Raila is like a well kept dog which has been thrown to compete with wild dogs.
Since he seriously began his presidential ambition in 2007, he just looks like a person who goes home sleeps well, hopes that the electoral body will do it’s work well and declare the winner. That’s not how it happens in Kenya. In Kenya as a politician you have to be aggressive; gaurd your votes and be on the toes of the electoral body like a lion guarding it’s prey. That even just a single movement or phone call needs to be treated with suspicion.
And not just that, even in his campaigns, he is not using his strong points to salvage votes. How Ruto managed to convince people that he is in the opposition while continuing to be the deputy president is beyond my understanding. He changed the narrative and now Raila was the one in government and inherited Uhuru’s poor corrupt government legacy.
Also mentioning being unstrategic unlike the opponents among other things.
Raila has always had a big advantage with the marginalized communities - the coastal sides, North Eastern (Somali), plain nilotes, (Turkana, etc) always preferring to vote for him despite not having anything for them, not even a plan, or using finances to try make them vote for him.
This election was very transparent, but it became transparent when Raila had lost his advantage. In 2017 things would have been different had it been transparent - he had the strong support of luhya, kamba, coastal communities plus other communities.
Maybe it’s his upbringing, brought up in a silver spoon environment. But in Kenya, you have to be aggressive as a politician if you want to make it.
If he ever leaves Kenya without the standout leadership position, he will only have himself to blame. The people did what they could do for him - vote for him, especially strongly in the previous elections but he never played his part. He just went home a happy smiling person forgetting the Kenya’s electrol bodies are not things to be entrusted alone.
