Kalonzo's awakening: From the watermelon to the trenches

Wiper leader Kalonzo Musyoka.[File, Standard]

For years, Kalonzo Musyoka built his political reputation around caution and diplomacy. He was comfortable in coalition negotiations, boardrooms and carefully worded press conferences, a style that eventually earned him the “Watermelon” label from critics who portrayed him as a politician reluctant to take decisive political risks.

That image is now being tested by a very different Kalonzo. As the 2027 General Election approaches, the Wiper Patriotic Front leader has increasingly moved away from the politics of statements and negotiations to a more aggressive grassroots campaign. He has been travelling across counties, addressing rallies, entering politically competitive areas and confronting hostility that would once have been enough to send many politicians back to Nairobi.

Political risk analyst and a Scholar-Practitioner in Political Risk and Presidential Politics, Dismas K Mokua, sees the shift as a deliberate attempt to change Kalonzo’s political brand.

“Kalonzo has been known as a cautious diplomat. This is the brand that earned him the watermelon tag,” Mokua says.

He argues that Kalonzo is now attempting to establish himself as a leading figure of the anti-establishment and the street, at a time when former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua has positioned himself as the de facto leader of the opposition.

The changing opposition landscape has made regional mobilisation increasingly important. Gachagua has repeatedly argued that the eventual opposition presidential candidate must demonstrate the numbers they can bring to the table. The message is straightforward: before leaders bargain over the flag, they must first demonstrate their ability to consolidate their own political constituencies and expand beyond them.

For Kalonzo, that creates an incentive to move faster.

On August 7, Wiper unveiled a new leadership structure, appointing former Cabinet Minister Jamleck Kamau as national chairman, Nyali MP Mohamed Ali as deputy party leader-designate and lawyer Ndegwa Njiru as the party’s spokesperson. The choices brought into the party’s top structure figures associated with a more combative style of politics.

The restructuring appeared to be part of a broader attempt to give Wiper a more aggressive political machine ahead of 2027.

Then came the Ukombozi Caravan. On August 25, Kalonzo unveiled the heavily branded campaign truck, taking Wiper’s mobilisation strategy onto the roads. The caravan became a physical representation of the change taking place within the party: instead of waiting for political developments to come to him, Kalonzo was taking his message directly to voters.

His subsequent travels have taken him into politically sensitive territory.

In Tharaka Nithi, his rallies in Ndagani and Chuka were disrupted after police stopped him from addressing the gatherings. In Garissa, an opposition rally involving Kalonzo and Mohamed Ali descended into chaos after youths threw stones at leaders and vehicles.

Kalonzo nevertheless continued his engagements, including a  late-night meeting with local elders and opinion leaders. He later travelled to Tana River, where he addressed worshippers at St Francis of Assisi Catholic Church in Hola and used the incidents to question the security situation in the country.

For Mokua, these encounters are significant because they are changing the way Kalonzo is perceived.

“Violence and disruption visited on him gives him much-needed street credentials for 2027,” he says. “He is now seen as a politician who can take a punch for Moraa.”

Mokua’s point is not that violence is a measure of political strength. Rather, he believes the confrontations help Kalonzo escape the image of a politician who operates only within controlled political environments. The more he appears in contested spaces, the easier it becomes for him to present himself as a politician willing to face the same political risks as ordinary opposition supporters.

There is also a strategic reason for Kalonzo’s national tours. Raila Odinga’s death left behind a large opposition constituency whose future political direction remains one of the biggest questions ahead of 2027. But Mokua cautions against the assumption that Kalonzo can simply inherit Raila’s political base.

“Mr Kalonzo Musyoka has no capacity nor competence to inherit Mr Raila Odinga’s base,” Mokua says, pointing to Raila’s unique charisma and what he describes as his “messianic” approach to politics.

Kalonzo’s opportunity, according to Mokua, lies elsewhere. He can build political infrastructure in Raila’s former strongholds by presenting himself as the politician who sacrificed alongside Raila and is therefore best placed to pursue the unfinished opposition project.

That means the current tours into different regions are not merely about holding rallies. They are an attempt to create national political credentials before the opposition coalition finally decides who should face President William Ruto.

Mokua believes Kalonzo’s political experience gives him an advantage over his fellow opposition principals. He describes him as “head and shoulders above his united opposition principals as far as the 2027 presidential race is concerned.”

But experience alone will not secure State House.

Mokua argues that Kalonzo’s realistic path to the presidency requires him to win a meaningful share of the Mount Kenya vote. This helps explain his strong relationship with Gachagua and his support for the former deputy president. Gachagua brings access to an important voting bloc, while Kalonzo brings experience, a strong Ukambani base and a history of working across opposition formations.

Their relationship is therefore also about electoral arithmetic. The one-term presidency proposal fits into the same calculation. Mokua describes the one-term pitch as a classic elite-bargain strategy. By presenting himself as a transition president, Kalonzo can reassure other opposition leaders that supporting him would not necessarily mean surrendering their own presidential ambitions for a full decade.

The wider opposition, Mokua argues, is not held together by a common ideology. It is an elite bargain driven largely by the shared objective of preventing Ruto from securing a second term, alongside the individual grievances and ambitions of its principals.

That makes the coming months unpredictable. There will be coalition permutations, new alliances and political surprises. Mokua warns that politicians will also be vulnerable to misinformation and disinformation as the contest intensifies, meaning that positions taken today cannot necessarily be assumed to remain unchanged when the election approaches.

For Kalonzo, however, waiting carries its own risks. Mokua argues that Kalonzo has already demonstrated his ability to consolidate Ukambani and does not require anyone to remind him to protect his political backyard. His bigger challenge is to turn that regional strength into a national presidential proposition.

He therefore has to demonstrate that he can remain firmly in command of Ukambani while building support elsewhere. His recent movements through the Coast, Mount Kenya East, northern Kenya and other regions suggest that this is precisely what he is attempting.

The stakes are particularly high because, as Mokua puts it, Kalonzo’s political capital in Ukambani and across Kenya could “go up in flames” if he does not run for president in 2027.

The former vice-president therefore appears to have recognised that the next election cannot be fought entirely from negotiation rooms. He needs the party machinery, the grassroots networks, the national tours and the political visibility to negotiate from a position of strength when the opposition finally sits down to choose its flagbearer.

Whether the new Kalonzo can overcome the old “Watermelon” image remains to be seen. He has not inherited Raila’s political constituency, nor has he established himself as the undisputed leader of the opposition.

But something has changed. Kalonzo is no longer behaving like a politician waiting for other leaders to determine his political future. He is building his own machinery, testing new territories and deliberately trying to demonstrate that he can take political pressure and remain standing.

For a man who has spent years being defined by caution, this may be his most consequential political gamble yet.

The “Watermelon” is now on the road, and for the first time in a long while, Kalonzo Musyoka appears determined to prove that he has teeth.