The cabinet and government of President Ruto as presently constituted is skewed. It is still largely populated by Kalenjins and Kikuyus.
A cabinet/government constituted with the entire country in mind cannot have four individuals from the same ethnic group sitting in a national cabinet of 22. The most is three.
This is the challenge for President Ruto. If he wants national support in 2027, then what he’s saying is that he’s ready to open the cabinet and upper echelons of his government to more ethnicities.
This too is where DP Rigathi Gachagua’s game is focused on.
Rigathi sees the possibility of an open cabinet, and government, with other ethnicities joining only mean one thing: reduction in the numbers of Kikuyus/Mt. Kenya in cabinet/government.
And he rightly sees the biggest danger being Western Kenya. The Luhya community is ascendant in the Ruto regime. With vote numbers that can comfortably dwarf Mt. Kenya if cast and counted properly, they are DP Rigathi’s biggest headache.
Next to the Luhya is the Luo.
Kenya’s presidential politics is a game of the Kikuyu, Kalenjin, Luo, Luhya and Kamba. The newest entry into that game is the Muslim Alliance, with Northern Kenya and Northern Kenya Diaspora set to play a bigger role from 2032 as Somali numbers quadruple on the voting roll.
In 2027, with Kalenjins still the steady incumbents, the dices to play are the four other ‘presidential’ ethnicities – Kikuyu, Luo + Luo Alliance, Luhya and Kamba.
For the Kikuyu, the question of bolting out of UDA is increasingly becoming a reality but there is a small hitch, there’s no guarantee that Mt. Kenya can defeat incumbent Ruto if they pull an ethnic bloc vote. Even if the entire Mt. Kenya votes to the last man to their man, it will not be enough to torpedo Ruto especially if they do not get an ally in the Luo, Luhya or Kamba bloc, but more specifically the Luo and, or, Luhya blocs.
Mt. Kenya is facing what the Luo is facing.
They simply don’t have a consequential national presidential material.
Uhuru Kenyatta may be powerful, as conveners of Limuru III sought to prove, but he is barred from contesting.
That means he can only support someone else, and put in the work. Till this hour, with the hindsight of his cavalier behavior will backing Raila in 2022, nothing convinces me that that cool kid will put in the work.
For the Luo, fielding a candidate against Ruto will mean fielding Raila Odinga again, because, like the Kikuyu, the Luo community lacks any other national presidential material. There’s no Luo ODM politician with a billion shillings (liquid cash) to spare as I write this, yet that’s the sum necessary “kuweka tip tu”.
Kenya’s presidential politics is expensive.
Sadly, Raila’s candidature presents its usual historical conundrums, the hardest of which will be having to once again try convince the Luhya and the Kamba to stay in line.
In the 2022 polls, it took Uhuru Kenyatta to convince Kalonzo to stay, with the assurance that power was within reach. In 2027, power will be miles away.
For the Luhya, with Mudavadi and Wetangula now enjoying trappings of government after almost decade in the cold, I do not see those two abandoning Ruto in 2027.
They know how hard it is to return to government once you exit stupidly.
They also know that life in opposition is “dog shit” life.
And the eventual beneficiary will not be them.
That means, Luhya politics is likely to remain leaderless and ruderless, open to sway in either direction.
In the end, however, Ruto may add his vote count in western, especially if Mt. Kenya bolts out protesting Luhya upsurge in Ruto’s government.
For the Wakamba, well, Kalonzo must just do something new. And frankly, he holds the trump.
If Mt. Kenya bolts, they’ll do so expecting to be backed, and not to back anyone.
Now, which is that group willing to back Mt. Kenya?
My gut tells me Mt. Kenya will not bolt out without answering the ‘who backs them’ question.
And do not underrate William Ruto’s ability to cobble new alliances.
The thinking within a section of the Luo political class is that the Luo should back a Mt. Kenya candidate.
Be that as it may, how will it resolve the question of Mt. Kenya’s refusal to vote Raila in 2022?
Another section wants the Luo to back Ruto for re-election. A third minuscule group wants the Luo to back Kalonzo.
But it doesn’t matter because if Raila chooses to make a sixth stab, the Luo will largely fall behind him.
From the foregoing, I can safely predict that William Ruto will be re-elected; but the ethnic formations that will deliver that vote is still too early to tell.
