January 30th Mock Treason, Failed Coup or Real Revolution
On January 30th 2018, we witnessed the truth of Bob Marley’s chant on April 17th 1980 at the birth of the country he named his now famous song after, Zimbabwe. He promised we’d “…know the true revolutionaries” and on January 30th 2018, we did.
We honour the Luo Nation.
You have reminded us who we are, the way of men. That all a man is, is his word. No man, now nor in the future will invoke your name in vain. The Luo Nation stood true to it’s pledge. The soldiers torched their ships, not even the Kerr could retreat.
Had the Kikuyu locked their own duplicitous elites, Kibaki et al, in to honouring the infamous “MoU”, the state of politics might be different. Instead they murmured their discontent with the rulers who claimed to speak for them in private conversations and now the territory finds itself where it is. (as it so happens, fate will give them a second chance to redeem themselves soon, or forever be bound by history with their favourite role models, the treacherous Jews).
In the age of cacophonous monotony for music, where clowns and crooners are considered role models, where the heroes of society are men who chase inflated leather skins around a field, cheered on by crowds, in to old age; on January 30th 2018 the Luo Nation reminded us the way of men.
The men of January 30
January 30th 2018 was a day of revelation, a day of many truths.
It revealed @CoalitionNASAke to be an illusion, @CoalitionNASAke is a Luo affair. It revealed the hunger for real revolutionary leadership amongst the youth. It revealed that the youth, the men especially are politically activated.
But, most importantly January 30th revealed the metal element in the bones of the Luo Nation. Like Nabii Ismail (as) to his father Nabii Ibrahim (as), the youth of the Luo Nation bravely without blame or moroseness submitted themselves to certain death by the hand of their father. They answered the call. Sadly their father intended to sacrifice them on the altar of Kratos, the demon of strength, might, power and sovereign rule, not their Creator. But fortunately for them their Creator has ultimate authority over all of man’s affairs, and it was not to be a day of sacrifice.
But nevertheless for this act of submission to a purpose and cause higher than themselves, we must pay homage to the Luo Nation, the Men of January 30.
In this age of godlessness, where all have succumbed to the seduction of western hedonism and instant gratification, the Luo Nation is a jewel, for it’s warrior remains alive.
Only two nations on the Somalian plate are capable of lifting the yoke of imperialism upon the necks of the tribes, the Somali and the Luo Nation. The Somali have joined the Kikuyu in the Church of Mammon, becoming the hand of the Imperialist oppressor. Hope now rests with the Luo Nation. We must wake the Luo Nation up to it’s true potential and the urgency of this overarching undertaking. And to wake them up, we must first of necessity open the Luo Nation’s eyes to the duplicity, incompetence and bankruptcy of the current Kerr, Raila Amolo Odinga (from here-on RAO).
In Bob Marley’s words we must not allow “our people to be tricked by mercenaries.”
The Mercenary
[30/01/18] NASA leader Raila Odinga swears by the bible at Uhuru Park grounds in Nairobi Credit: CAPITAL FM
RAO can neither govern nor rule nor is he interested in governing nor ruling. This is what is important. Not his personal duplicity which is now well documented in “Peeling back the Mask” by Miguna Miguna, not any of his personal flaws. A ruler is judged for who he is in office and not who he is in private.
It would also not be a problem if his lack of ability could be veiled, but the Swahili teach us “mwanaharamu hafichiki”. In English, the illegitimate child cannot be concealed, they will always reveal themselves. And true to the wise, during his stint as Prime Minister in a moment that is unforgettable, RAO revealed his complete ignorance of the essence of ruling and governance in his cry to the masses about the state of his outhouse. Betraying that even a simple administrative matter for his protocol office was beyond him.
While RAO’s “anti-Kikuyu hegemony forty one against one” rhetoric has borne fruit in consolidating his base, it will be insufficient going forward. Given the appetite for revolution the Luo Nation has shown, they can lead against the Master and not the “House Negro”. The comprador ruling elite of Kikuyu ethnicity are the face of the oppressive system, Capitalist Imperialism, not the system itself. The Kikuyu too and their elites are in need of liberation and “the Kikuyu hegemony” narrative has succeeded in blinding even intellectuals to the plight of the ordinary Kikuyus who lost their land during Kenyatta rule, and have lived in abject poverty and occupation under all the other Governments.
We have said in earlier writing Ramogi and Gikuyu in an election will always double down on their brigand sons, but that is because in an election contest wherein the population is an amalgam of tribes with no ideological bearing, the political rivalry will inevitably be organized around the powerful instinctive divisions of the populace, tribe in Kenya, clan in Somalia, race in America.
These divisions as powerful levers to “Divide to Rule”, serve all the elite well.
