Former IEBC Commissioner Roselyn Akombe has issued a stern warning to the political class, cautioning that the escalating rhetoric witnessed during Senator Edwin Sifuna’s chaotic Kitengela rally mirrors the early warning signs of past electoral violence.

The specter of 2017 returned to haunt the national conversation this morning as Dr. Roselyn Akombe broke her silence on the deepening fissures within the opposition. Her intervention comes barely hours after police teargassed a rally led by the embattled ODM Secretary General Edwin Sifuna in Kitengela, an event that has since been dubbed the "showdown" for the soul of the orange party.

Akombe, known for her abrupt resignation and flight to New York at the height of the nullified 2017 presidential election, did not mince words. In a statement that has ricocheted across social media, she warned that the "drums of war" are often beaten by those who have the least to lose, urging Kenyans to reject the bait of polarization.

The Red Flags of Intolerance

Her critique appears centered not just on the state's heavy-handed response, but on the incendiary nature of the current factional wars. The "Linda Mwananchi" versus "Linda Ground" schism has moved from boardroom coups to street confrontations. Akombe noted:

• The normalization of teargas as a tool of political engagement.
• The dangerous branding of internal party dissenters as "traitors" or "state projects."
• The mobilization of youth for proxy wars between established kingpins.

For the residents of Kitengela, who found themselves choking in clouds of pungent smoke yesterday, Akombe's words ring with an eerie familiarity. The town, a cosmopolitan melting pot, is often a bellwether for national tension.

A History of Prescience

Critics of Sifuna argue his "radical" stance against the broad-based government is reckless, while his supporters see him as the last line of defense against a de facto one-party state. Akombe’s caution cuts through this binary, asking a more fundamental question: Are we sleepwalking into another crisis?

"When the teargas clears, it is the ordinary mwananchi who is left rubbing their eyes," she remarked, a poignant reminder that in the high-stakes game of succession politics, the public is often collateral damage.