Government and Policy

Ruto’s Leadership Style Has Given Birth To Transactional Democracy Which Has Given The Crime Syndicate An Opportunity To Govern Kenya

BY Steve Biko · July 7, 2023 11:07 am

KEY POINTS

Transactional democracy thrives on looted resources. It abhors what is right, what is legitimate, and above all, what is true. President Ruto has used this form of democracy to take advantage of the greed and gullibility of Kenyans and enslave their elected politicians because he knows their every little dirty secret and he uses these secrets as leverage to ensure that his form of democracy carries the day.

Octavia E. Butler in his book, Parable of the Talents, says that we MUST Choose our leaders with wisdom and forethought. To be led by a coward is to be controlled by all that the coward fears. To be led by a fool is to be led by the opportunists who control the fool. To be led by a thief is to offer up your most precious treasures to be stolen. To be led by a liar is to ask to be told lies. To be led by a tyrant is to sell yourself and those you love into slavery and of course, this is the unfortunate situation that we find ourselves in as Kenyans.

His quote made me think of Kenya and Kenyans in how we pick and elect our leaders. We are the worst country in the world when it comes to picking leaders. We have politicians who lie more than the devil himself. We have politicians who steal more than Ali Baba and the forty thieves. We have politicians who claim to be honest more than Pinocchio himself.

The leadership style of the 5^th President of Kenya has given birth to a new form of democracy in Kenya called transactional democracy. Where the essence of democracy here is about who has the money to buy their way through. This form of democracy is worse than military dictatorship as it has given rise to a league of super thieves whose sole agenda is to loot public coffers so that they can have the currency needed for them to be in power. More than 60% of the elected politicians have an active criminal case and they are linked to money laundering, gold scamming schemes, organized crime, witchcraft, and wash-wash.

Our beliefs affect our choices. Our choices shape our actions. Our actions determine our results. The future we create depends upon the choices we make and the actions we take today. Unfortunately, it’s like Kenyans are the devil’s representatives here on earth because we seem to pick politicians who are thieves, rapists, terrorists, and murderers, not to mention lazy and greedier than pigs themselves. We seem to have forgotten that these choices we have been making for the past decade have matured and are now calling in their debts and it’s us, ordinary Kenyans who are dearly paying for the price.

In Kenya, we have no leader who is elected. Those elected are just smooth politicians who used every possible negative virtue to get to office. Kenya has less than two leaders. Unfortunately, these two are not elected to any office. Transactional democracy has killed our Constitution and weakened all KEY institutions that are critical for the management of the country and the checks and balances that are meant to exist between the three arms of government.

Criss Jami, Salomé in his book; In Every Inch In Every Mile says that Time and time again the pride of man influences his very own fall. While denying it, one gradually starts to believe that he is the authority, or that he possesses great moral dominion over others, yet it is spiritually unwarranted. By that point he loses steam; as a result, he falsely begins trying to prove that unwarranted dominion by seizing the role of a condemner. Salomé was clearly talking about the Kenya Kwanza Government. Every day they condemn the past leadership of Uhuru and when they realize their audience is tired they change their tune and start condemning Raila. No single day have they taken responsibility. No single day have they told the truth. No single day have they acknowledged their shortcomings. They have made it clear, it’s their way or the highway.

President Ruto the other day said that we do not understand why the cost of living is high and that because of our ignorance, we have no tangible solutions to offer except make noise day in, day out. I beg to differ with all the respect that I can master for him. Here are reasons why the cost of living is so so high, actually the highest in Africa and 7^th globally.

In her book Rise Up and Salute the Sun, Suzy Kassem speaks of citizens being able to Pick a leader who will keep jobs in their country by offering companies incentives to hire only within their borders, not one who allows corporations to outsource jobs for cheaper labor when there is a national employment crisis. Choose a leader who will invest in building bridges, not walls. Books, not weapons. Morality, not corruption. Intellectualism and wisdom, not ignorance. Stability, not fear, and terror. Peace, not chaos. Love, not hate. Convergence, not segregation. Tolerance, not discrimination. Fairness, not hypocrisy. Substance, not superficiality. Character, not immaturity. Transparency, not secrecy. Justice, not lawlessness. Environmental improvement and preservation, not destruction. Truth not lies.