But of interest to us here, is now that the Men of January 30 showed themselves worthy of the ultimate prize, is RAO the man to lead them to glory?
What would Raila Amolo Odinga need to take the Centre?
We are beyond Elections or any Constitutional means to ascend to power. RAO has lost his religion. He has apostatized Democracy and Constitutionalism.
“Constitution my foot!”.
He also has no message beyond “Kikuyus are the problem” packaged as “Electoral autocracy” and “I want my turn” packaged as “Electoral justice”. In other words, he has no idea. Democracy’s true nature has been revealed and can no longer be used to capture all the tribes’ imaginations. Democracy is now known to simply be a method for the strong to legitimize their power over the weak. “Democracy” is now understood to be whatever the elites decide it is, whenever they decide.
RAO is now only left with realpolitik.
Begging the question, what combination of entities and institutions does he need to dislodge the centre? In less subtle terms, what does RAO need to orchestrate a coup d’etat?
This is not libel, RAO has made no secret of his intent. RAO promised his supporters an “Emmerson Mnangagwa” style of coup. But RAO will never win the prize of President, not for lack of support, not for lack of opportunity, not for lack of fortune but as above for the lack of awareness. As the reader can see RAO does not understand that the time to orchestrate that type of coup was when he was Prime Minister under the weakest, most frail and aged President ever to govern in the region. It was then that he was supposed to build alliances, consolidate power, seize institutions (for instance impose himself as chair of the National Security Council) endear himself to tribal elites. Instead he betrayed his generals and alienated the government he led. An “Emmerson Mnangagwa” style of coup requires supreme patience, building of confidence and trust through painstakingly slow diplomacy that happens in the shadows. It is delicate and dangerous, completely without the rock-star reward of the chanting crowd in the glare of floodlights.
We began by stating without qualification, RAO will only ever be Tribal Chief, never Chief of the Tribes or if you prefer “President”.
Now we qualify.
Given RAO has abandoned the illusion of rechtsstaat and has no call, what combination of entities and institutions would he need to seize the Centre?
Absolutely simplified, there are three important levels of play, the international state space, the nation-state level — which for “Kenya” is more correctly client pseudo-state, and the state institution space.
In the international state space a client-state putchist requires a suzerain sponsor primarily for political cover. RAO has been the United States Government “man on the spot”, making no secret of it. Fund raising in the US and meeting with US politicians multiples of times on multiple tours that were widely covered in the local press. The United States Government since Ambassador Smith Hempstone has been the primary benefactor of the political opposition in Kenya. Suzerain backing though vital is not sufficient as will be explained later. Suzerain backing tools the comprador for the “neighbourhood fight”, rarely does the suzerain fight for his comprador directly.
To win the neighbourhood fight the comprador then needs to assemble a “winning tribal coalition” before capturing the vital instruments of power in the institution space. This is where we submit RAO’s Achilles heel reveals itself, he is his own greatest enemy. In 2008, Prime Minister RAO like “Macbeth” drunk with power, spite and fear of loss betrayed his comrade at arms “Banquo” William Samoei Ruto dispatching the Political assassin, the International Criminal Court Prosecutor Professor Moreno Ocampo to solve the “future” problem before it became a present problem for him. It was at this moment in the year 2008 that we submit RAO lost all future elections, because he over-estimated his own popularity in a territory that suffers a lower order of Otto von Bismark’s 3 out of 5 problem. Given that Europe in the 19th Century had five powers Germany, Britain, France, Austria and Russia he understood “the importance of being a party of three on the European chessboard” that determined the winning tribal coalition in the formation of alliances. Germany had to be in 3 of the 5. It’s safety lay in ensuring it never got caught on the losing side. Given its geographical position at the centre, it was going to be at the front-line of any war and if the dice fell wrong it would be in the middle, making this according to scholars Otto von Bismark’s worst nightmare. A war where Germany had to confront Russia and France at the same time. RAO in 2008 played himself out of the two thirds, in to the one third. As in the Kenya territory’s current configuration the tribes of power are primarily three, the Kikuyus — Britain’s core pillar, the Kalenjin — the King makers, and the Luo — America’s arrogating surrogate. Raila made possible what was thought impossible after the Kiambaa Church Massacre in the Rift Valley where dozens of Kikuyu women and children were burnt alive at the height of the 2007 post-election violence. He managed to create a marriage of convenience between the Kikuyu and Kalenjin as they worked together to rescue their brigand sons from perceived imperialism, giving rise to an unbeatable political coalition which has successfully managed to keep him on outside since. All efforts to divide and rule the coalition have born no fruit and all indications are they will bear none now and in the future. Nothing but failure awaits him down this road.
RAO still has United States Government (USG here-on) suzerain support. He does not have the two out of three tribal coalition necessary to de-centre the territory like he did in the year 2007, but what opportunity exists in layer three? The Institutions layer?
