Kenya's biggest political mistake is choosing leaders on charisma instead of competence, and Edwin Sifuna's sudden rise as "presidential material" is Exhibit A.
What has he actually delivered? Years on our TV screens, sharp soundbites alongside Senator Onyonka, but as Senator for Nairobi, where's the transformation? As ODM Secretary General, where's the institutional legacy?
He has never run a county. Never held a cabinet docket. Never carried the weight of an executive decision that could make or break people's lives. Yet we're expected to hand him the most powerful office in the country on the strength of TV appearances alone.
This is exactly how Kenya keeps recycling disappointment. We reward visibility over capability, and then act shocked when governance fails. If we don't start demanding a real track record before a real title, we will keep getting leaders who are excellent at debate stages and absent everywhere it actually matters.
The presidency is not a reward for popularity. It's a test of leadership Kenya cannot afford to get wrong again.
We are slowly walking into a dangerous future that many people are refusing to acknowledge.
If things continue the way they are, schools will become more chaotic, communities more unstable, and we will start seeing more teenagers getting involved in crime, violence, drug abuse, and reckless behavior at levels we are not prepared for as a country.
Parenting is collapsing in many homes. Some parents are too absent, too overwhelmed, or have surrendered the role of raising children to phones, schools, and the internet.
At the same time, our education system is struggling to shape character, discipline, emotional intelligence, and critical thinking beyond just exams and grades.
Then add the drug problem into the mix. Drugs are becoming more accessible within estates, neighborhoods, and even around schools. Young people are experimenting earlier, addiction is increasing silently, and many are growing up without proper guidance, mentorship, or emotional support systems.
Now combine that with excessive screentime, social media addiction, exposure to harmful content, short attention spans, online radicalization, and the normalization of aggression and disrespect online.
You end up creating a generation that is emotionally overstimulated, mentally exhausted, easily influenced, and increasingly disconnected from reality.
That combination is a ticking time bomb.
A society cannot survive when children grow up without structure, discipline, purpose, values, or present adults guiding them. If parents do not reclaim their responsibility, if schools continue weakening, if mental health remains ignored, and if drugs continue flooding the streets, then the consequences will not just be felt in homes. They will be felt in classrooms, neighborhoods, workplaces, and across the entire country.
The warning signs are already here. The patterns have already formed. Kenya must stop treating this as a small issue before we raise a generation that is angry, lost, addicted, and difficult to control.