Bungoma Governor Ken Lusaka has a lot to reflect on. He is serving his second term as governor. In between, he was the Senate Speaker. Before that, he had been a Permanent Secretary, the first Provincial Secretary, a District Commissioner and a District Officer.

A civil servant in all strands, strata and definition. However, it is intrigues that characterised the last few months of his stewardship of the Upper House that Lusaka says remain the most memorable to him.

“It was a very difficult moment for me. We were operating in a very hot political atmosphere. Things were moving very fast. I always found myself at the centre of fierce conflicts. I made very many enemies within a very short period. It was a moment I cannot wish anyone to go through. That was fire itself,” Lusaka divulged.

He says hostile politics gripped the then-ruling Jubilee Party in early 2018, immediately after the rapprochement between the hitherto political nemeses in the persons of the then President Uhuru Kenyatta and Opposition leader Raila Odinga in the so-called handshake between the two political titans. Uhuru and Raila were fierce rivals in both the 2013 and 2017 presidential elections in which the former emerged victorious.

However, in 2017, the Supreme Court invalidated Uhuru’s win owing to what it termed as “irregularities and illegalities” and ordered a repeat, which the Raila’s National Super Alliance (Nasa) boycotted and called for mass protests. In January 2018, at the height of the demonstrations, Raila went ahead to swear himself in as the ‘People’s President’ at Uhuru Park.

Two months later, on March 9, Uhuru and Raila confounded both friend and foe when they appeared on the steps of Harambee House which hosts the Office of the President, to declare a cessation of hostilities between them and announced a working partnership under the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI).

Umbrella entity Lusaka says the establishment of the BBI elicited tectonic reverberations within the Jubilee Party political base with two main camps emerging to either align with or against the closing of ranks, which was given the sobriquet ‘Handshake’, between the two leaders just as it did in Raila’s Nasa.

In a conversation with People Daily, the Governor who turned 60 years in September, said he is in the process of compiling his tell-it-all memoir which he hopes to launch by June next year. He says the frictions that hit the Jubilee Party after the elections did not affect him and his office directly until much later towards the end of 2021.

Ahead of the 2017 General-Election, Lusaka who was the Party Leader of New Ford Kenya (NFK)— like several others — folded his political outfit to form a single umbrella entity known as Jubilee Party where then President Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto were the Party Leader and Deputy Party Leader respectively. However, Lusaka lost the Bungoma gubernatorial seat to Wycliffe Wangamati of Ford Kenya, a party headed then – as now – by Wetangula, but was later accommodated in the Jubilee administration’s power echelons as Speaker of the Senate.

The Governor reflects: “I started off very well. After I lost my seat, retired President and current President William Ruto were gracious enough to endorse me for the position of the Senate. I got unanimous support of the Jubilee Party.

I went to the Senate with an open mind. I began by understanding the Senate and how it stands out as the institution that has the adhesive that holds devolution together. With time, I realised that the Senate and the Council of Governors would have to read from the same script in regards to how devolution should work.

“Once the Senators accepted me, it was easier for both sides of the political divide to engage objectively. At that time, I had the total support of both President Uhuru Kenyatta and Deputy President and the entire Jubilee Party formation. Everything went on well for me,” he said.

BBI agenda

Soon after the Handshake and BBI process that kick-started a constitutional review process, two factions erupted within Jubilee with one known as Kieleweke loyal to President Uhuru Kenyatta and the other known as Tanga Tanga aligned to his Deputy Ruto.

“These frictions did not affect me as Speaker. In any case, whether in private or public both the President and Deputy President denied there being any differences between them in spite of the consistent media reports and public rantings between their respective lieutenants.

But matters changed after the BBI agenda flopped in the Supreme Court and Ruto’s camp technically pulled out of Jubilee Party to form the United Democratic Alliance (UDA). That is when everything went ballistic,” the former Speaker reflects.

“Everything started going south for me. The (Jubilee) party decided to kick some of its parliamentary leadership from key House positions. This was a very trying moment for me. Most of these colleagues were very close friends with whom we had worked together and who had accorded me full support and co-operation during the course of my work.

It was a very painful moment for me,” he observes. Haunted me Those who were to be kicked out of their House positions were then Deputy Speaker Prof Kithure Kindiki (now Interior Cabinet Secretary), Leader of Majority Kipchumba Murkomen (now Transport Cabinet Secretary) and Susan Kihika (now Nakuru Governor).

“Take someone like Kindiki and Murkomen, for example. These two are lawyers. They had taught law at university. They were very helpful to me and my office in very many ways. We were very close. They gave me all the support I required. Kindiki is a brilliant, decent, soft-spoken and very loyal worker always ready to help. Murkomen is the one who escorted me to the Chair to be sworn in as Speaker on the day of my election.

The two and (Agriuculture CS Mithika Linturi were the ones who argued for my case on the floor of the House when (then) senators James Orengo (Siaya, now Governor) and Mutula Kilonzo Jnr (Makueni, now Governor) attempted to block my election. It haunted me a lot that I was now the one to hold the Sword of Damocles that would rip their political careers apart. It was not a good experience. It still pains me to date.

However, I am happy that we have mended fences after we all met again in the Kenya Kwanza coalition and jointly won the elections together. I and Kihika are Governors while Kindiki and Murkomen are Cabinet Secretaries. As they say in my Bungoma backyard, Efindu Fichenjanga (things change). We are all friends once again. Very good friends,” Lusaka stated.