Coup d’Etat
According to Adnan Khan’s recent treatise on Coup d’Etat “Making Sense of Coups”, the social order of the Kenya territory is such that it would require the coup to be a “coup by election” rather than a “coup by battle”. “Coup by election” here implying a referendum among the elites on whether to support RAO or Uhuru Muigai Kenyatta (from here-on UMK), not universal suffrage.
In his bid to compel this “election”, RAO would need to first completely control public information. Second make his dejure “People’s Presidency” a defacto “Executive Presidency” by creating the illusion of it’s inevitability. Third suborn or coerce Parliament into submission. The fourth, final and most vital prong of the entire initiative — co-option of the vital fraction of the National Security Council, without which all the other prongs will either be ineffectual or easy to roll back.
To control public information, unlike in the past when all putchists needed do was to capture the state’s only public broadcast station, today’s information infrastructure in a complex information ecosystem like Kenya would require the support of a combination of key business elites and total seizure of the behemoth Safaricom. This avenue is barely even worth exploring given that the Government on January 30th 2018 in a live security operation proved to us all that it is now impossible for a Government to fully control information flow. A massive effort was made to censor, by a Government in power and it failed miserably. Estimates indicate over a hundred thousand people watched the mock swearing-in streamed live online. In other analyses in this publication we have qualified Safaricom as a supranational body that cannot be controlled or regulated by national institutions. The Government of Kenya (GoK here-on) could easily have chocked off the Internet at it’s fibre-optic termination point in Mombasa, but even this would have been inconsequential as the telcos would have failed over to satellite backup. RAO cannot therefore achieve control of public information in a situation as fluid as a coup where a Government fully in control was unable to. And this failure by the GoK to strangle communication for the public should not in anyway be an indictment on it’s competence, the USG is unsuccessfully struggling with the same problem. The Internet is it’s Frankenstein Monster.
The other three depend on the fourth. To create a strong illusion of his inevitability, compel submission of Parliament and prevent a military rout of his leadership by any of the security services requires him to successfully coot key members of the National Security Council, a fête that is impossible given his reputation for political betrayal and the infamy of his personal duplicity. Whichever way a rational, expedient politician or administrator games it, there is no scenario in which a RAO “Presidency” would be worth the risk by any member of the National Security Council. Supporting RAO risks personal loss on the slim chance he wins as William Samoei Ruto learnt and guarantees it when he loses.
Now, the above only analyses RAO’s side of the chessboard. There is no discussion of what obstacles he would have to surmount in an all out onslaught against the centre assuming he somehow overcame his own limits.
How is the centre structured?
Here again, RAO suffers another blind-spot.
UMK many fail to understand is only genealogically Kikuyu. UMK’s sociological father is not Gikuyu, it is Gikuyu’s master and owner, Imperial Britain. UMK is no more Kikuyu than Queen Elizabeth is English. Queen Elizabeth is actually German. She is Queen Elizabeth of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. They changed their houses name to Windsor in 1917 to make it more palatable to the English public whose sons she’d send to war against the sons of the citizen’s of her husband King George V’s first cousin German Kaiser Wilhelm II. Just like Johnstone Kamau became Jomo Kenyatta to enter the class that has no tribe, no colour, only interests, imperial interests. This is evidenced by his complete lack of interest in the plight of ordinary Kikuyus. Was he a Kikuyu chief, the plight of the Kikuyus locally and around the world would be his concern, the prostitution of Kikuyu women in Nanyuki, humiliation by perverts masquerading as tourists…the littany of untenable crimes of British citizens against his tribe would have moved him to act but he only moved when British occupiers were threatened by a tribal revanche, which he used the army to quell.
UMK is only in terms of legal process an elected leader, he is in reality an enthroned prince. He has on many occasions, true to his characteristic sincerity confessed this to the public, but been largely misunderstood. Saying roughly something to the effect “electing me or not electing me to office will have no significant impact on my life…”. Yes, this is actually correct. UMK’s power does not come from the number of votes he gets in an election, his power comes from his hectarage. He is part of the land aristocracy the British created in all their colonies to protect their empire. Land is a source of power. Because Capitalism is materialistic, it’s criterion is property (capital), as such hectarage (the amount of land one owns) is directly proportional to the power they wield within the territory and population. Just like in a public liability company, the number of shares one owns is directly proportional to the power they wield over the company. That is why Bob Collymore’s oft repeated statement that “I serve over 55,000 shareholders” was cynical tongue-in-cheek deception. Bob Collymore served the majority shareholders, Vodafone/Vodacom. So too will any elected President in power serve the major land owners. Remember Philip Murgor as Director of Public Prosecutions flew to Nakuru to enter a nolle prosequi for the human game-hunting colonizer now late serial killer Tom Chomondeley. He was acting on behalf of the “true” citizen. Land is the true source of the Kenyatta family’s power, alter the land tenure system and they become plebeians, and this was why Beth Mugo famously declared “The Title-Deed is sacrosanct”. Inviolable. She used a religious term because it is their article of faith, the true basis of the Kenyatta family identity and it’s power. It is their religion.
