Last week, I wrote about the regime’s desperate search for a bogeyman — a typical candidate they can identify, label, and profile as the face of opposition.  

The kind of person they can hang their frustrations on.  

You see, without this symbolic enemy, the idea of Wantam — that elusive, morphing opposition spirit — continues to grow in force and form.  

Eventually, it might crown a candidate late in the day, and the later they do this, the strong enough the momentum will be to send this regime packing. 

But there is a twist.  

Listening to Kenyans on the streets, it does seem like one man’s larger-than-life image in the Wantam agenda is frustrating the Wantam movement.  

Ironically, he is also its most potent weapon whenever he steps in front of a crowd or camera. That man is Riggy G. 

Riggy G is the proverbial wildcard who will either be the straw that breaks the camel’s back or the dark horse that helps it outrun a stallion. 

To truly deconstruct this regime, you need Riggy G. He is brutal, rugged, and raw. He operates on a near-primordial level of arrogance.  

And he has no qualms dragging everyone into the mud where his crude wits shine brightest.  

That is the terrain where this regime needs to be confronted by someone who simply wants it gone, and not to replace President Ruto. And that is where Riggy G is king. 

Yet therein lies the paradox. If Riggy’s rough edges can be sharpened into purposeful blows, his truth-telling delivered with polish and discipline, then this regime will be perpetually on the defensive.  

As the MP for Kitutu Chache South noted, Riggy G has run away with the largest ethnic voting bloc.  

But more importantly, his sharp jabs at the regime have awakened an even bigger, tribeless, and previously apolitical group. 

That is, salaried Kenyans. This bloc is unmoored from ethnicity, driven instead by economic survival, and when mobilised, it could rise in protest and ultimately vote this regime out. 

But here is the catch and the paradox. They will rise only if the alternative is anyone but Riggy G.  

He is both essential and unacceptable. The Wantam formula needs him to destroy, not to ascend. 

You cannot replace a tired striker with the league’s most notorious, red-carded defender and expect to win the title. It does not work like that. Riggy G must be the libero, the workhorse of a player.  

The hard tackler. The one who breaks the opponent’s play, disrupts flow, and goes in with high boots and flying tackles, making even Sergio Ramos and Pepe nod in admiration. 

That is his role. And opposition strategists must find a way to restrict him to that role of a libero, and the target voters need to be socialised early enough of this reality.  

His statements like “I have the best chance to send President William Ruto home” must be erased from the public sphere.  

He does not and probably will not. The opposition must deploy him surgically, assign him specific targets, and unleash him only when the game calls for aggression. He should never become the playmaker or the finisher.  

If he does, the regime will gleefully crown him the opposition’s face.

That bogeyman they have been waiting for. And then they will unleash the outrage machine and spend every resource to tear him apart. 

The writer is a media studies Researcher