can be best described by the word ‘Negative’. Social media describes it all; look at a blogger like Allan Wadi, full of hate speech and tribal hatred, he has found himself behind bars a number of times for the same reasons. 

CORD should concentrate more in uniting its leaders and not dividing their votes, mind game applies well in politics but the impact it leaves in the mind of people is not easy to erase. Wetangula and Raila should dance in the same tune. They should not make the public realize the crisis of power in their coalition. The statements Wetangula gave after Raila Odinga failed to attend his presidential launch created a drift in CORD. 

For many of us, nobody likes being criticized for no good reason and evidence. Therefore, for the CORD coalition to gather more votes for their presidential candidate, they’ve got to change their strategy. Negative criticism can only do harm. They’ll lose more votes if the status quo continues. When the President is busy launching projects in different parts of the country, CORD should be sensitizing people on the importance of registering as a voter and the importance of voting in a right leader. They should be selling their manifesto as early as now. Kenyans have come to hate violence unless for the few. The few violent Kenyans can’t make Raila or Uhuru gather a 50 plus one percentage threshold of votes (50+1%). It can’t!  If this trend continues CORD members are deemed to get the surprise of their life come 2017.