Uhuru, Raila fail to appear at county bosses retreat
By Noah Cheploen, November 11, 2020
Governors left Naivasha in a state of confusion yesterday after President Uhuru Kenyatta and Orange Democratic Movement leader Raila Odinga failed to attend their meeting.
Although the two principals had been slated to attend the closing ceremony of the two-day Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) report closing ceremony, their no-show left the county bosses searching for answers.
On Monday, Council of Governors chairman Wycliffe Oparanya had told the People Daily the two leaders had confirmed their attendance saying they were going to arrive at the venue in the afternoon.
Come yesterday and the governors emerged from their meeting at around 1.30pm and went ahead to present their resolutions to the press, with no sign that the two principals would grace the event.
Oparanya, who is also the Kakamega governor, while downplaying Uhuru and Raila’s absence said they would present the document to the two principals today.
He dismissed claims that the two leaders had snubbed them. “Who said that they were going to attend?
They never snubbed us… in fact one of the principals joined us virtually,” said Oparanya.
However, a few minutes after the governors left for their rooms as they prepared to leave the venue, they were quickly called back after reports emerged that the two principals were on their way to the venue.
But that did not happen. And, in what could give a clue of what might have transpired, Odinga said in a tweet that time for new ideas was over adding that what is left is editorial work.
“There is significantly little chance of significant new ideas being brought into the BBI document ahead of the referendum except for editorial work to make it explicit on demands by various groups, he said.
“It is basically done and there is little likelihood that new ideas will be pushed into it,” Odinga tweeted.
“However, there are groups that feel their views were not captured in the manner they were presented during the collection of views and those are the corrections we are promising to make, he stated.