Thursday, March 24, 2011

Raila hinted Kalonzo would ditch him ahead of 2007 vote


While Mr Odinga (left) expressed reservations about Mr Musyoka’s commitment, the latter claimed that the government was helping his colleague (Odinga) “because President Kibaki’s supporters would rather the President face him (Odinga),  than Musyoka.” Photo/FILE
While Mr Odinga (left) expressed reservations about Mr Musyoka’s commitment, the latter claimed the government was helping his colleague (Odinga) “because President Kibaki’s supporters would rather the President face him (Odinga), than Musyoka.” Photo/FILE 
By NATION REPORTER
Posted Wednesday, March 23 2011 at 22:04

One of the ODM-Kenya leaders, Mr Raila Odinga, in 2007 predicted that opposition colleague Kalonzo Musyoka would bolt out to join President Kibaki.
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In a May 2007 conversation with US State Department official Johnnie Carson, Mr Odinga expressed reservations about Mr Musyoka’s commitment to opposition efforts to remove President Kibaki from power in the elections later that year.
Mr Odinga, who is now the Prime Minister, spoke to the ambassador at the height of negotiations among ODM top leaders on who was most formidable to face President Kibaki in the December 2007 duel.
The opposition chiefs were exploring the option of picking a presidential candidate through a national primary or consensus among aspirants.
“Mr Odinga noted that there was nothing keeping a candidate who loses the nomination from leaving ODM-K.
“He hinted that there was someone (rumoured to be Mr Musyoka, although Mr Odinga did not say so) who might quit ODM-K and join the Kibaki team,” says a diplomatic cable by secret-spilling network, WikiLeaks.
But Mr Musyoka did not defect to the Kibaki camp as predicted — he contested the presidency against President Kibaki and Mr Odinga and only joined the government after the disputed election as Vice-President in a coalition arrangement.
On his part, Mr Musyoka claimed that the government was helping Mr Odinga “because President Kibaki’s supporters would rather the President face him (Odinga), than Musyoka.”
“(President) Kibaki will not have to leave State House to win against Mr Odinga,” Mr Musyoka told the ambassador. “If I am the ODM candidate, President Kibaki might not run,” he declared.
The cable reveals that Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta was reluctant to speculate on ODM-K’s future. “Your guess is as good as mine,” he said, adding that the key determinant would be a free and fair presidential primary.
He was adamant that ODM-K was only an umbrella organisation, and that Kanu was his party. However, he argued that President Kibaki’s (party) was in disarray. He spoke of instability in the President’s inner circle.
“President Kibaki needs to organise his house, because right now, with no one in charge, ministers are making their own decisions,” he said.
But the Rev Mutava Musyimi, then at the helm of the National Council of Churches of Kenya, dismissed ODM-K as vehicle that was “making noise, but not moving and probably has no wheels.”
According to the cable, the Rev Musyimi (now Gachoka MP), explained that while President Kibaki had “favoured his own”, he had achieved a strong record of economic growth.
“While he thought coalition politics were the future in Kenya, and that ODM-K would be good for Kenya, he argued that the parties needed to move beyond coalitions viewed simply as a method for cobbling together various ethnicities.”
Wrangles within ODM-K led to a split that saw Mr Odinga taking over the leadership of ODM from a lawyer who had registered it leaving Mr Musyoka with ODM-K.

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