Scramble for Votes in the Diaspora

The 2012 General Election will the first under the new constitutional dispensation and it will be historic on many accounts. For the first time, Kenyans in the Diaspora will take part in the elections. It is estimated that there are about three million Kenyans in the Diaspora and out of these three million Kenyans in the Diaspora, it is guesstimated that at least half of them are eligible voters which makes the Diaspora vote a significant voting bloc capable of deciding the outcome of the General Election. The Diaspora voting bloc is unique in several ways though.

Death Warrants –President Kibaki’s Leadership Failure

For the first time in the history of our nation, ordinary citizens are beginning to have faith in the judiciary. Since independence, patronage, corruption, and dearth of the rule of the law plagued our entire legal system making it dysfunctional. However, the situation is improving dramatically and ordinary Kenyans are very optimistic thanks to the constitutional reforms being implemented by the Judicial Service Commission and the Chief Justice in particular. However, in the ongoing criminal justice system reforms, there is a big elephant in the room and it’s the failure by the President to sign death warrants for criminals sentenced to death.

The Threat of Unemployed Youth and 2012 Elections

I fully support the war in Somalia against the Al-Shabaab -that ragtag band of terrorists whose cross-border attacks have terrorized Kenyans and threatened to destabilize our country. And whereas I fully approve of the government’s response to the Al-Shabaab attacks, I contend that the threat posed to our nationhood by our very own able-bodied men and women who feel they have no stake in our society and consequently feel they have no responsibility towards it because they are unemployed, is greater than the threat posed by the Al-Shabaab. This was clearly demonstrated in the 2007 post-election violence; it is an existential

The Kibaki Succession Politics are Hopelessly Bankrupt

With every Tom, Dick and Harry declaring their bid for the highest office in the land, the menu of those aspiring for the presidency in the next General Elections has now become ridiculously rich. It remains to be seen what impact this will have on the General Elections. Nonetheless, most everyone with an honest opinion agrees that the Right Honourable Prime Minister, Raila Amolo Odinga is still the man to beat in the next General Elections; a political reality that is notoriously