President William Ruto currently on a tour of Nyanza region. PHOTO/UGC.
By PATRICK MAYOYO
By any serious measure, Senator Edwin Sifuna has become a political force that President William Ruto can no longer dismiss lightly.
For months, the establishment treated the Nairobi senator as little more than political noise: an ambitious young lawyer, an ODM firebrand, a figure whose moment of celebrity politics was expected to fade as quickly as it arrived.
But political noise does not normally provoke this much attention from State House. A politician who is irrelevant is ignored. A politician who is dangerous is attacked.
The increasingly personal rhetoric directed at Sifuna suggests that President Ruto’s political strategists have begun to grasp what the senator’s growing popularity could mean for the 2027 presidential contest.
Recent TIFA findings are particularly revealing. In its July 2026 survey, Sifuna emerged as the most preferred opposition presidential contender, with 15 per cent, ahead of Fred Matiang’i at 14 per cent and Kalonzo Musyoka at 13 per cent.
President Ruto remained ahead overall at 24 per cent, while 20 per cent of respondents were undecided. TIFA also reported a dramatic rise in Sifuna’s support from virtually zero in 2025 to 15 per cent in June 2026. People Daily
That does not make Sifuna the inevitable winner. But it makes him impossible to dismiss. And that is precisely the problem.
President Ruto possesses a political instinct that has served him well throughout his career: identify an opponent, personalise the contest and reduce a complicated political argument to a battle between personalities.
But Sifuna presents a fundamentally different kind of challenge. The senator is not merely attacking Ruto’s policies. He is attempting to change the question Kenyans will ask about power itself. That is considerably more dangerous.
Linda Mwananchi presidential hopeful, Senator Edwin Sifuna. PHOTO/FILE.
An opposition politician who says, “Ruto has failed to build enough roads” can be answered with a list of roads. A politician who says, “The problem is how power is exercised” forces the government into a far more uncomfortable argument.
Suddenly, the debate is no longer about the number of kilometres of tarmac or affordable houses Ruto is building. It is about constitutionalism. It is about accountability. It is about transparency. It is about public participation. It is about the conduct of State institutions.
It is also about whether development can ever justify the abuse or excessive concentration of public power. That is a battle no incumbent should want to fight on unfavourable terrain.
Perhaps the most extraordinary development in this political confrontation has been the resort to claims that Sifuna is somehow using uganga—witchcraft—to create political confusion.
If such rhetoric is intended as political ridicule, it may instead expose something far more profound.
When an established political machine begins searching for supernatural explanations for an opponent’s popularity, one has to ask whether it has run out of convincing political explanations.
Sifuna does not need magic to explain his rise. There are perfectly ordinary political explanations. Young Kenyans are angry. Many are economically anxious. Trust in political institutions has weakened.
The old language of political mobilisation is losing some of its power. Digital platforms have given citizens the ability to organise outside traditional party structures.
And a generation that watched the political establishment struggle to respond to the protests around the Finance Bill 2024/25 has become increasingly willing to challenge authority directly. None of this requires witchcraft.
When the supernatural explanation becomes difficult to sustain, there is another familiar weapon in African politics: the suggestion that the troublesome politician is somebody else’s puppet.
Wiper Patriotic Front presidential aspirant Kalonzo Musyoka. PHOTO/FILE.
Sifuna has at different times been portrayed by critics as a project of powerful political sponsors, including former President Uhuru Kenyatta and now former Baringo Senator Gideon Moi.
Again, perhaps political sponsorship exists. Kenyan politics is hardly a stranger to hidden alliances and elite bargaining. But the sponsorship argument carries an obvious weakness. It assumes that Kenyans are incapable of developing political preferences independently. That is increasingly difficult to believe.
The young Kenyan who watches a political speech on a mobile phone, shares it on WhatsApp, debates it on X or TikTok and contributes a few hundred shillings to a political cause is not necessarily waiting for instructions from a retired president.
He may simply be making his own political judgement. That is the part of the equation established political machines find hardest to control.
Sifuna’s most effective political invention may not be a policy proposal. It may be three words: Mimi Ndio Sifuna. And the answer: Sisi Ndio Sifuna. There is a profound political difference between those two statements. “Mimi” is the candidate and “Sisi” is the movement. That transformation is precisely what political strategists should be watching.
When supporters stop describing a politician merely as someone they support and begin describing themselves as part of his political identity, a campaign can evolve into something larger than the candidate. It creates emotional ownership. It creates belonging. And it creates the possibility of a genuine grassroots movement.
