YVONNE'S TAKE: Partiless parties of Kenya

Fellow Kenyans, a new poll by TIFA has confirmed what many of us already suspected: loyalty to political parties is fast fading.

TIFA chart shows UDA, which swept into power in 2022, enjoying 38% support, is now down to 16% — a reduction by more than half! The same goes for ODM, once at 32%, now at 13%. The single largest category? “Undecided or none” — at a whopping 43%.

Let that sink in: the biggest party in Kenya today is no party at all. If this is not the biggest repudiation of the political class we have seen in recent times, I don’t know what is!

I suspect this is about more than fatigue. It is the aftermath of the 2024 and 2025 protests, the Gen-Z-led revolution in the streets that demanded a different kind of politics. And when the top two parties, once bitter rivals, joined hands to protect themselves from the very people who put them in power, it sent a message: the lines we were asked to choose between in 2022 were apparently illusions.

Today, leaders from both sides freely admit that their manifestos were not that different after all. Well, if that’s true, then why did we have to go through the most expensive, divisive exercise in our history to choose between them?

Political parties are supposed to be ideological homes. In the U.S., Republicans and Democrats have debated ideas for over 150 years. In the U.K., Labour and Conservatives have clashed over the role of the state for more than a century. In Europe, Social Democrats, Liberals, and Greens may form coalitions, but their core beliefs remain distinct.

Here, our parties are not ideological homes. They are special-purpose vehicles, built to get us to an election and discarded once the political cargo is delivered. When they’re done with one driver, they find another.

Yet, we fund them. Yes, our taxes pay these parties millions of shillings every year through the Political Parties Fund — money that is supposed to build strong, enduring institutions. What have we gotten in return? Cross-carpeting, broken promises, and endless coalition dramas.

This 43% — the new “party of none” — is a warning sign. It is a vote of no confidence in the entire political class. It says: Stop treating us as numbers, as tribes, as cargo. Give us ideas, give us values, give us something real to believe in.

Because if you don’t, we may just decide that your parties no longer deserve the funding — or our votes.