Mini poll wins have fortified President Ruto for epic 2027 election battle

There is a cautionary saying in Nigeria that “he who brings ant-infested firewood to his house invites lizards”. 

For months on end, former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua, former Cabinet Secretary Justin Muturi and Trans Nzoia Governor George Natembeya did just that. While trying to upstage President William Ruto ahead of the November 27 by-elections, they chose ad hominem and dared him in so many ways. 

They had a support cast in a group of Luhya leaders whose agenda was to humiliate Ruto, but as fate would have it, both flopped. At the end of the day, “their eyes don see shege” (they bit the dust), as our Nigerian friends would say. 

Their deportment amplifies the character of Madume, a belligerent man in Elechi Amadi’s novel, The Concubine. Madume was ill tempered, jealous and bitter. He hated his village mate, Emenike, because the latter married Ihuoma, a maiden he lusted after, and a dispute over land ownership. 

The takeaway is that a good fighter picks his fights carefully. For Natembeya, a man who understands the workings of the coercive state machinery, it was reckless exposing himself in Malava, bragging that ‘no outsider’ would impose a leader on the people of Mulembe nation. 

That brag has become an albatross around his neck. Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi, who would ordinarily let most  things slide, has been taking digs at Natembeya. Farouk Kibet, the man who single-handedly delivered Malava to UDA, has now trained his guns on Natembeya’s throne. And the Speaker of the National Assembly, Moses Wetangula, still smarting from losing the Kabuchai MCA seat, has someone to vent his spleen on. Against these individuals, George ‘Walker’ might turn out to be a walking political corpse 

UDA’s win in Malava and Mbeere constituencies has ‘fortified’ Ruto for the epic 2027 duel. Buoyed by this win, Ruto will rub it in and turn the screw in the opposition’s flesh slowly, but excruciatingly. 

Ruto has proven that he is street smart and doesn’t easily back off from a fight. The steely side of him emerged after Gen Zs tried to ruffle his feathers in June 2024 with street protests and the demand to disband his first Cabinet.

The message to his political detractors is clear; that half-hearted, ineffective threats, noise and epithets from a disjointed opposition will not unseat him in 2027. 

The opposition must rethink its strategies. There is no miracle that will pave the way for it to the State House, because miracles are extinct, replaced by data science. Everything seems to revolve around numbers that must be amassed through sound strategy, not sound bytes. 

Whoever opined that politics is a dirty game definitely hit the bull’s eye. The opposition must never lose sight of the fact that the incumbent enjoys an array of advantages they don’t have, which gives him a comfortable head start. 

This ranges from state funded logistics, control over electoral systems despite pretences to the contrary about institutional independence. Adage has it that he who pulls the purse strings calls the tune and because the president has control over the instruments of violence that oversee elections, he holds the ace card if push comes to shove. 

To imagine the police service is, and operates independently is a fallacy, absolute nonsense designed to give commoners a feel good sense; the belief that the executive doesn’t, after all, have unfettered powers. Well, the President appoints the Inspector General of Police, and its budget is approved by a pliant Parliament that jumps every time the executive sneezes. 

Rather than look for Ruto’s soft underbelly, the opposition would do well to catalyse electoral reforms through an overhaul of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC), and ensure a holistic embrace of foolproof technology in voting to cut down malpractices and the time it takes to count ballot papers. 

Every minute increases the chances of cheating, induces suspicion and gives grounds to losers to contest results. We must find a way around bottlenecks that stifle our democracy, leading to unnecessary blood letting during elections.