Just how dirty can Mombasa politics get?

By Eugene Omilo
As names for candidates eyeing various political seats continue to sprout, political analysts in Mombasa are worried of the latest strategies being thought out by the top players with the dreaded ‘race factor’ stealthily sneaking into the façade further making Mombasa politics dirtier than ever before.
This is despite warnings by the National Cohesion and Integration Commission (NCIC) that tough action will be taken to politicians who are bent on engaging in hate speech and blatant unpatriotic style of selling their candidatures to the electorate.
Happenings in the political circles in Mombasa recently involving contenders for the top seats remain a stark reminder of where Mombasa politics has come from and where, sadly, some political players want to return to so as to ‘deal’ with their opponents.

An analyst, Mr. Mohammed Yusuf, told this blogger that there are fears that many ‘fair skinned’ candidates have stormed the political scene leaving local residents to ask themselves who will control Mombasa after 2012.
Focal points

“Mombasa and Lamu are the focal points of this region. With the current trend of candidatures, one is left to wonder why a certain group of people are keen to control the politics of the region,”said Mr. Yusuf.

According to Mr. Yusuf, the ‘natives’ or the Waswahili feel they are being pushed in the periphery as far as leadership of the region is concerned as more Coastals of the Arabic roots position themselves to take the major seats in Mombasa and Lamu.

In Mombasa, the analyst continues, a majority of those eyeing the seats of either governor or senator are of Arab descent including tycoon Suleiman Shahbal, Mr. Taib Ali Taib, Cabinet minister Najib Balala and renowned scholar Prof Shakuat Abdulrazak who unconfirmed reports indicates that might be shifting from academia to elective politics in 2012.

In Lamu, there is Issa Timamy who has declared his interest in the post of governor, Lamu East MP Mr. Abu Chiaba who has announced that he will be vying for the post of senator and his Lamu West counterpart Fahim Twaha who will also be eying a bigger seat.

Others are businessman Muhamed Zubedi and political activist Swaleh Imu all of whom are fairer skinned.

The native Waswahili candidates in Mombasa are former KPA chief Abdala Mwaruwa, Changamwe MP Ramadhan Kajembe, Kisauni MP Hassan Joho and of late Human rights activist Hassan Omar.

Mr. Yusuf says with the race for governor getting tighter by the day, some candidates might resort to capitalize on the racial backlash to the disadvantage of the candidates of Arab decent.

“One question that people might ask is how many of ‘these’ will we accommodate yet we have our own sons? ” poses Mr. Yusuf.

Apart from the racial undertones, the battle for Mombasa governorship has also started to feature mudslinging and name calling with the latest spat involving the Mombasa mayor Ahmed Muhdhar who is understood to be a chief strategist in one of the top contender’s camp.

Muhdhar was recently put to the defensive for allegedly insulting Arabs by former Kisauni MP Said Hemed while he was addressing this year’s Idd Baraza at Treasury square in Mombasa.

The hated sentiments had arisen from an apparent onslaught that the mayor made on the candidature of Shahbal by questioning his alleged intention to spend a whooping Sh4 billion as his campaign budget for the seat of Mombasa governor.

"The allegations are unfounded and totally untrue. All I said in my speech was that there was someone who was raised in a poor family background and now wants to spend Sh 4 billion to become Governor of Mombasa County. Even Raila's presidential campaign will not cost that amount of money," the mayor was later quoted as saying in an apparent retreat over his earlier verbal misadventure.

Hemed had stormed the mayors’ parlor to demand an explanation on why his people were being discriminated upon.
The two, (Muhdhar and Hemed) have however reconciled and were together during the opening of the new Tudor Muslim cemetery recently.
Mr. Shahbal himself who was at the time in a tour of the United States has vehemently denied the allegations saying instead that it is a ploy by his competitors to shift the focus from issues of policy to money.

