Leaked Documents Reveal Raila's Failure to Tame Uhuru

Leaked documents revealed how African Union envoy Raila Odinga rejected a move that would have made him president, a seat he has coveted for a long time, when he competed against Uhuru Kenyatta in 2013.

The Standard and Daily Nation, on Saturday, December 4, reported that the documents, which originated from Cambridge Analytica, detailed how the lobby group had approached Odinga in 2013, with a promise to help him ascend to power.

However, Raila was reportedly overconfident that he would win the 2013 elections against Uhuru, forcing the company to shift to the latter's camp. Uhuru went on to win the 2013 and 2017 elections with support from UK's Cambridge Analytica. 

According to the report, emails between CA and a Kenyan contact which were leaked by whistleblower site Hindsight Files disclosed how Raila's camp thwarted the idea.

"Last time we had a fruitful engagement which led to a meeting with Marcus Beltran of SCL (formerly Strategic Laboratories Communication - a mother group of CA), and ODM top brass. 

"It was truly unfortunate that ODM was too confident and thought that the services of SCL would best serve them in 2017 elections when they were already in power. The results of their overconfidence are well known," a December 2, 2013 email from the company's Kenyan contact read.

CA went on to hatch a tactic based on public relation strategies following surveys in Kenya, which saw Kenyatta ascend to power. The research was based on the political views of Kenyans, governance structures, perceptions on the International Criminal Court, the trust of various leaders and the reasons Kenyans had for voting.

"Insights were used to produce messaging to appeal to target groups, issue hierarchies and propensity to change vote scores were produced for each group," a document to The National Alliance (TNA) read.

CA kept track of Kenyan politics and before approaching Uhuru in his 2017 re-run, the lobby group was reportedly approached by Raila's camp to help them oust the head of state.

However, the firm stood by Uhuru, bagging a new contract worth Ksh250 million. The report further detailed that Raila turned against the company after losing to Uhuru again, accusing CA of election malpractice.