This clearly is the curse of ODM's decision to wage the next electoral campaign on the grassy meadows of virtue. They have shown a keen-ness to portray their party and their leader as a Messiah to the Kenyan masses, a saintly band of merry men who will dislodge the oppressive regime that has dominated Kenyan politics for the past 44 years.  The snare they set at the same time however, is that by pitching themselves as the people's party, the party of the slum-dweller and the poor farmer, of the marginalized regions and the excluded tribes; ODM are inviting us to inspect their ranks and to judge them on their integrity and past record.

It follows then, that if it is on the grounds of ethics that we are to prefer Raila Odinga and his cohort to the Moi-Kibaki axis; the newly crowned ODM champion and those surrounding him will need to prove themselves above reproach. Even as they wave the Kroll report, or raise the specters of Anglo-Leasing, or remind us of the massive land holdings of the old KANU and DP congregation, or the injustice of the privatizations, or the increasing gulf between rich and poor; ODM will have to explain why even a cursory inspection proves they are far, far from whiter than snow.

If as their more sensible candidates are likely to admit, both sides are morally compromised, they then saddle themselves with the burden of explaining how on a scale of moral relativity, their transgressions are not as dark as those of the NARC-DP-KANU conglomerate. So instead of going out there and winning hearts and minds, they will spend time on the newspapers and on television explaining Raila's involvement with the Molasses plant, Musalia's involvement in Goldenburg, William Ruto's NSSF scandal, William Ntimama's aggression and most of all, why if they are a party of the poor, the majority of them are billionaires and half-billionaires.

I would like to think of myself as a neutral, but more importantly I am not an idiot. An increasing number of Kenyans are unlikely to be idiots either, so if ODM would like a real chance at winning the 2007 election, they had really better change their strategy. Wage the campaign on ideas, not on morals for that just drapes the ugly pall of hypocrisy over you, and stealthily, silently extinguishes your orange halo.