John Methu: The scruffy 35-year-old 'Mountain' Senator whose political star just got brighter

The 35-year-old battle-hardened politician was massively instrumental in the shocking victory delivered to his party, as well as the humiliatingly mortifying defeat slapped on President William Ruto and his acolytes.

Fearless and strikingly charismatic, Methu tore through Ol-Kalou with the precision of a surgeon, rousing up the crowds, stimulating the masses, leading choruses and charging up the streets in a masterful adeptness that worked like an ancient spell.

Faced with overwhelming torrents of super-charged state machinery, and a blinding blitzkrieg from the ruling party's coffers, Methu remained unflappable, remaining true to his course, showing up each day, loaded and ready to fire, not once buckling under the pressure of the government's big boys.

For every missile Ruto's boys propelled, Methu was the man trusted to unleash counterpunches with devastating one-liners, a man whose magnetic, disruptive force saw his star shoot through the skies, and a man packed with a crushing bite force potent enough to tear foes into bloody chunks of flesh.

Sporting that defiant beard and a full head of stubbornly unkempt hair, Methu strode Ol Kalou like the proverbial colossus - tough, tenacious and tactical, almost like a mythical figure plucked straight from a Madeline Miller novel.

Watching him stare down the presidency was watching a masterclass in political theatre, as he spoke with a lethal combination of weaponised wit and soaring oratory, tearing down his detractors, championing the cause of his people, remaining daringly defiant and invoking the gods of the steely Nyandarua slopes.

Dedicated to a fault, Methu would convert his Mugumo home into the makeshift DCP headquarters, allowing thousands of volunteers, planners, politicians, party officials, campaigners, agents and functionaries to walk in and out at ease, everyone with a solid mission - deliver the victory to former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua.

And it worked. Wondrously.

In Methu, Gachagua had found the perfect bogeyman to sweep Ruto's boys out of town, a virulent politician packed with the perfect methodology to shake things up, win the masses, whip the government charlatans and restore the region's fading glory.

His rallies were often packed with hundreds of ardent followers, as he stood above them, like a righteous messiah, singing songs, throwing shukas over his head, draped in the colours of his party, speaking with effusive candour and dripping with persuasive power.

With the Gikuyu customs and traditions perfectly woven into him, Methu easily earned the sobriquet 'Gitungati' - an endearing term given to people who have proven their worth, shown great courage, fiercely defended the community and fervently offered their soul and blood to the enduring cause of the 'Mountain'.

Perhaps more than any other politician, Methu appeared to perfectly understand the region's profound, subterranean craving for better representation, political pride, brazen loyalty and a politics that felt alive, dangerous, and deeply consequential.

And he was mercilessly up to the task.

An irrepressible firebrand, and with eyes that crackled with ideological fire, Methu quickly became the President's biggest threat, who, despite the billions in bribes, the 'development projects' and the bloody state terror, still managed to sway the minds of tens of thousands, a radical dissent as undogmatic as he was committed.

Here was a man whose vision of liberation was not only romantic but also ruthless, personal and even poetic.

Unlike some of his peers in the Senate, Methu became a stupendous master of realpolitik, ensuring that the DCP communique was always not just swiftly delivered but also meticulously so and at every TV debate, bringing along an elegant verbal jousting that badly eviscerated his opponents.

This is the man who, at the funeral of the late David Kiaraho, stood at a presidential podium, tapped the microphone, cleared his throat and delivered a blistering broadside at a mortified Ruto, declaring, "Mr President, nakuheshimu lakini sikuogopi!" (I respect you, but I do not fear you)

That single statement rattled across Nyandarua and beyond, becoming the defining declaration of a fearlessly prepared combatant.

Intently fixed on sending the president packing, the Nyandarua firebrand maintains the same tousled beard as that of the KANU era's 'Bearded Sisters', arguing that, by appearing so, he was channelling the spirit of resistance - and constantly clothed in the armour of war.

Speaking of his unconventional look, he once told Jeff Koinange on Citizen TV: "My wife keeps telling me that she needs me to shave this beard, but I tell her that we are in the forest, we do not have the latitude and the space to look very good. We are in the forest, we are fighting, you can’t fight when you are looking very nice."

The Ol Kalou by-election finally proved to the world that a scruffy 35-year-old, with a fearless spirit and dazzling magnetism, could topple state propaganda, face up to powerful human bulldozers, swim against hurricanes of cash and still deliver a stunning triumph - and send jitters down the corridors of State House.

Nyandarua's Mau Mau glory appears to be back - and just like the Mau Mau, Methu is figuratively using the county's remote and rugged hideouts to carry out lethal strikes against his mortal enemies. And it's working perfectly.