Photos/FILE Prime Minister Raila Odinga (left), retired President Daniel Moi through his son Gideon (centre), and former powerful minister Nicholas Biwott are each said to be making moves in a renewed scramble for votes in the region.
By JULIUS SIGEI juliussigei@gmail.com
Posted Saturday, June 11 2011 at 18:50
Posted Saturday, June 11 2011 at 18:50
The reported fallout between Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta and Eldoret North MP William Ruto has re-energised their opponents who see hope of regaining support in the Rift Valley.
Prime Minister Raila Odinga, retired President Daniel Moi through his son Gideon, and former powerful minister Nicholas Biwott are each said to be making moves in a renewed scramble for votes in the region.
The alliance between Mr Kenyatta and Mr Ruto that includes five other regional kingpins has lately run into problems after Mr Ruto hinted two weeks ago that he could go it alone in next year’s General Election.
The announcement he made on the two Kalenjin FM stations, Chamgei and Kass, is said to have been prompted by ordinary voters and civic leaders who told the MP that he should not play second fiddle to Mr Kenyatta. Mr Ruto has since denied that he was going it alone.
Mr Biwott is upbeat that he is gaining support after bagging two civic seats – one in Keiyo South and another in Chepalungu constituency – in recent by elections and has announced that his National Vision Party is the party to watch in the region.
“NVP will sweep through this region as it has homegrown solutions,” he said last week.
And Mr Moi received a boost last month when several ODM councillors from Baringo County “apologised” to him for having ditched Kanu in 2007 and announced they had rejoined the independence party.
In 2007, the region voted almost to a man for Mr Odinga, frowning on Mr Moi, who had had a grip on the expansive province for close to half a century.
Immediately after the fallout between Mr Odinga and Mr Ruto in 2008 over how to try post-election violence suspects and the Mau Forest restoration, which the PM was spearheading, the former president was all over the place telling the region “I had told you”.
While it is the older Moi who propped up Mr Ruto beginning with the Youth for Kanu’92 days, they have since fallen out, and the former is keen to have his son, Gideon, take over the stewardship of the community.
That hope had all but vanished after Gideon lost the Baringo Central seat in 2007, but it has been resuscitated with the region’s apparent disillusionment with Mr Ruto’s chosen path to power.
Kipkelion MP Magerer Lang’at said the prevailing political mood in the region provided the community with time to make sober decisions on where to go.
“The situation leaves a lot of room to chart our political destiny without emotional baggage. A community should not make a decision based on one man’s woes,” he said referring to Mr Ruto’s case at the International Criminal Court.
Dr Adams Oloo, head of Political Science and Public Administration at the University of Nairobi, does not see the former Keiyo South MP as one to benefit from any imminent fallout.
“Members of the kitchen cabinets usually do not have grassroots support. Look at people like Mbiyu Koinange during Kenyatta’s time and now Environment minister John Michuki. They only hold sway as power brokers to their godfathers,” said Dr Oloo.
He said Mr Moi and Mr Odinga stood to benefit depending on how they explained themselves to the electorate but added that Kanu’s disadvantage was that it carried bad baggage and depended on state machinery in its heyday to reach out.
The PM has started a diplomatic offensive in the region with elders from the Luo and Kalenjin communities meeting recently to promote what they termed “good neighbourliness’’.
Muhoroni MP and Education assistant minister Ayiecho Olweny also confirmed in an earlier interview that he has recently run several errands for Mr Odinga in the Rift Valley.
The “errands” come amid reports of a change of heart by Mr Odinga’s erstwhile allies in the province–Agriculture minister Sally Kosgei and Tinderet MP Henry Kosgey, who had ditched him.
The PM attended the wedding of the latter’s son last week and announced ODM would stand by Mr Kosgey.
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