The digital fundraising associated with Sifuna’s political mobilisation adds another layer. His supporters have reportedly raised millions through small contributions. Whether that fundraising can eventually finance a serious national presidential campaign is another matter. But the political message is unmistakable.
That is potentially disruptive in a political system accustomed to wealthy patrons, ethnic kingpins, business interests and elite coalition-making.
It must also be noted that Ruto understands the old politics, while Sifuna is betting on the new one. This may be the deepest strategic difference between the two politicians.
Principal Secretary (PS) in the State Department for Internal Security and National Administration, Dr. Raymond Omollo, accompanies President Ruto during his Nyanza tour. PHOTO/UGC.
Ruto is a product and master of Kenya’s traditional political battlefield. He understands alliances. He understands regional arithmetic. He understands patronage networks. He understands the power of government visibility. He understands the importance of political brokers.
Sifuna is attempting to play a different game. His politics are increasingly mediated through television interviews, social media, public rallies, constitutional arguments and direct engagement with younger citizens.
The difference is not merely technological. It is generational. For decades, Kenyan politicians told young people that they were the leaders of tomorrow. That promise is beginning to sound insulting. Young Kenyans want to lead today.
They do not want another political elder to explain why their generation must wait another five years, another election or another presidential succession.
This is why Sifuna’s age matters politically. It is not simply that he is young. It is that his political rise coincides with a generation that is increasingly unwilling to defer its political aspirations to established elites.
The 2024 protests against the Finance Bill were not merely an argument about taxation. They exposed a deeper crisis of political trust. Young Kenyans demonstrated that they could mobilise without waiting for traditional opposition parties to organise them.
They used social media to coordinate. They challenged political leaders. They confronted Parliament. And they forced the government to reconsider a major piece of legislation. That experience fundamentally altered the psychological balance between citizens and political authority.
The message was simple: The people can organise without permission. Sifuna’s political opportunity exists partly because he appears to understand that new political psychology.
He is not asking young Kenyans to join an old political machine merely because the machine has changed its colours. He is attempting to tell them that they themselves are the political force. That is why Sisi Ndio Sifuna is more important than it first appears.
Jubilee Party presidential candidate Dr Fred Matiang’i . PHOTO/FILE.
There is an even bigger reason Sifuna’s message could trouble Ruto. It challenges the traditional development bargain. Kenyan elections have often been fought around the question: What will you give us? Sifuna’s emerging argument asks a more fundamental question: What will you do with the power we give you? That is a radically different proposition.
Kenya’s 2010 Constitution was designed precisely to constrain public power and place citizens at the centre of governance. Article 10 establishes values including the rule of law, democracy, participation of the people, human rights, integrity, transparency and accountability.
Those principles are not obstacles to development. They are supposed to determine how development is pursued. A government cannot reasonably say that because it is building roads it should not be questioned.
It cannot argue that economic programmes eliminate the need for accountability. It cannot demand political loyalty as the price of public services. And it cannot expect citizens to surrender constitutional rights in exchange for development projects. That is the intellectual territory Sifuna is beginning to occupy.
And that is why Ruto’s strategy could backfire. The President has a choice. He can continue attacking Sifuna personally. Or he can confront the substance of Sifuna’s political argument.
The first option may actually help the senator. Every attack from the presidency gives Sifuna another national platform. Every attempt to ridicule him increases his visibility. Every effort to portray him as somebody else’s project gives him another opportunity to say: Judge me by what I stand for.
This is one of the oldest rules of politics: Do not give your opponent more importance than his own campaign can buy. Yet that may be precisely what is happening.
Ruto’s attacks risk turning Sifuna into the political protagonist the President is trying to prevent him from becoming.
Sifuna’s greatest obstacle may not be Ruto. It may be the opposition itself. Kalonzo has political experience and a substantial support base. Matiang’i has national recognition and experience in government. Rigathi Gachagua commands his own political constituency.
Another July 2026 Infotrak survey actually placed Kalonzo and Matiang’i ahead of Sifuna among opposition supporters, illustrating just how fluid the contest remains. So the question is not whether Sifuna is popular.
DCP party leader Rigathi Gachagua. PHOTO/FILE.
The question is whether the opposition can agree on what to do with that popularity. If four or five politicians insist on being presidential candidates, Ruto’s greatest ally may not be his political machinery. It may be opposition splintering.