“All my competitors want is to make people believe that I have a lot of money so that wherever I go, they don’t listen to what I have to tell them but what I have to offer as hand outs,” said Mr. Shahbal in a recent roundtable meeting he hosted for journalists at the Royal Court hotel in Mombasa.

During the meeting, Mr. Shahbal also raised concerns of planned vote rigging and intimidation which his competitors , he said, were keen to use to frustrate his candidature.
Interestingly, these claims come at a time when the electoral commission has not even thought of starting the tendering process for printing ballot materials.

Another keen observer of Mombasa politics Mr. Hassan Greave says the emergence of youthful candidates like Mr. Hassan Omar is likely to change the political scene of Mombasa as the last crop of Mombasa old guards might be seeing their last days in the local politics.

According to Mr. Greave, Mr. Omar clearly replaces Mr. Kajembe as the front runner of the senators race as apart from his tag as a human race activist, many young voters would most likely identify with him than the incumbent Mombasa MPs who are also eyeing the seat like Mr. Kajembe.

“The biggest asset for Mr. Omar is his popularity which in this context is based on media coverage.His position in KNHRC gives him a platform to be heard almost every day unlike say Mr. Taib who went underground since he lost the race for Mvita parliamentary seat to Mr. Balala in 2007,” says Mr. Greave.

“Mr. Taib might be coming in as a political novice,” he adds.

Joho man to watch
Mr. Greave though has a different view from that held by many thinking Shahbal might be the man to watch in the governor’s race.

According to him, the dynamics of politics might put Shahbal in a difficult position if he continues to pursue what he terms as a gentlemanly approach to politics.

“Shahbal might launch the most wonderful manifesto and exude the most admirable characters but Joho is not to be slighted as he has cut himself a niche as a very aggressive politician in the time he has served as MP for Kisauni,” says Mr. Greave.
He says local voters have a totally different psychology from that of opinion swingers as they are more likely to identify with a robust personality as their preferred leader than one with a passive personality.

“I would not be surprised next year if the likes of Gedion Sonko are elected because Kenyans would most likely be charmed by an aggressive candidate,” he says adding that Joho can be classified in the same category.
Both Mr. Greave and Mr. Yusuf agree that money will also be a major factor as people will most likely swing to the side with most money.
Given that both Shahbal and Joho are relatively wealthy, their encounter might be a very interesting one to watch.

Their two might as well have to fight for in the ODM primaries if they both choose to stick to the Orange party as their 2012 political vehicle.

A source intimated to yours truly that Mr. Shahbal might be considering to die with ODM because of the fact that many ODM think tanks are favouring him for the post over Joho who is currently the party’s Organising Secretary.
It is also understood that Mr. Shahbal held a meeting with Nairobi architect Mr. Joshua Okinda before his recent trip to the US to weigh the possibilities of capturing the ODM ticket though details of what was discussed remain scanty.

Mr. Okinda is the man who is touted to be eyeing the seat of ODM Secretary General Prof Anyang Nyong’o.

“Though it is too early to say who will most likely be voted as governor or senator in Mombasa, ultimately, it is either money or skin which will be used as the determining factor,” concludes Mr. Yusuf.

All in all, it is not wise to insinuate that the electorate in Mombasa is still the same as the one during the era of spats between Prof Rashid Mzee and late Karisa Maitha in thye battle of Kisauniu. Mombasa residents are today highly educated and liberal and would certainly be voting for their preferred candidates without looking at their tribes or race.

The clarion call is that Dr. Ahmed Yassin, the local ‘hate speech spy’ should be alert to deal decisively with politicians who might want to use this cheap scapegoat to undermine the candidature of their competitors.

Long live the unity of Mombasa and its people!



STOP PRESS: Just before we went to press, an unfortunate incident happened in Mombasa where security officials sprayed acid to anti drugs activists to prevent them from handing over a memorandum to PM Raila Odinga who was visiting the region. It is not clear which local leaders or ODM officials were accompanying the PM at the time of the incident. That all major TV stations and newspapers decided to kill the story makes this brief in a nondescript blog food for thought.