By Jerome Ogola

For purposes of setting the record straight, I do not belong to ODM. I contested in the last elections and I will still contest an independent candidate, not as an option, or an afterthought, after losing in the nominations, but as a matter of choice

The major reason behind this choice is that I do not want to associate with the confusion that is Kenya’s political parties, and I’ve always declined to dive and swim into the shark infested waters

However, I supported Raila in the last elections and voted for him, and I will still vote for him, unless I get convinced that someone else could be a better candidate, as some wise man once advised that it is only lunatics who can’t change their minds

Raila to me is a political leader, in fact the greatest of our times, and not a religion, which means as much as I adore him, I do not necessarily agree with everything he says and does, among them the way his party ODM is managed, particularly the party primaries

With the twin loses in Ugenya and Embakasi, the party will be conducting a post mortem, to scientifically establish what went wrong. Even before the process commences, it is prudent to understand that the party’s shortfalls begin and ends with nominations

Jubilee may not be the yardstick here, as they too had their shortcomings, but not in the magnitude of ODM. Neither are other parties. In Likuyani ward, for example, Mama Phonace won an ANC MCA nominations, that never happened, locking off the clear favorite, my good friend Daniel Dan Songa and many others

In the general elections, she performed dismally, garnering less than a hundred votes, meaning she stood no chance of winning the primaries

For the Wiper, Musila’s memoir tells it all. Kalonzo deep fried him in favor of Malombe, for the Kitui Wiper gubernatorial elections. After defecting to vie as an independent he beat Malombe by over 50k votes, in a race won by Ngilu

None of the parties, is clean enough to ridicule ODM

If the orange party can straighten that then, they will redeem their glorious past, when they had more one hundred MPs in the national assembly. Today they have less than 70 as Jubilee plays a behemoth with an excess of 150.

Wiper is the tallest in the category of dwarfs with less than 20 and Ford Kenya has 12 KANU 10 and ANC 10. Independents are 13 or thereby as fringe parties also lay claim of a few MPs.

Had the opposition coalition schemed well, they would’ve won a majority seats. How for example, would Wangwe win in Navakholo, had Ford K, ODM and ANC fielded a joint candidate. Jubilee was far much more organized than the opposition

Before the marriage of TNA and URP, ODM was the single largest party, and the same can be said today, now that a divorce of the red party is in the offing. However, they must conduct free and fair primaries and hopefully, the flogging it has received in the by elections, is sufficient reason to change ways and if that doesn’t happen, the flogging that awaits the party in the ballot outdoes that which Baba received on his back at the Coast, when that mad man, sent by Jubilee, invaded the diase with a nyahunyo

Great afternoon my fellow hoof eaters!!