Rift in ODM over calls to dissolve key party organs

By James Mbaka and Geoffrey Mosoku

Kenya: Opinion is sharply divided over the fate of ODM’s secretariat and the party’s National Elections Board (NEB) that supervised the botched polls

While a faction allied to the nominated senator Agnes Zani wants the two bodies held responsible for the Kasarani fiasco, the other team led by Budalangi MP Ababu Namwamba feels that calls for overhaul at Orange House are premature and an attempt to divert attention from real issues.

Both Nawamba and Zani were locked in a bitter battle for the secretary general’s position in the Orange party before the elections aborted at Kasarani following invasion by some youths who destroyed election materials.

Took sides

The Standard has established that those pushing for the overhaul of the ODM secretariat are targeting the party’s Executive Director Magerer Lang’at and other directors at Orange House whom they accuse of taking sides in the bungled polls

They allege that the secretariat accredited non-delegates to get into the arena to sway the election.

Both camps agree that there were more than 5,000 delegates at Kasarani almost twice the number legible to participate in the elections of picking national office bearers.

Magerer was on the receiving end at Kasarani when youths waylaid him and attacked him at the gymnasium’s VIP lounge, accusing him of calling in the police to eject delegates from the venue.

He has since recorded a formal complaint statement with the police and investigations are ongoing.