By JULIUS SIGEI, ALPHONCE SHIUNDU and JACOB NG'ETICH
Posted Friday, March 9 2012 at 19:06
Posted Friday, March 9 2012 at 19:06
Musalia Mudavadi’s supporters are sure of bagging ODM delegates from regions where Prime Minister Raila Odinga is not very popular.
Those in this school of thought point out that it could be the main reason Mr Mudavadi is opting for voting in counties to select the ODM presidential candidate.
They say delegates from the Rift Valley and Eastern provinces are not likely to vote for Mr Odinga; he is not popular in those areas at all.
With each county producing 20 votes, well, who knows? Mr Odinga’s operatives at Orange House, however, are quick to laugh off these presumptions.
“Whose delegates are we talking about?” One of them posed. “We determined the dates, organised the grassroots elections and made sure our key supporters got elected,” one of them said this week.
The team plays down the possibility of infiltrators. “I don’t think 20 officials can be infiltrated if an election is happening at the County Headquarters,” says the official.
Mr Odinga’s pointman in the Meru region since 1991, Mr Mpuri Aburi, supports these sentiments.
“We know our party officials by name and loyalty levels. We know who is with us and who is not. We are talking of only 20 delegates, my friend,” said Mr Aburi on phone.
Miss Mumbi Ng’aru, a key figure in Mr Odinga’s operations in Central Kenya, remembers that in 2007, it is Central and Eastern delegates who gave Raila the biggest boost.
“It was more hostile to Mr Odinga then. They voted him in because they were in ODM because of him, and not anything else.”
Mr Aburi re-inforced this, “Those of us who have stood by (Mr Odinga) and faced our people’s backlash cannot just turn away from him because his deputy wants a ticket. We are in ODM because of Mr Odinga. And it remains so,” said Mr Aburi.
So, as far as the party operatives are concerned, Mr Odinga would beat his deputy, Kasarani or no Kasarani, counties or no counties.
Mr Mudavadi, therefore, may really need to test the loyalty levels of the party’s delegates.
Mr Mudavadi, therefore, may really need to test the loyalty levels of the party’s delegates.
It might not be a walk in the park for him in regions where Mr Odinga got few votes in 2007.
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