In Kenyan political mythology, 1982 was the year it all went wrong. In that year, a failed military coup transformed the previously genteel ruler Daniel arap Moi into a brutal and kleptocratic dictator who would spend the next two decades making life miserable for his countrymen. His successor, Mwai Kibaki, was also supposedly a gentle soul until he faced his own come-to-Judas-moment when divisions in his government saw his regime lose a 2005 referendum on adopting a new constitution. He responded by sweeping out the rebels in his cabinet and, two years later, stealing the election and almost destroying the country.

Like all good myths, these have grains of truth. It is true that Moi became much more brutal and dictatorial after the attempted coup – two years after, he commanded Kenyans to “sing like parrots … the song I sing. If I put a full stop, you should put a full stop.” But he was a tyrant well before the coup. For example, in the weeks before it happened, he had changed the Constitution to make Kenya a de jure single-party state, and detained without trial political opponents and........

© Al Jazeera