UMK does not need to be “elected President” to exercise “Presidential” scale power for his personal benefit. Thus his statement, “electing me is of consequence to you, not me”.
And it is this characteristic, that RAO has to contend with in any assault against the centre. RAO has to rip the map of KENYA-tta.
The @CoalitionNASAke shenanigans — jeering, chanting and heckling on the streets are at best a source of humour for UMK, at worst a nuisance. Remember how tickled he was by the demonstrations at the height of their “IEBC must go” street antics, letting out a full belly laugh at a public rally. Asking, with what seemed like genuine curiosity, why they would humiliate themselves so.
With the substantive nature of UMK articulated, we can now assess what it means to RAO’s extra-constitutional strategy to seize power.
We have established RAO is backed by a powerful suzerain, lacks the necessary tribal coalition but can under exceptional circumstances, which we are completely unable to artificially construct even for gaming purposes, ally key members of the National Security Council.
First, though RAO’s suzerain America may have successfully infiltrated the Security services under cover of it’s War on Terror (joint war game simulations, training arrangements, supply of communications gear), this is far from sufficient to guarantee control of the entire command structure. America’s ability to activate security groups may not transcend the specialised Anti-Terror units and Special forces.
American capture of the military is also far from sufficient to alter the political landscape without significant support from the tribal elites, that we have established RAO does not have. Therefore, even with the highly improbable seizure of the city by a highly ambitious colonel with a highly motivated, inordinately committed special operations battalion or two, just like in the case of 2012 Malian coup d’etat, it would most probably be eventually rolled back.
It is also of extremely significant consequence that through the ongoing occupation of Somalia by the Kenya Defence Force, UMK is a ”wartime” President. The state of Wartime powers activated for the President cannot be ascertained at the time of writing this, but the political ramifications are to consolidate the chain of command below UMK to the disadvantage of any other interloper. If RAO supports the occupation he reinforces UMK, if he opposes the occupation he falls out with his suzerain, whose occupation it really is. On this key issue — Somalia occupation, which is the only one of sufficient significance in use as a lever to widen a crack between the incumbent and his military commanders, Raila is damned if he does, damned if he doesn’t, making capture of the military nearly impossible for RAO.
Now again, “Politics is the art of the possible”. Dismissing RAO outright while he is backed by the imperialist architects of Operation AJAX, Operation Northwood, DBACHILLES and every other of hundreds of coup d’etat around the world would be unwise.
To this end, we introduce a supranational line of defence present within the territory and that has been activated in the past. In 1965 the British Army intervened locally in an Operation called Binnacle. As it so happens it was by UMK’s father Jomo Kenyatta against RAO’s father Oginga Odinga. Though the British Ministry of Defence website states they number only about a hundred permanent staff, it is difficult to confirm or ascertain the real configuration of British troops in the territory. This is a layer RAO would have to contend with, a operational level he cannot reach, which has the ability to change the reality on the ground. What are we saying? That in addition to everything else going for him, Uhuru Muigai Kenyatta is one of the few Presidents on the continent who can potentially survive a mutiny by his own armed forces.
Short of direct American invasion and installation of RAO in office, he is incapable of the coordination necessary to capture the territory, even with Operation AJAX level CIA support. He calls for American help in the morning, attacks America for interference in the evening. His inconsistency and duplicity make for poor empire building material.
The centre is solid. The centre is in no danger from RAO.
Which way forward for the revolutionary spirit of Anyuola?
January 30th was the day of earthquake. The day the long promised political tsunami was to hit the bank and re-order the entire political landscape. On January 30, for the real revolutionary, it was the day for a speech that would echo across the continent and the world. January 30th was the day to march on Statehouse.
The centre avoided a massive crisis by a hair’s breadth.
January 30th was Raila Amolo Odinga’s day of rage. It was the day his oratory would capture the public imagination and become the moment we would all look back on as the turning point in his long quest for power…
..but true to his word, he was every bit the virgin he promised to be, he submitted meekly to the demands of the roaring Luo Nation begging it to be gentle and patient, now that he had kept his promise.
To quote Kwendo Opanga in the Sunday Nation of February 11th 2018 it is time for “new leaders and ideas”.
Arkanudin Yasin
Chairman of the Central Contact Committee of Hizb ut Tahrir in Kenya