Let me put our position on the table before somebody arrives with a seating arrangement: for those of us backing Linda Mwananchi because of Edwin Sifuna, the destination is the presidency. He is the reason we are here. Nobody should mistake our enthusiasm for an open cheque that can be quietly written in somebody else’s name. We came with a choice. We would appreciate it if the political caterers stopped trying to change our order.
We ordered a presidential candidate. Please do not bring us a deputy and explain that the kitchen has decided.
There is a serious argument beneath that little joke. Support belongs to the people who give it. It does not become the personal property of everyone who happens to share a platform with their preferred leader. A movement may have many speakers, organisers and ambitions, but an individual supporter is entitled to say exactly what brought them there. Our answer is Sifuna. No other person can simply step into that place and assume our consent has travelled with the microphone.
That does not diminish anyone else’s contribution. People can work hard, speak well and deserve respect without becoming our choice for president. We can appreciate the whole choir and still know whose voice made us stop outside the church. There is no offence in saying so. Indeed, it saves everyone the expense of rehearsing a song the congregation did not request.
For us, the call for Sifuna to run comes from the people who want him to stand. That is the point we want him, his colleagues and every enthusiastic arranger of political furniture to understand. We are asking him to seek the presidency because we believe he should offer himself for that responsibility. Our call should be heard in its own right, rather than translated into a bargaining position we never authorised.
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And if he says he would prefer to remain comfortably outside that contest? We shall politely disagree with impressive consistency. We shall make our case in public, write our appeals and invite him to explain his hesitation. We shall return to the conversation with the persistence of a relative who has discovered that you own a pickup and now considers every family move your constitutional responsibility.
When we joke that we will “force” him to run, that is the force we mean: peaceful persuasion, patient organising and an argument too serious to dismiss with a smile. His decision remains his. Our determination to persuade him remains ours. Nobody needs threats when they have a good case and enough persistence to make a polite reminder feel like a recurring calendar appointment.
Edwin, you are entitled to think. We are equally entitled to ask whether the thinking requires an entire geological era.
We understand that a presidential campaign is an enormous undertaking. It asks difficult things of a candidate, a family and everyone who helps to build it. Enthusiasm does not pay every bill, protect private time or solve the practical problems of organisation. Those concerns deserve honest answers. But they are reasons to discuss what would be required, not reasons to treat the people’s invitation as a passing noise outside the window.
If the concern is readiness, let us hear what readiness would involve. If the concern is the burden, let supporters understand the work they would need to carry. A serious public conversation would be more useful than leaving everyone to interpret every pause, photograph and handshake as though politics were an examination in facial expressions. Some of us would like to finish our tea without being told that the angle of somebody’s elbow has changed the entire future of the country.
The deputy presidency is a substantial office, and seeking it can be an honourable choice. Our argument concerns the role we want Sifuna to pursue. We believe he should lead the ticket, explain his programme directly to voters and ask them for the responsibility of governing. That is the invitation. Calling it by a smaller name will not make us forget what we said.
Imagine inviting someone to be the head chef because you believe in the meal they can prepare, then being told they will be allowed to stand near the kitchen and compliment the menu. You might reasonably have questions. You might even put down your spoon. Political participation ought to permit at least as much scrutiny as ordering lunch.
Those discussing alliances should therefore begin by listening. Cooperation can broaden a campaign and bring useful experience into it. But a discussion among leaders cannot automatically settle what supporters will believe, accept or vote for. Agreements need a public explanation. They need reasons strong enough to survive outside the room in which they were negotiated.
Votes have owners. Every voter has a mind, a memory and the freedom to decide. You cannot pack supporters into a coalition agreement like complimentary bottles of water and announce that delivery is complete. Some will ask where you are taking them. Others will read the label. We intend to do both.
Our message to everyone working alongside Sifuna is therefore straightforward: take this preference seriously. If you want our support for a different arrangement, you will have to persuade us. A photograph of smiling leaders will not do all the work. Neither will a solemn announcement that “consultations have taken place,” especially if the people being consulted somehow never include the people expected to vote.
We would welcome cooperation that gives this presidential call a fair hearing and a credible path. What we reject is the assumption that our support can be redirected without our participation. Respectful disagreement is available to everyone. So is the right to withhold political support. Democracy becomes rather pointless if voters are allowed to clap but are considered difficult when they develop preferences.
That is why the phrase “We are Sifuna; he is Edwin” matters to me. It captures the difference between one person and the hope that supporters gather around him. Edwin is a human being with his own judgement, responsibilities and limitations. “Sifuna,” in this expression, names the public expectation we are asking him to carry. The words are affectionate, but the responsibility inside them is demanding.
They also place an obligation on us. If we say the call comes from the people, we must behave like people prepared to do the work. We cannot demand a presidential campaign and then disappear as soon as somebody mentions volunteering. A country cannot be organised entirely through capital letters, fire emojis and the occasional photograph of a lion.
