Raila Odinga has lost the 2022 elections, making him one of the unluckiest presidential candidates in Kenya.Even if he moves to the Supreme Court to argue his case, he won’t succeed this time—he doesn’t have a strong case. There are 9 main mistakes he made that gave Ruto victory.
- Handshake
The 2018 handshake forced him to inherit Jubilee mistakes.Ruto learnt quickly and distanced himself from the mess the government had created. But Raila was too blind to see that.
Ruto approached the 2022 election as an outsider while Raila approached it from the government side.
- Believing that the system could help him win
Raila Odinga all along believed that he had the system and that a win was not an option.He thought the system will rig for him and do everything to prevent Ruto from becoming the president. He was wrong.
The system failed to help him,it failed to replace Chebukati who helped Ruto become the president.
Raila thought that the four commissioners the government appointed in 2021 were to help him win not knowing that it’s Chebukati who was to determine the winner.
Raila’s supporters even believed that the system was to help him win,most of them didn’t even bother to vote.
- The selection of Martha Karua as the running mate
Of all the running mate options Raila had,Martha Karua was the weakest candidate—she delivered nothing.In fact Kalonzo Musyoka delivered more votes than everyone in Azimio.
At one time Kalonzo told Raila that he would lose if he doesn’t select him as his running mate,but the Enigma didn’t listen.
The worst thing we witnessed is when Karua didn’t even deliver from her polling station,Ruto got more votes than Raila from the polling station.
Raila thought that by selecting a woman as the running mate,all women in Kenya were to vote for him….he was wrong.
- By leaving Mudavadi and Wetangula to Ruto
Ruto harvested big from Raila by winning Mudavadi and Wetangula.The two delivered 600,000 votes from Western Kenya. In fact, Ruto won presidency because of the Western votes. This is one reason Raila will cry after losing the Supreme Court case.
- By not deploying agents to polling stations
Polling stations is where the election was won.Raila failed to recruit agents and deploy them to polling stations. This ineffectiveness helped Ruto to guard his votes and even manipulate some.
The result from the polling stations is the one that’s entered in form 34A which nobody can alter.
- Having wrong political advisors
He was surrounded by old people like Atwoli, Charity Ngilu,Maina Kamanda and several others who had ganged up against young people in Ruto’s side. These are the people who misadvised him.
While Raila relied on old people, Ruto went direct to voters and begged for their votes.
- Opinion polls and media
Opinion polls were paid huge amounts of money to place Raila ahead of Ruto.The figures and percentages they put out here were fake.The media was also biased.They gave more publicity to Raila and even openly campaigned for him at the expense of Ruto
- Depending on Uhuru’s support
Raila thought that Uhuru was to campaign for him in Mount Kenya,he waited until the last minute.Uhuru failed Raila by not campaigning for him in the mountain.
- Remarks during campaigns
The remarks he made during campaigns especially in regard to Mitumba failed him.People also thought he is not a Christian. Majority of church goers didn’t vote for him.