Aden Duale's assertions on Constitution don't add up

The debate on whether Kenyans should participate in a referendum to amend the Constitution has been renewed.

As has happened before, the campaign, which is being spearheaded by the leadership of the Opposition National Super Alliance, has generated varied reactions.

In the ruling Jubilee Party, politicians allied to Deputy President William Ruto have not changed their position. They believe the campaign is intended to scuttle the DP’s 2022 presidential bid or whittle down his powers in the event he wins the election to succeed President Uhuru Kenyatta.

Speaking in the presence of Mr Ruto, Leader of Majority Aden Duale fired a salvo at those pushing for the referendum. He argued that they were daydreaming because they could not collect the one million signatures needed to kick off the process.

He also claimed the Uhuru-Raila Odinga deal did not contain this item. I beg to differ with this thinking. In the past, we have witnessed bloody ethnic violence mainly during the electioneering period.

The time has come to ask ourselves hard questions. Where did the rain begin to beat us? It started when we adopted a Constitution that is anchored on a winner-take-all system.

This is why the losers would cry foul and claim elections had been rigged. Going forward, they would reject the results and ask their supporters to come out in numbers and fight for “truth and justice”.

Given this scenario, I fully support the handshake between Uhuru and Raila. One of the highlights of their nine-point shared objectives is to build a cohesive and united Kenya.

To achieve this, creating the positions of prime minister, two deputies and official leader of Opposition is the way to go. In this arrangement, Kenya will revert to the system that existed during the grand coalition government - in which retired President Mwai Kibaki shared power with Raila.

The adoption of this system cleared the way for the two leaders to re-unite and sign a ceasefire to end the deadly post-election violence. The majority of people have no problem with the creation of these new executive positions.

This would help to ease tension and save our country from sliding into anarchy. The top leaders will no longer consider elections a matter of life and death because all of them will be accommodated in Government.

But the plebiscite must aim to drastically reduce the high cost of living. As such, the Senate and positions of women representatives, nominated MPs and MCAs should be scrapped.