By Jeeh Wanjurah

She had obviously prepared for the occasion judging by her attention-grabbing costume but eventually the day belonged to her mouth.

Millie Odhiambo’s invocation of the taboo subject of wife battery on Cecil Miller will be unforgettable for a while. It was the sucker punch that condemned Independent Interim Electoral Commission (IEEC) proposed chairman to a TKO for a coveted job. With her pronouncement, male MPs, ostensibly gnawed by the guilt of introspection, acquired the stiffness of a man struggling with a bad stomach before his mother-in-law. Even proponents of Miller were careful not to be seen as too vocal against the charges. From the suppressed anxieties, it was clear the Nominated MP had pricked raw nerves.

Perhaps Millie should walk her talk too on spousal violence by being equally discriminative on the company she keeps in Parliament. In the same week she was putting paid to Miller’s hopes of leading IIEC, she had cast her lot with a camp that is not exactly famous in social circles for sending their wives flowers and other lovey-doveys. But then, she is a politician and the timing of words is often more important than the underlying conviction or even the message.

That Millie wore such a headgear to Parliament last Thursday is in itself one of the blatant gender discriminations nobody complains about because, well, the victims are men. Although women have rightly raised a storm over their right to keep their handbags in the Chamber, they still enjoy many dressing indulgences over men. For instance, while male MPs must contend with the stiffness of suits and ties or Maoist or Islamic tunics, women are at liberty to turn up in anything and everything.

That means unless wisdom dawns on Parliament to suitably amend the Standing Orders to free male MPs to contemporary dressing styles, the nation will never play witness to, say, the attractive legs of Bifwoli Wakoli, the nicely toned biceps of Nuh Nassir or the pedicured toes of John Mbadi.

By contrast, women MPs are in a costumes Canaan. Some like Special Programmes Minister Naomi Shaban favour flowing kitenges. Others prefer measured-to-fit skirts of Wavinya Ndeti. But quite often, like with Millie last week, some turn up clad in apparels of doubtful utility besides aesthetics attention. Thus while a genuinely balding man or a guy with bad hair like Prof Ayiecho Olweny does not enjoy the license to dignify his looks with a cap, an otherwise beautifully haired womanlike Millie can afford the luxury of a kitenge cap that belongs more with the harem of the Sultan of Kotoko than a serious Kenyan legislator.

On Cecil Miller

So there she stood, in a red-or was it maroon?–headgear complimenting her kitenge wear. Nevertheless, it was clear she would have still stood out in a sackcloth. Her numerous Points of Order interruptions escorted with the determined thudding of the foot like in a Sunday School recital of kanyaga Shetani kanyaga stood out during the debate on Miller and his proposed IIEC team.

Like in a good choreography, it was really manufactured anger. Genuine witness to her contributions during the sittings of the Parliamentary Select Committee that short-listed the candidates can confess their shock at the extremity of her about turn, especially on the choice of Miller.

Sources recall how she had been full of praise for Miller at the interviews and her good words are reported to have heavily tilted the scales in his favour. It is what Mwangi Kiunjuri laboured to point out later on the floor. But the problem with the Assistant Minister is that much of his intelligent arguments are irredeemably eroded by his shags-mundu accent. It means rather than paying attention to his point, the audience is lost in the fascination with his ability to speak English in Kikuyu.

Millie’s rise to conspicuousness in Parliament has been gradual and steady. In fact, admirers of her energies for children rights as the boss at Cradle, an NGO, might have been a bit disconcerted with her largely muted Parliamentary presence last year. But she has since engaged higher gears, especially with her proposed Motion against child trafficking. Whether the latter is not a legal overkill for crimes that can be adequately solved by enforcing existing legislation is a moot point. The Sexual Offences Act, for instance, has explicit clauses against trade in children. Perhaps posterity will be kind to the MP’s tenure if we can also talk of the Millie Odhiambo Bill or Act.

She must however be careful in balancing character against desire, however noble the latter is. Stamping a mark in Parliament is often a concerted act. You will need to build and sustain alliances outside narrow ethnic or party interests. Investing in bipartisan goodwill is essential. You can ill afford perceptions of being a rental mouth; a journeywoman preoccupied with attack dog missions. Were she and the anti-Miller gang genuine, she would perhaps confess the real reason for rejecting the young man was never stated.

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