By Robert Wesonga
[Part One]
Let me begin with the immortal words of the late
Philip Ochieng, that towering giant of Kenyan journalism whose mind cut through
nonsense like a panga through overgrown bush—along the sugarcane thoroughfares of Nambale. I
shall not quote him verbatim—the dead deserve better than lazy verbatim—but I
will capture his essence: He once wrote, "When you present yourself before
the state to apply for an identity card, they will demand several particulars.
But there is something particularly particular about the particulars they will
ask. That particular thing is your tribe."
Ochieng, in his infinite wisdom, was not celebrating
tribalism. He was stating a fact so obvious that only the intellectually
dishonest pretend not to see it. The Kenyan state, for all its pretensions to
nationhood, has always wanted to know where you come from, who your people are,
which linguistic cluster you call home. They do not ask this out of anthropological
curiosity. They ask because in Kenya, tribe is currency. Tribe is destiny.
Tribe is the silent arithmetic that often determines who eats and who watches
others eat.
Let me paint you three snapshots, as vivid as an
August sunrise over Kakamega Forest:
Snapshot One: It
is February 2026. The President has nominated Francis Ole Meja as Chairperson
of the Public Service Commission. Within hours, Members of Parliament from the
Maa community gather before television cameras, their faces arranged in
expressions of gratitude. They thank the President for remembering the Maasai.
They speak of being considered, of being included, of finally getting a seat at
the high table. Nobody accuses them of tribalism. Nobody lectures them about
nationalism. They are simply doing what every community in Kenya does—watching
out for their own.
Snapshot Two: For
decades, Luo Nyanza has stood resolutely behind Raila Odinga through
presidential elections lost, through marches in the battle-ridden streets of
Nairobi and Kisumu; through nights in the cold insults and horrendous epithets.
They have been called names—radicals, rebels, perennial outsiders. But when the
Gen Z demonstrations shook the foundations of the state, and Ruto needed to
steady his ship, who did he turn to? He turned to Raila. And suddenly,
appointments began flowing towards Luo Nyanza. Roads started being tarmacked.
Factories proposed, bridges started being built. Economic goods, as if by
magic, found their way to the shores of Lake Victoria. There has been no lecture
on tribalism, only the quiet rationalising of what we all know to be true.
Snapshot Three: Cast your mind back to the pre-election pact that brought
Mudavadi and Wetang'ula into the governing fold. The promise, whispered in
corridors and sealed with handshakes, was thirty percent. Thirty percent of
appointments. Thirty percent of development. Thirty percent of the national
cake, baked fresh for the Luhya people. The less said about how that promise
has been honoured, the better. The less said about what has actually trickled
down from Nairobi to Busia, Kakamega, or Bungoma, the kinder I will be.
Now, I am not here to cast stones. Every community
plays the game as it is structured. The Kalenjins have consolidated around Ruto
with a discipline that would make a Prussian general weep with admiration. The
Kikuyus, for all their little squabbles, know how to rally around a flag—be it
Kibaki, Uhuru or Gachagua—when the moment demands it. The Kisiis have found
their champion in Matiang'i. And the Luo, though still reeling from the sad
reality of a Raila-shaped vacuum, stand a better chance of finding a new voice
than we do—if we do not wake from our slumber soon enough.
What happened to the spirit that rallied the Abaluhya
around Masinde Muliro? Around Wamalwa Kijana? We lazily accept the accolade of
being the second-largest ethnic community in this nation, but do little to make
our numerical potential count in the national arithmetic.
I will tell you what we have done. We have fought
among ourselves. We have undermined each other. We have competed, with an
enthusiasm that would be admirable if directed elsewhere, to prove who can cosy
up most convincingly to whoever happens to be in power at the moment. We have
produced leaders who rush to State House not to demand anything for their
people, but to demonstrate how little they will ask for, how reasonable they
can be, how different they are from those "tribalists" from other
communities.
