ODINGA AN ENIGMA?

This article in deed speaks volumes about the next president of the republic...

More appearances on Churchill Live could boost chances of Raila & Co


By MURITHI MUTIGA

Posted Saturday, June 4 2011 at 18:32


Three key presidential candidates — Martha Karua, Uhuru Kenyatta and Raila Odinga — have all accepted invitations to trade jokes with comedian Dan Ndambuki aka Churchill in the last few weeks.

One of the most interesting bits about the reaction to the shows has been the almost unanimous sense of wonder of viewers who were seeing a side of the politicians they had never encountered before.

So Ms Karua can be so funny and accessible? Is that really Mr Kenyatta who appeared so ‘‘chilled out’’ and mixed easily with wananchi?

The latest politician on Churchill Live was Mr Odinga. You do not have to go much further than the Nation website to see just how much the Prime Minister divides opinion.

Any story involving him attracts a huge number of readers. And within minutes of being posted, you will have dozens of comments below the story with some staunchly defending Mr Odinga and others bitterly attacking him.

Things were different on Thursday. A few minutes after the screening, Churchill posted a line on his Facebook page asking for feedback.

The response (as is usual for anything involving Mr Odinga it attracted more than a thousand posts) was, for once, almost uniformly positive.

People were not discussing his politics or his policies. They were not tearing each other apart about his chances in 2012.

They were making fun of his shoes. Expressing wonder at the fact he is familiar with the Kigeugeu hit song by Jaguar that is a sensation with teens.

They mused about the story of how he met Ida, and one commentator demanded to know whether the PM was quite sober when he took up the microphone to sing along. On and on it went.

The politicians appealing for votes on comedy shows and other such fora are making a wise move because the world has moved on from the days when the electorate was asked to choose between radically competing visions on how to take the country forward.

No major differences

The end of the Cold War means there are no major differences in the economic policies of candidates in most countries.

The electorate in the TV and Internet age is more likely to vote for the candidate who is more emotionally appealing.

That is how Gordon Brown, a far more substantial and serious figure than the current British Prime Minister David Cameron and his deputy Nick Clegg, lost to his more PR savvy opponents at the last elections.

In the US, President Obama, never one to fail to appreciate the ever-changing realities of the world we live in, became the first sitting President to appear on the comedian Jay Leno’s show in March 2009.

The advantages of these formats are numerous — not least the fact you catch a mostly young audience that prefers to get information on current affairs from comedy shows and social media rather than from the traditional media.

In Kenya, the candidates that take every opportunity to let voters see them outside the formal settings in Parliament and political rallies will likely reap rewards in 2012.

Ms Karua’s frequent calls for youthful responsibility on her Facebook page and her references to the job of mothering can only help to offset her stern-faced image.

Mr Kenyatta is a famously social animal without the pretensions one would expect from his parentage — but he has to find a way to communicate that to the masses.