ODM is suffering from serious leadership and ideological paucity

The Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) party leader Oburu Oginga is yet to demonstrate aptitude to successfully lead the party except to self immolation. He appears indecisive and totally detached from the reality that is facing the party that his brother, Raila Odinga, painstakingly built.

By all indications, Dr Oburu has already given in to UDA's declaration of love and is only short of making a public announcement. Since Raila's death last year, leadership and ideological bankruptcy within ODM have been amplified by the now cliche phrase, "Raila left us in the broad-based government".

Those behind the broad-based ruckus don't venture any cogent reasoning to buoy their zombie arguments. Independent thought has become anathema in ODM. Every Tom, Dick and Harry in ODM has claimed that Raila left him a message for the party. Curiously, the messages lack uniformity, which is a slight on the person of Raila. It was unlike him to trade with the currency of ambiguity. These supposed dreams are evidently abstract, dubious and self-serving.

How, then, can a few individuals who propagate implausible and unverified claims, which they want to make ODM's policy guidelines, be trusted to keep the party and its spirit alive?

A handful turncoats in ODM hellbent on sinking the party harbour a misplaced belief in their power to control the minds and destinies of more than three million voters in Nyanza, and all other ODM adherents countrywide.

While completely oblivious that the people contractually donated authority to them to exercise it on their behalf, they believe they have the power to direct ODM members where to go and who to vote for.

Voters must not only debunk this false belief, they must put them to shame. The leaders can throttle ODM as a party, but never micromanage the people's ability to think and the right to elect leaders of their own choice.

Kenyans must get out of their slumber and acknowledge that they have the power and means to whip errant leaders back into line, and use those powers. The law on recall of MPs, for instance, would save many constituencies a lot of headache and shame, but has never been used despite the abundance of candidates. Kenyans must stop acting and behaving as if they are mere pawns on the political chessboard and unleash their power.

Complacent, hallucinating and lethargic leaders should be jolted back into wakefulness. In 1789, Parisians tired of a conceited leadership acted to correct the imbalance by storming Bastille to seize guns and gunpowder, birthing the French revolution. They were unhappy that a popular minister, Jacques Necker had been dismissed by King Louis XVI, who went ahead to deploy troops to intimidate the people. This caused hitherto suppressed public anger to burst free of its constraints.

The circumstances in France at the time and Kenya today are similar: Leadership hubris, political bickering and instability, high cost of living and widespread hunger. Even now, as more than two million Kenyans battle starvation, our leaders would rather bicker over trivialities.

Our Bastille today should be the Ministry of Interior and National Administration and the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission. Kenyans should flood both and get their guns (IDs) and gunpowder (votes) to kick out leaders they believe have betrayed them for too long. Kenyans must reclaim their dignity and stop being playthings for charlatans masquerading as leaders.

Poverty has for long been used to imprison the people's minds, rights and freedoms. Ordinary citizens must refuse to be pawns. Instead, they should use their poverty to rally against leaders. Let it inflame their anger, make them demand positive and immediate action and put the leaders to task explaining why poverty is still ravaging millions of Kenyans more than 60 years after independence.

Kenya is not a poor country, except that those entrusted with the responsibility of managing our finances are barracudas with nary a care for the common man. Commoners are resigned to poverty, the lever by which they are being manipulated. When commoners stop deifying leaders and believing poverty is their portion, Kenya will become a better place.