Changing fortunes in Maasai politics – Weekly Citizen

The battlelines for the over 600,000 Maasai votes in Kajiado, Narok and Samburu counties have been drawn with William Ruto and Raila Odinga in a cutthroat competition ahead of the 2022 polls.
Though Raila has not declared his interest in the 2022 presidential race, he will either marshal the Maasai to vote for him or a candidate of his choice. Others say that if Raila does not run, the community vote will land in Ruto hands.
Already, several Maasai leaders have pledged to rally the community in the three counties to support Ruto.
Kajiado governor Joseph ole Lenku was the first to declare the community’s preferred presidential aspirant during the burial of senior chief Samuel Koriata in Narok South, a ceremony attended by Ruto.
“Some are telling me to forget about the succession debate but let me say today that I will rally the Maasai community to support Ruto so he can win the 2022 elections,” Lenku declared during the event.

Narok Governor Ole Tunai

He added that the community’s leaders were holding talks on forming a united front ahead of that vote.
Speaking at the same venue, Narok governor Samuel Tunai noted that the Jubilee Party administration had initiated projects and is pursuing others under Uhuru Kenyatta’s Big Four agenda on affordable housing, manufacturing, food security and universal health coverage, which will see Ruto carry the day in Maasailand in 2022.
Others who have vowed to back Ruto include Narok West MP Gabriel Tongoyo who has been praising the DP as a warrior of the community’s interests.
“When a warrior is set for combat, he always asks a friend to give a spear, bows and arrows or any weapon for the fight. We assure you of our support,” Tongoyo said in the presence of the deputy president.
Others who have promised to support Ruto include Samburu governor Moses Lenokulal and MPs Korei Lemein (Narok South) and David Ole Sankok (nominated).
During this year’s Madaraka Day celebrations in Narok, Kenyans witnessed supremacy war between Ruto and Raila.
ODM leader was not given a chance to speak to the thousands of Kenyans who had flocked Narok Stadium for the celebrations.
But when Raila was leaving the stadium, hundreds of Maasai clad in their traditional attire blocked his motorcade, demanding he addresses them.

Senator Ole Kina

From the onset, it so looked like Narok residents were so happy to see Raila grace the event going by the rousing welcome he received.
Thousands of Maasai men and women had been ferried from Kajiado and Narok to the stadium a day before the event while others trekked to the venue in the wee hours.
When Ruto introduced Raila, the crowd went ecstatic. In contrast, when Ruto arrived at the Narok Stadium, he was not received in an electrifying manner like the ODM leader.
According to protocol, Narok governor, Samuel Ole Tunai could only invite a fellow governor or Ruto after which it was upon the DP to invite Raila to address the crowd before inviting the president.
But Ruto decided not to give Raila a chance to speak and instead invited the president who could also not break protocol by inviting Raila to speak after Ruto did.
Pundits aver that Ruto was clearly telling Raila that “I am the one in charge here”.
Also, pundits aver, the Mau Forest politics played a major role in Ruto’s decision to silence Raila since the former prime minister has been in the forefront in pushing for the conservation of the Mau Forest and has even called for the eviction of squatters who have invaded the forest.
Ruto on the other hand has been against Raila’s approach to the Mau issue.
Given a chance to speak, Raila might have addressed the Mau issue that is still a pain in the neck of a number of Maasais and this would have not gone well with Ruto who is also out to defend members of his Kipsigis community from eviction from the vast forest.

DP Ruto and Tunai

During the 2017 polls, Jubilee party maintained its hold of Narok, Kajiado and partly Samburu.
In Narok, the party retained four of the six parliamentary seats except Narok North where Moitalel ole Kenta recaptured his seat on an ODM ticket and Narok West which went to CCM.
This is the only county where all the MPs retained their seats with the only loser being Narok West’s Patrick ole Ntutu who abandoned his parliamentary ambition to help his brother Stephen ole Ntutu face it off with JP’s Tunai in the gubernatorial race on a CCM ticket.
The Ntutus were sent to political oblivion after JP’s Tunai floored Stephen.
Jubilee lost the Narok West seat to CCM’s Gabriel Tong’oyo.
Kenta had won the seat on a TNA ticket in 2013.
In 2013, the Jubilee coalition clinched all the five parliamentary seats in the county through URP apart from Emurua Dikir’s Joana Ng’eno who won on a Kenya National Congress ticket.
In 2017 elections, Ng’eno retained his ticket through Kanu which supported Jubilee Party.
Another loss for the Jubilee Party was the senatorial seat which went to ODM’s Ledama ole Kina.
Woman representative Roselinda Kudate retained her seat via Jubilee. She was the pioneer Narok county woman representative after clinching the seat on a URP ticket in 2013.
During the 2017 campaigns, Raila threw barbs at Ruto saying the DP was to blame for the mismanagement of Maasai Mara National Reserve’s resources but this was not enough to convince the Maasai to vote for ODM candidates.
Raila claimed Ruto and Tunai had been stealing tourism proceeds in excess of Sh3 billion annually from it but this did not dissuade the voters from reelecting the governor.
The governor is fluent in both Maa and Kipsigis dialects.
After the election, there was ethnic flareups in Olposimoru along the border of Nakuru and Narok counties pitting the Maasai against the Kipsigis.
Trading centres, stores and houses were reduced to ashes and families left homeless in the violence.
A few months later the Maasai and Kipsigis communities reached a peace and agreed to bury the hatchet at a meeting that county commissioner George Natembeya attended.

Narok North MP Moitalel Ole Kenta at a past event.

But a section of North and South Rift leaders demanded the Director of Public Prosecution and Inspector General of Police arrest and prosecute Raila’s ally, Narok senator Ledama ole Kina, Narok North MP Moitalel ole Kenta and former Nairobi county speaker Alex Magelo for incitement, but none of them was arrested.
In Kajiado, Ruto still holds sway going by the 2017 election results where the Jubilee Party stamped its authority by sweeping all the three county seats as well as four out of five parliamentary seats.
In the polls, Lenku snatched the governorship seat from David Nkedianye of ODM who since decamped from the Orange party.
Newcomer Philip Mpaayei shook off a spirited onslaught from ODM’s Daniel Tinaai, to succeed Peter Mositet as Kajiado’s second senator.
Out of the five parliamentary seats, JP got four against ODM’s one. They are Joseph Manje of Kajiado North, Peris Tobiko of Kajiado East, George Sunkuyia of Kajiado West and Katoo ole Metito of Kajiado South. Elijah Memusi was the only exception retaining his Kajiado Central seat on an ODM ticket.

Samburu Governor Lenolkulal

Most of the Jubilee MPs and MCAs in Kajiado are behind Ruto.
In Samburu, the 2017 battle was largely between Ruto and Kanu chairman Gideon Moi.
Ruto carried the day when Samburu governor Moses Lenolkulal defeated Kanu’s Gabriel Lengoiboni.
Kanu, however, won the Samburu East and Samburu West parliamentary seats with Nominated senator Naisula Lesuuda managing 14,561 votes against 13,971 votes polled by the incumbent MP Lati Lelelit.
The Samburu Women representative’s seat was retained by Kanu’s outspoken Maison Leshoomo.
Raila’s ODM also got a number of seats.
As things stand now, Raila seems to be gaining more ground in Maasailand.