A Retrospective Analysis of Age Contests in Kenya's Succession Politics through Editorial Cartoons of the 2002 Presidential Elections

Abstract

This study set out to analyse the political succession contest in Kenya between the old and younger leaders using lenses of editorial cartoons. The age question in politics continues to dominate Kenya's political succession discourse, with the younger politicians struggling to rise to leadership positions, which the elder politicians are keen on clinging onto. Cartoons constitute a popular, yet sometimes, overlooked genre of visual political communication.  The aim of this study was to find out how editorial cartoons articulated the issue of succession through the political debates age in Kenya.  Choosing to locate the study on editorial cartoons of 2002 was important because the issues of age and political succession were widely discussed during the 2002 General Election. This study involved a selection of cartoons from two leading newspapers in Kenya, namely Nation  and Standard. The cartoons used were published on the opinion and editorial pages between January 2002 and December 2002. Change messages were centred on the replacement of the older generation (Old Guards) by the youth (Young Turks). Eight cartoons were purposively selected and analysed by employing the Four Master Tropes – metaphor, irony, metonymy and synecdoche. The study found out that cartoons raise important theoretical questions in the context of an emerging democracy, like Kenya, and that they adequately articulate the political leadership struggles between the younger and older politicians. The study shows that the youth are portrayed as strong in physic but temporal and inexperienced for political leadership. These aspects were well communicated through all the four tropes, with most of them depicting the younger leaders as lacking in wisdom and unable to play different positions in leadership, as attested to by the various troupes represented through football matches, boxing matches and races. Although the older politicians are still widely viewed to have an upper hand in leadership, this study found out that they were under pressure to get out. But the older politicians are portrayed as struggling to maintain their stranglehold on power. The study calls for an expansion of editorial political cartoon space in newspapers and a greater attention to the meanings they create in politics. There is need to consider cartoons as a genuine news commentary that can help provide a good visual representation of politics.