The supporter who writes “WE ARE READY” should be prepared for the deeply unfair possibility of being asked to help. Readiness may involve attending a meeting, listening to someone who disagrees or explaining a policy without forwarding a video with seventeen exclamation marks. It may require patience. This is a terrible inconvenience, but apparently democracy has refused to introduce a one-click delivery option.
Serious support should make a movement more credible. It should discourage invented claims, refuse intimidation and leave room for honest questions. If someone challenges our preferred candidate’s ideas, we should be able to answer the challenge. Turning every disagreement into a personal quarrel would suggest that our confidence cannot survive contact with a follow-up question.
There is another responsibility we must accept before asking Sifuna to accept his: our enthusiasm must remain accountable to the lives we want improved. A presidential campaign should eventually reach the kitchen table. What would change for the household struggling to plan next month? How would a business owner make decisions with greater confidence? What would competent public service feel like to a person who simply needs an office to do its job?
These questions deserve clear proposals and difficult scrutiny. A parent cannot pay school fees with a memorable slogan. A business cannot meet its wage bill using the applause from a rally. Even the most loyal supporter eventually reaches the supermarket till, where the cashier remains stubbornly uninterested in the quality of last weekend’s speech.
That is the serious reflection beneath our insistence that Sifuna should stand. We want the chance to examine his ideas at presidential scale. We want him to assemble a capable team, explain the choices he would make and tell the public how he would measure success. Admiration should lead us to demand more detail from him, because we are considering him for more responsibility.
If he makes a promise, we should ask how it would be delivered. If he proposes spending, we should ask what would fund it. If an idea has weaknesses, we should expect him to address them. That sort of scrutiny does not spoil a movement. It helps prepare a leader for a job in which confidence alone will never be enough.
We should be particularly suspicious of the idea that loving a candidate means permanently surrendering our questions. The presidential chair does not come with instructions telling citizens to switch off their brains. Should Sifuna win our support and then win office, our expectations would follow him through the door. We would still want answers. We would simply address our reminders to a more impressive building.
For that reason, the people’s call should be heard as an offer of work and an expectation of service. We are asking him to enter a demanding contest, and we should be ready to examine him seriously within it. He would still have to earn support beyond those already persuaded. He would still have to win the confidence of voters who see things differently. Our conviction cannot substitute for their choice.
The presidency will never become anyone’s property merely because supporters say the name loudly enough. We know that. What we want is the opportunity to put forward the candidate we believe in and make our case openly. Let the ideas face questions. Let the candidate face the country. Let voters decide with the dignity of people whose judgement matters.
That is also why our appeal cannot end at “Sifuna must run.” It must continue into “Here is why we believe he should, and here is what we expect if he does.” Otherwise, we would be asking him to climb a mountain while we remain at the bottom selling motivational captions. He would be entitled to look down and ask whether the committee of encouragement had remembered to bring its shoes.
We should bring our shoes. We should bring serious expectations and the discipline to debate them. A movement gains substance when its supporters can explain the public purpose behind their attachment to a leader. If we cannot explain that purpose, we risk confusing affection with a programme and a packed comment section with an organisation.
Our preference for Sifuna is clear. Keeping that preference clear does not require us to insult everyone else. We can tell other leaders that their contributions matter while also telling them that our presidential choice is not automatically available for reassignment. We can cooperate without pretending we have forgotten why we came. Courtesy does not require political amnesia.
And Sifuna himself should understand the affection inside this pressure. When supporters ask him to aim for the highest office, they are asking him to take their belief seriously. They want an answer that engages with the invitation. They do not want to wake up one morning and discover that their presidential hopes have been converted into a supporting role, with a statement thanking them for their understanding before anyone has checked whether they understand.
Please allow us to do our own understanding. We have brought our own brains. They may be tired from everyday life, but they still function remarkably well when somebody attempts to change our political order.
If his answer is hesitation, let there be a conversation about the reasons. If he answers that the task is difficult, we shall agree and ask what work needs doing. If, after hearing us fully, his answer remains no, he retains that freedom. We would be disappointed, and we would have to decide our own political future. The support we offered would still belong to us; nobody else would inherit it merely by standing nearby.
That final possibility makes listening more urgent. A movement should want to understand what holds its supporters together before making decisions about where to take them. For those of us speaking here, Sifuna is central to that answer. Take his presidential prospect out of the conversation and you have changed the proposition we are being asked to support. It would be wise to notice that before printing the celebratory T-shirts.
So let us be warm, direct and extremely difficult to misunderstand. Edwin Sifuna, we want you to seek the presidency. We want you to prepare for it with the seriousness the office deserves. We want everyone discussing the future of Linda Mwananchi to hear that request without quietly replacing it with a more convenient one.
We will keep making the case peacefully. We will keep asking for an answer. We will laugh, because laughter gives a difficult conversation room to breathe, but nobody should confuse the laughter with a lack of conviction. A smiling voter can still know exactly what they want.
For us, the destination is State House. We have said it plainly enough for the back of the room to hear. Kindly stop passing around application forms for the passenger seat.
We are Sifuna. He is Edwin. And Edwin, with affection, the people calling your name would like a word about that presidential application.