Broad-based or ‘handshake governments’ are not a new phenomenon. Kenya’s governance system – from independence, the advent of multi-party politics, to the present times – has been a series of ‘broad-based,’ ‘political handshake’ arrangements.
To understand the history of broad-based governments, we need to take a journey through the past. In that journey, we must make a stopover in Gatundu, Kiambu County. The year is December 25, 1963, and a Cabinet meeting chaired by Jomo Kenyatta, then Prime Minister before becoming president the following year, has just declared of state of emergency in North Eastern Province.
Northern Kenya wants to secede, arguing that the region is more Somalia than Kenya. To counter the insurgency, Jomo declares a state of emergency in the in the vast region. But there is a problem-the proclamation of emergency would lapse after seven days if it is not approved by 65 per cent of the Senate and the House of Representatives.
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By lunchtime on December 31, 1963, Jomo and his henchmen fail to mobilise 65 per cent of Senate vote, only managing 60.5 per cent of the votes. Jomo has a political headache – he has to choose between letting the secessionists fragment the country or tear up the Constitution and prolong the state of emergency.
The crisis is averted when Jomo quickly arranges a ‘broad-based’ government after a political ‘handshake’ between his party Kanu and the Opposition Kenya African Democratic Union which strongly supported that Kenya be split into regions.
And right there, the first “broad-based” government was born. After a quick ‘handshake’ over lunch, the Senate is recalled to sanction the emergency proclamation. By the end of that day, both the government and Opposition are in the same political bed.
Kenya’s political landscape was steady-until the next crisis necessitated another ‘broad-based’ arrangement. It came after Kenya shed the one-party state to become a multi-party state. The emergence of political parties that threatened to fragment Kenya’s political linen.
Facing the prospect of losing power to the Opposition, President Daniel arap Moi quickly arranged for a handshake between Kanu and the leading opposition party, the National Development Party, led by Raila Odinga. The country is again stabilised, thanks to a broad-based political arrangement.
Fast-forward to 2007, when again, Kenya is on the brink of a crisis following a contested presidential election that saw President Mwai Kibaki declared the winner, and the Opposition rejecting the results. The ensuing violence leaves hundreds of people dead and properties worth millions of shillings destroyed.
What to do? Handshake! It happened at Serena Hotel where under the watch of former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, another broad-based government was formed. Without it, there would be no country left to write home about today.
Five years later, in 2013, another handshake saved Kenya from a crisis. Kenya’s fourth President Uhuru Kenyatta, moved to avert a showdown between himself and the self-declared ‘people’s President.
The consequences of having two presidents was too dire to imagine, and Uhuru pulls his father’s 1963 political stunt; he orchestrated a handshake with his nemesis, and quietly incorporated the Opposition in government to the chagrin of his deputy William Ruto who accused him of sneaking in Raila through the backdoor.
Now Uhuru’s successor, Dr Ruto, finds himself using the same vehicle that his four predecessors used to stay in power. To and avert a crisis triggered by a full blown rebellion against his presidency led by Gen Zs, Ruto ensures that the Opposition does not join the youth in the streets. For indeed, had the main Opposition party, ODM joined the Gen Zs, Ruto would not be President today.
What saved his presidency, what saved the country from something akin to the Arab spring? A handshake; a broad-based government.
The handshake is here to stay. We must embrace it. We must learn to live with it, whether we like it or not. Because history tells us that it is the only reason we have been relatively stable in a region embroiled with turmoil.
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By Duncan Mindo