Harambee even if the supposed derivation from "Hare Ambeh" (Hail Ambeh) were true, it has become irrelevant to the term's modern usage and meaning. In January 2002, the Risk Advisory Group Ltd commissioned by President Moi's administration as part of the anti-corruption efforts recommended the abolition of "harambee" or the "spirit of pulling together". In 2003 when the National Rainbow Coalition NARC took over from the Kenya African National Union KANU, President Mwai Kibaki enacted the Public Officers Ethics Act which prohibited Members of Parliament and Cabinet Secretaries from presiding over "Harambees". In February 2018, a petition was presented to the
Mwai Kibaki media, and moved the Chairman of the Electoral Commission, Samuel Kivuitu, to another room where Kivuitu went on to declare Kibaki the winner by 4,584,721 votes to Odinga's 4,352,993, placing Kibaki ahead of Odinga by about 232,000 votes in the hotly contested election with Kalonzo Musyoka a distant third. One hour later, in a hastily convened dusk ceremony, Kibaki was sworn in at the grounds of State House Nairobi for his second term, defiantly calling for the "verdict of the people" to be respected and for "healing and reconciliation" to begin. This arose tension and led to protests by a