Credibility of ODM polls will define party’s future

By ABABU NAMWAMBA

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In 415 BC, the ancient Athenians attacked Sicily, believing their expedition would bring them riches, 16-year Peloponnesian War. They did not consider the dangers of an invasion so far from home; they did not foresee that the Sicilians would fight all the harder since the battles were on their own homeland, or that all of Athens’ enemies would band together against them, or that war would break out on several fronts, stretching their forces way too thin.

The Sicilian expedition was a complete disaster, leading to the destruction of one of the greatest civilisations of all time. The Athenians were led into this disaster by their hearts, not their minds. They saw only the chance in the distance.

In law 29 of his 48 law glory, not the dangers that loomed of power, Robert Green says: “The ending is everything. Plan all the way to it, taking into account all the possible consequences, obstacles, and twists of fortune that might reverse your hard work and give glory to others. By planning to the end you will not be overwhelmed by circumstances and you will know when to stop. Gently guide fortune and help determine the future by thinking far ahead... when you see several steps ahead, and plan all your moves all the way to the end, you will no longer be tempted by emotion or by the desire to improvise. Your clarity will rid you of the anxiety and vagueness, the primary reasons why so many fail to conclude their actions successfully. You see the ending and you tolerate no deviation.”

To Cardinal de Retz, “the most ordinary cause of people’s mistakes is their being too frightened at the present danger, and not enough so at that which is remote.”

Montaigne adds: “how much easier it is never to get in than to get yourself out!... in their beginnings it is we who guide affairs and hold them in our power, but so often once they are set in motion, it is they who guide us and sweep us along.”

Later this week, the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) comes face to face with fate when the party holds its much-awaited elections for national officials.

Quite intriguingly, the elections have presented the party with pretty much the same dilemma that confronted Kenyans at the last General Election: the choice between regressive status quo and progressive transformation; to do business as usual or business unusual? To reward cronyism or unleash the full potential of meritocracy? To merely talk the talk of democracy or actually walk the walk of free expression of the democratic will? By the time you read this column next week, the die will be cast.

In casting that die, ODM must be acutely conscious of the fundamental reality that this election is no ordinary exercise. It is a historic turning point with monumental implications. This is not about the candidates angling for the various positions.

The real deal here is the very soul and future of the party. That is why the party leadership must look beyond next weekend, with the keen awareness that “the ending is everything”. The election on February 28 is merely the beginning, a practice match, a dress rehearsal for the contest proper against the real rival - battle 2017 against team Jubilee.

It is said that if you do the same thing over and over again and yet expect different results each time, then there certainly is something very wrong with your head!

ODM has a fantastic opportunity to exorcise the ghosts of negative rhetoric and bungled electoral exercises that have always combined to steal the party’s thunder and sabotage momentum at critical moments.

Indeed, February 28 is a perfect platform for ODM to throw the gauntlet at the feat of its rivals and the IEBC, by demonstrating how elections, of whatever nature, should be handled in order to pass the test of free, fair and credible.

Otherwise, what moral authority would the party have to point at the speck in the eye of IEBC if it proceeds to plant a log in its own? Exactly a year after democracy was on trial, the very soul and future of the Orange party now lie on the scales. Which way the scales tip will be defining. Very defining!

The writer is Budalang’i MP and Chair of Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee