The Decorated State Medal That Could be Awaiting Murathe After Uhuru's Presidency for his Job 'Well Done'

Deputy President William Ruto recently cited Jubilee vice chairman David Murathe as one of the individuals in the 'deep state' keen on scuttling his presidential ambition by denying him the ticket to fly the Jubilee flag come 2022 General Election.

By Ndung'u Wa Gathua

Ruto also noted that the party has been captured by Murathe and his ilk leaving him sidelined at the periphery and without a say.

"The party has been hijacked by brokers who are running it through fear. Their word is the party position. The same virus that infected Kanu and killed it after the 2002 elections has come to Jubilee," Ruto said.

Murathe, a political reject and a servile minion of President Uhuru Kenyatta, has since 2018 never hidden his hellbent desire to ensure that Ruto doesn't ascend to the presidency. And Ruto knows it.

"Those in this scheme are boasting that I will not be there soon. Since the system cannot elect anybody, they can only kill. But there is God in heaven," Ruto tweeted a few months ago.

The substantial influence that Murathe wields in Uhuru's government cannot be discounted or disputed. In fact, when he speaks about anything to do with government, he is more oftenly than not interpreted to be representing President Uhuru's stand. He is undoubtedly the face of the so-called 'deep state' in Kenyan politics currently. 

Questions then arises, with Uhuru exiting the presidency in 2022, what will become of Murathe and other henchmen of his caliber? What will be their position in the incoming administration? More interestingly, where will they sit at the apex of State political power in the event Ruto wins?

They are really very hard questions to answer with any foreseeable iota of certainty. But as I once noted on a different platform, political henchmen like Murathe have a tendency to step on every other persons toes apart from the person that they serve. As such, they are feared and hated in equal measures by all.

Not even the political class has a dalliance with the Murathes because they are more often than not the recipients of the 'dirty' services that they render on behalf of their masters. Ruto is a case in point of such recipients.

The voters on the other hand, also loathe underlings and fawners like Murathe for the immense undelegated power that they wield and project with utmost impunity, after all they are not answerable to them!

As long as their master is happy and contented with their bullish knockdown machinations, nothing else really matters.

That said, let's revisit our earlier questions and try and figure out the likely scenario of Murathe and company in a post-Uhuru era. To do so, let's peruse the books of history and find out what became of other past Murathes.

For the purpose of keeping within the confines of this argument, let's use one Lavrentiy Beria who was Soviet Union's dictator Joseph Stalin, staunch henchman, just as Murathe is to Uhuru. 

However, unlike Murathe, Beria had an official role in Stalin's administration where he served as the Marshal of the Soviet Union and chief of security and secret police apparatus.

These roles had before Beria not wielded much influence and power in the Soviet administration, just like the office of Jubilee VC can be dismissed as a non-entity before the eyes of Kenya's State administrative order.

Regardless, Beria would go on to become the longest-lived and most influential of Stalin's secret police chiefs. Stalin had entrusted Beria to do for him all the 'dirty' jobs that saw him rule with an iron fist. These dirty jobs includes the infamous 1936 - 1938 'The Great Purge'. 

Beria, as a result, became the second most powerful man in Soviet Union after Stalin even though he was very far from being that in the formally recognized power structure.

After Stalin's death in March 1953, the Soviet ruling class would by motivation to revenge against the evils that Beria had meted on them during Stalin's era, conspire against him and in June 1953, removed him from the powerful position he had assumed upon Stalin's death three months earlier.

Beria would then be arrested and charged with 357 counts of rape and treason before he got executed on December 1953, six months after Stalin's death. His begging for mercy and pardon did nothing to save him. He would thereafter be hurriedly buried in an unmarked grave in a forest in Moscow outskirts.

We are in 2020 and not 1953. The dynamics of dealing with influential political henchmen like Beria was tackled have undoubtedly changed, but the State medals that bootlickers get in present times for their well done jobs, remains decorated as ever!

Remember Murathe is already being mentioned in the multibillion shillings KEMSA scandal. So, the means and ways to reward him accordingly when the opportune moment finally comes, will neither be lacking nor limited in supply.