This is where Sifuna’s real test begins. Can he persuade Kalonzo? Can he persuade Matiang’i? Can he persuade Gachagua? Can he build a coalition broad enough to overcome regional calculations?
And can he convince established politicians to support a younger candidate without demanding that he first spend another decade proving that he is “ready”? These are not easy questions.
There is a danger in romanticising political movements. Kenyan politics is littered with politicians who once looked unstoppable. Poll numbers rise. Crowds swell. Social media explodes. Slogans become fashionable.
Then the election arrives. And politics becomes brutally mathematical. Votes must be registered. Agents must be recruited and paid. Coalitions must be negotiated. Resources must be raised. Polling-station structures must function. Regional support must be converted into actual votes.
And the candidate must survive the inevitable political attacks that accompany a serious presidential campaign. Sifuna has to demonstrate that he can do all of this at national scale.
Some people are now comparing Sifuna’s political rise to that of former US President Barack Obama. Obama’s great achievement was not that he could attract enormous crowds. It was that he converted enthusiasm into organisation. He turned supporters into volunteers; volunteers into local networks, networks into votes and small donations into a formidable national campaign.
That is the standard Sifuna must meet if the “Obama moment” analogy is to mean anything.
The President’s vulnerability is not necessarily Sifuna himself. It is the possibility that Sifuna could become the vessel through which several forms of dissatisfaction converge.
Young voters. Anti-establishment voters. Constitutionalists. Disaffected opposition supporters. Urban voters. Citizens angry about the cost of living. People frustrated with corruption. And Kenyans who simply believe that the political system has stopped listening.
President Ruto launching construction of a road project in Nyanza. PHOTO/UGC.
Political movements become dangerous to incumbents when they stop being about one grievance. They become dangerous when different grievances begin speaking through one candidate.
That is the possibility Sifuna now represents. And that is why Ruto should be worried, because Kenya is approaching a generational political collision.
The coming election may ultimately produce another familiar Kenyan contest between competing regional coalitions. It may also produce something different. The old political system is based heavily on negotiation among elites. The emerging political system is increasingly driven by direct citizen mobilisation.
The old system asks: Who are your political kingpins? The new system asks: How many citizens can you mobilise? The old system depends on patronage. The new system can depend on digital networks. The old system tells young people to wait. The new generation is saying: We have waited long enough. That is the political meaning behind Sifuna’s rise.
The President has a choice. He can continue trying to destroy Sifuna’s credibility. He can call him inexperienced. He can portray him as a puppet. He can suggest that wealthy political actors are behind him. He can mock his slogans. He can attack his ambitions and even call him mganga (witchdoctor).
Or he can do something considerably more difficult: answer Sifuna’s arguments. Explain why constitutionalism is not enough. Explain why accountability should take second place to development. Explain why young Kenyans should trust the existing political order. Explain why the next five years should look like the previous ones. That would be a far harder political task.
Because the moment an incumbent starts explaining why citizens should not demand more accountability, the incumbent has already conceded that accountability is the battlefield.
There is still a long road between political excitement and State House. Sifuna has not won the opposition nomination. He has not built a complete national coalition. He has not demonstrated nationwide electoral machinery.
And he has not proved that his support will survive the inevitable ethnic, regional and economic calculations that have historically shaped Kenyan presidential elections.
But something important has already happened. The political establishment has been forced to take him seriously.
Linda Mwananchi leaders Edwin Sifuna, Babu Owino and James Orengo. PHOTO/UGC.
A politician once dismissed as a passing cloud is now featuring prominently in national polling and opposition calculations. TIFA’s July survey recorded him as the leading opposition presidential preference, while its reporting also highlighted the speed of his rise. That is not a revolution. But it is a warning.
And President Ruto would be making a strategic mistake if he responded to that warning with ridicule rather than politics. Because the greatest danger to an incumbent is not an opposition politician who is popular.
It is an opposition politician who can persuade citizens that the election is not merely about replacing one person with another. It is about changing the rules of political power. That is the battle Sifuna appears to be preparing to fight.
And if Ruto has genuinely recognised the threat, his increasingly aggressive attacks may be evidence of something much more important than anger. They may be evidence of fear.
The question now is whether Sifuna can turn that fear into a movement powerful enough to change Kenya’s political equation. For the first time in a long time, the answer cannot simply be dismissed.
And as he continues to say Mimi Ndio Sifuna, his supporters are increasingly answering: Sisi Ndio Sifuna. The 2027 election may ultimately reveal whether that is merely a slogan or brand name—or the opening line of a political revolution.