In response to the President’s assertion, his leadership style has created a transactional democracy where those with money have the opportunity and access to institutions of power and ultimately access to him as President. The negative domino effect of this is a run-down country with no virtue and no potential future. From the days of Youth for KANU, President Ruto has perfected the art of transactions to such an extent that it’s given rise to a degenerative essence of democracy. Everyone in Kenya Kwanza employs the transactional democracy method to get things done. This form of democracy does not care about what is right or wrong. It does not care about integrity or virtues. It does not care for the needs of the ordinary people. The denominator currency is how much you to gain access to that which you seek. This has seen the worst of us rise to serious echelons of power while those who value integrity and ethical conduct have been consigned to corners of mediocrity and nonrelevance. The President has curved an image of one who only values money and he will use anything including religion to achieve whatever his heart desires. Unfortunately whatever his heart’s desires are, do not align with the needs and wants of the people of Kenya. Ruto’s form of democracy has put into ICU the full essence and purpose of Chapter 6 of our Constitution.

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Transactional democracy is wielded by politicians who are afraid to think. It’s wielded by politicians who lack any intellectual depth to critically think about a country’s challenges and how best to address them. This form of democracy has no room for any divergent views. It has no room for any ethical behavior. It has no room for reason or logic. It only has room for how much money you have or how much can you steal without feeling guilty. I say this with bitterness because when the media was called unprintable names by the CS for Trade, we all expected the President to stand on the side of reason and logic and fairness but he stood with the CS. He picked a side that looks down on Kenyans. A side that doesn’t care for what is right or what is ideal. Our elders, when they said, show me your friends and I will show you, who you are, must have been thinking about the President and the CS for Trade.

I have always maintained that you don’t necessarily need atomic bombs to destroy a nation. Politicians who value their pockets more than the life of citizens always do that every day. Kenya Kwanza politicians are destroying the country with their greed for material things, their lack of critical thinking to solve our issues, and most importantly, their sycophantic behavior. We have politicians with no spine. We have politicians who cannot think beyond their noses, erect penises, and wet vaginas to save their lives. With public coffers, they are constantly satiating their demonic desires that seem to be insatiable.

The passage of the Finance Bill by the Kenya Kwanza leadership proved that they hate thinking, that they prefer to raise taxes to loot from a people they have come to understand very well and they know how to manipulate them. Not to mention that the youth populace has no iota of integrity or common sense. A youth populace that will be bribed with KES 527 to betray their country by talking about fake achievements of the government. Transactional democracy thrives on looted resources. It abhors what is right, what is legitimate, and above all, what is true. President Ruto has used this form of democracy to take advantage of the greed and gullibility of Kenyans and enslave their elected politicians because he knows their every little dirty secret and he uses these secrets as leverage to ensure that his form of democracy carries the day.

Increasing taxes, constantly blaming the previous administration, and lying without an ounce of shame show that they have no capacity to think critically to come up with a better way to manage and grow the country. They have refused to look at:

Manufacturing
Production
Agro-Processing
Agriculture
Local Tourism
Debt restructuring
Energy and Fuel
Reforming the tax code to ensure they are reduced and applied to a wider tax base.

As means to:

Reduce unemployment
Increase the tax base
Increase our export turnovers
Create the perfect business environment

They have refused to think along these lines because then they will not be able to:

Clean their dirty money
Receive kickbacks
Horde public funds to create a cache of illegal wealth
Steal public funds to create offshore accounts for their families
Reward their cronies
Reward their girlfriends and boyfriends.

The decisions taken so far indicate a leadership that is ignorant, has no ability to reason logically, a leadership that is threatened by any divergent views, a leadership that believes in lies, a leadership that is averse to truth, and most importantly a leadership that prefers mediocrity. It is easier to increase taxes, because, they will have quick money to steal. Anything else like manufacturing will not create the right avenues for them to steal and plunder.

Richelle E. Goodrich in Making Wishes talked about what true leadership is all about. They said that the sign of a good leader is easy to recognize, though it is hardly ever seen. The greatest leaders are those who share as equals in the trials and struggles, the demands and expectations, the hills and trenches, and the laws and punishments placed upon the backs of those governed. A great leader is motivated not by power but by compassion. Therefore he can do nothing but make himself a servant to those whom he rules. Such a leader is unequivocally respected and loved for loving. Unfortunately, for us, we only hear of leaders in movies and other countries. In Kenya, as Boniface Mwangi famously said, Kenya is a country where the Mafia has a country to take advantage of. The fruits of transactional democracy whose denominator currency is money have created an unfortunate opportunity for the Mafia or the crime syndicate to govern the country. They have shown that virtues take no one anywhere and that vices are all one needs to succeed. Ruto is the only Kenyan President who had the golden opportunity to make Kenya great but failed to take advantage of the auspicious occasion. I pray that one day we will rise up and say enough is enough with transactional democracy.