Kibaki was the country’s longest serving MP. He had been MP for 50 years between 1963 and 2013 when he retired as president. For voters to trust you in 10 elections, you must be exceptional and very trustworthy.
He was the also country’s longest serving finance minsiter. He served two regimes in the same capacity from 1969 and 1981. These are notable achievements worth celebrating. Aren’t they?
Again, lest you forget, the man ascended from obscurity to the apex. From Mangu to Makerere to LSE back to teaching at Makerere and then a direct plunge into national politics when he was brought in (by Mboya?) to serve KANU as an organizing secretary, in 1961.
He was Kenya’s first treasury PS, in 1963, was minsiter for commerce in 1966-1969, was minister for finance 1969-1981, vice president from 1978 to 1988 and minister for health 1988-1991.
He was Kenya’s opposition leader from 1997-2002 and president from 2002-2013. He takes credit for the introduction of FPE and the revival of several state corporations that were on their death beds.
However, like everyone else, he had his dark side too. Although it is considered uncouth and uncultured to talk ill of the dead, especially in Africa, Nikolai Gogol, the Russian playwright taught us that each one of us has ‘some little failings’, a good reason we shouldn’t shy from highlighting both sides, when enumerating their greatness.
Kibaki is the third person in the hierarchy of land ownership in Kenya after the Kenyattas and the Mois. Of course the acquisition of most of these parcels of land were irregular as these individuals took advantage of their proximity to power to allocate themselves land mostly repossessed from fleeing Britons.
This is an excerpt from Joe Hamisi’s book Looters and Grabbers
“KIBAKI’s earliest grab was that of the 1200-acres Gingalily farm, along the Nakuru-Solai road, in 1960s. He also took advantage of his position as finance misniter to allocate himself some 10k acres, in Bahati via the STF (settler transfer fund). He also owns 10k in Laikipia, 10k in Rumiruti and 10k in Raure Ranch”
On his efforts in the revival of the country’s economy,after the dethronement of KANU in 2002, anyone who participated killing something, should never claim any credit for rescucitating the same.
He was part and parcel of the KANU plunder that brought the country down. It is inaccurate to praise him for reviving an economy that went down under his watch. Remember he was finance minsiter for a decade. If he was dissatisfied with the manner the affairs of the country was being managed, then he ought to have stepped aside, like Bildad Kagia did.
Lastly, in his own regime, corruption happened in the same scale as it did in the KANU days. His regime gave us Anglo-Leasing, a NARC’s equivalent of KANU’s Goldenberg.
He also squandered an opportunity and the prevailing national mood to unite the country. In 2007/8, the country went up in flames because he refused to hand over power, even after losing in seven of the eight provinces.
Millions were displaced, property worth billions destroyed and at least 1500 killed, including some 30 cremated alive in a church in Kiambaa, in Eldoret. Soy market was burnt down 100% and for the first time in history, we saw igloos, like those of eskimos, dot the country’s terrain, in the name of IDP camps.
When he left, he bequeathed the state machinery he had used to rig, to Uhuru who used the same to cheat in an election, as he himself had done on 2007.
Even as the world mourns Kibaki, we shouldn’t forget his dark side, which also had a huge impact in the country.
RIP KIBAKI