And while we have been busy being reasonable, while
we have been busy proving our nationalist credentials, while we have been busy
playing the gentlemen and ladies of Kenyan politics, other communities have
been eating our lunch. They have been taking what rightfully belongs to us, not
through malice, but through the simple logic of political organisation. They
understand something that we have refused to understand: that in the
marketplace of Kenyan politics, if you do not demand, you will be ignored. If
you do not assert, you will be forgotten. If you do not consolidate, you will
be divided and conquered.
The great Chinua Achebe, drawing on the folk wisdom
of his people, told us that until the lion learns to write, then the story of
the hunt will always glorify the hunter. For too long, the Luhya have allowed
others to write our story. We have allowed ourselves to be depicted as passive,
as content with crumbs, as a community that does not mind being taken for
granted. It is time for us to pick up the pen. It is time for us to tell our
own story.
And the first chapter of that story must begin with
the recognition that we need a voice. A single voice. A voice that can sit at
the negotiating table and say, without apology or embarrassment: "This is
what the Luhya people require. These are the appointments that must go to our
sons and daughters. These are the roads that must be built in our counties.
These are the schools that must be upgraded in our villages."
For years, we have watched Mudavadi and
Wetang'ula—two men of considerable ability, men who could have been
titans—choose the path of acquiescence. They have played the gentlemen while
others scramble for things under their very noses. They have negotiated by
stating what they will not ask for, by demonstrating how reasonable they can
be. And what has reasonableness brought us? What has gentlemanly conduct
delivered from the house on the hill?
It is time for a different approach. It is time for a
Luhya kingpin who understands that politics is not a tea party.
At this moment in our history, that leader appears to
be none other than Edwin Sifuna. I say this not as a partisan, but as an
observer of political reality. Watch him in the well of Parliament: his tongue
is a blade, his mind a fortress. When he rises to speak, even his adversaries
listen—not because they agree, but because they know they will be challenged.
He has shown, in the trenches of Nairobi politics, the courage to stand alone,
to vote against his own side when principle demands it, to refuse the seductive
whisper of expediency. While others chase favours, he has remained consistent—a
rare commodity in a marketplace of political prostitutes. He possesses
something rare in Luhya leadership: the willingness to confront, to demand, to
stand firm even when it is not convenient. He understands that power respects
only those who are willing to fight for it.
But let me be clear. I am not proposing that we
retreat into ethnic cocoons and abandon the dream of a united Kenya. I am not
suggesting that we become tribalists in the negative sense of that word. I am
simply recognising reality. In Kenya, as it is presently constituted,
communities that organise themselves politically get ahead. Communities that
fragment, that fight among themselves, that produce leaders who compete to
demonstrate how little they want—these communities get left behind.
The Luo have shown us the way. Through decades of
opposition, through years in the political wilderness, they never abandoned
their champion. And now, they are reaping the rewards of that fidelity. Not all
of them are benefiting, to be sure. But enough are benefiting to make a
difference. Enough are benefiting to show that the strategy works.
The Kalenjins have shown us the way. They rallied
around Ruto when he was nothing, when he was dismissed as a junior minister,
when everyone said he would never make it. And now they occupy the highest
offices in the land. I say ‘they’ knowing that there is the risk of faulty
overgeneralisation, but realising what it means.
It is time for the Luhya to learn these lessons. It
is time for us to put aside our internal differences, to stop competing to see
who can be the most reasonable, to stop proving that we are different from
those "tribalists." We are not different. We are human beings who
love our children, who want our communities to thrive, who deserve our fair
share of the national cake.
And to get that fair share, we need a voice. A single
voice. A voice that says: "We are here. We matter. We will not be
ignored."
If that makes us tribalists in the eyes of those who
have been eating our share all along, so be it. I would rather be called a
tribalist with roads in my county than a nationalist with nothing but speeches
to show for it.
The time for political correctness is over. The time
for gentlemen's agreements that benefit only the other side is over. The time
for the Luhya to take their rightful place at the high table is now.
Robert Wesonga is a freethinker
and writer of his own things.
There will be Part Two and Part Three...
