Mt Kenya leaders tell off Raila over claims of political debt
Hillary Mageka @hillarymageka
Allies of President Uhuru Kenyatta and his Deputy William Ruto (DP) from Central Kenya were yesterday united in telling off ODM leader Raila Odinga over claims that the region owes him a political debt ahead of the 2022 General Election.
Speaking on Kameme TV on Monday, Raila insisted that the President’s political backyard owed him a 58-year old political debt.
He cited the 1963 gesture by his father Jaramogi Oginga who declined to assume the post of prime minister and instead demanded the colonial government sets free Kenya’s founding father Mzee Jomo Kenyatta, who would later ascend to the high office.
He also reminded the Mt Kenya region that in 2002, he sacrificed his own presidential ambitions and threw his weight behind former President Mwai Kibaki using the famous “Kibaki Tosha” declaration.
“My father refused to be made the prime minister and instead pushed to have Jomo Kenyatta released from prison. They worked together only to differ over land issues.
That was ideological differences and not a tribal war. The region should remain steadfast and support our quest for a better Kenya, join us in building the bridges,” he said.
Common agenda
But yesterday, Kirinyaga Woman Rep Purity Ngirici insisted that Mt Kenya region does not owe the ODM leader, and by extension, the DP any political debt.
Ngirici, in a Facebook post claimed that Raila only backed Kibaki in 2002 to ensure the opposition went to the election as a united bloc.
“In 1963 when his father championed for the release of Jomo Kenyatta, that was the right thing to do because the common agenda was to have a self-internal rule,” Ngirici said.
“Mount Kenya doesn’t owe even Ruto, we support him because we believe in his ideologies,” she added.
Nyeri Town MP Wambugu Ngunjiri, a key supporter of the BBI project in the region also hit out at the “politics of debts” and warned the region will only vote for someone who would convince them through manifesto.
“ We are not going to vote for anybody based on debt, but what deal they seek to offer us for future engagement,” Ngunjiri maintained.
On her part, Gilgil MP Martha Wangari opined that Raila was trying to conceal the fact, that he fought the Kibaki leadership between 2002 and 2007, leading to the post election violence.
“The reason why it is difficult to have Raila voted for in Mt Kenya is because people feel he antagonised Kibaki too much during the Grand Coalition Government,” she said.
