Raila Odinga: Why I have no faith in Parliament driving dialogue

Cord leader Raila Odinga during an interview with the Standard in his offcie. [PHOTO: FIDELIS KABUNYI]

NAIROBI, KENYA: The Coalition for Reforms and Democracy (CORD) will not agree to a Parliament-driven dialogue because MPs have contributed immensely to the desecration of the Constitution but will welcome an all-inclusive team to spearhead its quest for a referendum, former Prime Minister Raila Odinga says.

The Mutava Musyimi led parliamentary inter-party political caucus on national dialogue may therefore not achieve much in bringing Jubilee and CORD leadership together because the latter has dismissed it.

In an interview with The Standard on Sunday, the CORD leader said it would be great injustice to the people if they were to allow Parliament to champion the issues they have raised with the government.

"Parliament has already taken away the media freedom we fought for in the Constitution. They have already returned powers of oversight and appointment of police to the Executive and are in the process of returning the powers of land adjudication to the Executive," said Raila.

Although the government has denied it ordered media houses not to air live coverage of the Saba Saba rally, the former Prime Minister insists media owners and senior editors were summoned to Serena Hotel and ordered not to broadcast the rally live.

He clarified that not all 13 points on the agenda released at Uhuru Park on July 7, 2014 were referendum issues and that they would continue exerting pressure on the government to deal with some of the operational items on the list.

"The cost of living, corruption and inclusivity should be looked at without delay, because it is just a matter of implementing sections of the Constitution," said Raila.

But those that will form part of the referendum are the reform of the Independent Electoral Boundaries Commission (IEBC), reform of devolution to stop national government interference, using of subsidiary legislation to amend the Constitution like the Media Amendment Bill which is now law and is being abused.

Other amendments to be addressed will be the Police Service Amendment Act, the proposed Land Act Amendment Bill aimed at removing powers from the National Land Commission and transferring them to the Executive.

Raila is optimistic that the referendum will sail through because Parliament will not use its tyranny of numbers to stop one million signatures that will be collected by leaders from all parts of the country.

The process will be championed by the Okoa Kenya (Save Kenya) team, which the CORD leader envisages will bring together political leaders, civil society, religious leaders and elders from all over the country.

Said Raila: "Inclusivity is the catchword. That is why we have formed Okoa Kenya Movement, which will function outside CORD. We want them to forward us names which we are going to include in this committee to help us formulate the question and collect signatures."

The CORD team will now build on the momentum of the Saba Saba rally which Raila described as very successful "despite the deployment of 15,000 police officers in Nairobi and the residential estates to scare people from attending but only ended up making the holiday more successful" which he says failed.

In its push for the referendum, the CORD team will also rely on the fact that almost all governors agree that devolution is not working smoothly.

"First, relations between the national and the county governments is not harmonious as provided for in the Constitution, that the two levels are distinct and must cooperate. That is an issue that needs to be urgently addressed," said Raila.

A lot of complains by governors that money is not being released in a timely way to enable them execute their mandate is also a boon to the CORD agenda for a referendum.

It has emerged that CORD will also be seeking to amend sections of the law especially the formulae used to share resources between the national and county governments, which they argue is skewed.

"We are talking of a minimum 15 per-cent of the available audited accounts but the existing accounts that were used for the percentage were the 2009 and 2010 figures when the Constitution was promulgated," Raila said.

He explained that the law should change because the government insists it is giving 43 per cent, and yet it is from the budget of four years ago and not the current one.

The CORD team will therefore propose that the law specifically reads 40 percentage of the current budget will be made available to the counties.

Speaking from his office in Milimani, Nairobi, Raila again revisited the issue of the Provincial Administration, which he argued had also not been resolved because the government is now talking about restructuring it against what is provided for in the Constitution.

Those framing the referendum question will therefore seek to know from Kenyans if what the government is doing is the restructuring they demanded to be included in the Constitution.

Apart from the issue of IEBC, the referendum will also seek to resolve the long running power struggles and infighting between Members of County Assembles and governors who have been threatened with impeachment through blackmail.

Raila dismissed criticism from former allies in the struggle for reforms like the Reverend Timothy Njoya and Gitobu Imanyara who cautioned that former oppressors were also falsely riding on the Saba Saba fame to reap political mileage.

The two leaders told The Standard on Sunday last week that some of the top CORD leaders working with Raila should apologise to them before pretending they are part of the struggle.

"The struggle is not static. It is very dynamic and keeps on changing. People change their positions. There are some people who were with us in the struggle and have crossed to the other side," said Raila.

He gave an example of the late Cabinet minister John Michuki who during the Bomas of Kenya conference on Constitution review gave an analogy of juggling and balancing a slippery liver in the hands.

Michuki was at the time inferring that the change of the Constitution was no longer necessary because former President Moi had left power and Kibaki was now on the throne.

Laughing, Raila described Michuki's statement as absurd because: "These are people with selfish agenda who lack serious convictions for change. But there are others who were on the other side, who have since changed their minds and moved to the reforms side," said Raila.

It is from such experience that he advises against stopping other leaders from joining the camp of the progressives because they only help strengthen their position and warns that insisting on them apologising will not take the country far in politics.

Asked about the attendance of Makueni Governor Kivutha Kibwana at the Saba Saba meeting, Raila said he was glad that Kibwana was working with CORD to bring back reforms.

"Yeah, he is back. He was with us in Machakos and he said he would come to Uhuru Park where the governor told us he never thought time would come when we would again go back to Saba Saba," said Raila.

He added: "Kibwana believes the time has come for us to go back to the trenches and fight for these changes. It is because he is on the receiving end as a governor and knows the problems that they have, the kind of devolution that these people want is not the one we were struggling for."

Asked about the charm he has with crowds, Raila said they were only playing their role to check on the excesses of government.

"The Jubilee government was accusing the Opposition of sleeping on the job but we said we wanted to give them a chance to implement their programmes. They kept saying Opposition was asleep. The Swahili say usiamshe mbwa aliyelala ukimuamsha, utalala wewe (Don't wake up a sleeping dog, if you do it is you who will sleep). Now that the Opposition is working they are crying that the heat is too much."

He also dismissed claims by Machakos Governor Alfred Mutua that he had been invited to State House but rejected the meeting.

"I'm not aware of any invitation to State House. How would Mutua know and I don't know about it and again that is not his business," charged Raila.