It won’t be business as usual, Meru leaders tell Uhuru over State jobs

FROM LEFT: Kiraitu Murungi, Mithika Linturi and Mpuri Aburi

By MUNENE KAMAU

KENYA: All is not well in the larger Meru region, politically. The region that comprises Meru and Tharaka Nithi counties has experienced political unease since the formation of President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Jubilee government.

Although there was quiet discontent among locals over appointments in the previous regime under Mwai Kibaki, the grumbling was markedly hushed.

But the matter is now boiling over with a section of leaders in the expansive and vote-rich region accusing the government of favouring one area (or a village, according to them) in public appointments. Matters came to a head last weekend, with the disgruntled leaders even reading out names of top public servants from the region whom they claimed came from one locality.

The discontented leaders said they expected “President Uhuru to right what Kibaki had got wrong but he appears to follow the cue.”

It is a growing revolt that has threatened to shake the core voting base of the Jubilee administration and could throw its allegiance into serious doubts.

The leaders, led by outspoken Igembe South MP Mithika Linturi, have sounded a warning to the Uhuru administration that it will not be business as usual if their concerns are not addressed. Of concern is that although there has been a perception among Kenyans that Meru people are beneficiaries of key State appointments, the appointees hail from one locality within the region.

Lion’s share

“We must tell Kenyans the truth, we have been accused of enjoying the lion’s share of appointments but the picture is completely different,” said Linturi during a meeting held at Maili Tatu in Igembe.

The grumbling first came to the fore following the appointment of Francis Muthaura as the chair of the Lamu Port Southern Sudan-Ethiopia Transport (Lapsset) project.

This appointment did not go down well with some leaders from the Nyambene sub-community, whose captain Linturi was the first to express his dissatisfaction.

Also to raise his objection was Tharaka Nithi Senator Kithure Kindiki, who felt that it was time for such an appointment to have come from his area this time round.

Kindiki, however, toned down later with Maara MP Kareke Mbiuki taking over the crusade and even vowing never to support Uhuru again.

Kareke, like Linturi, was elected on a TNA ticket and the two feel their overwhelming support for the party and its leader has not been rewarded. In the larger Meru, the battle was between TNA, the Alliance Party of Kenya (APK) and the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM).

No wonder then the results of the elections were that Mpuru Aburi of Tigania East won on an ODM ticket and so was Kubai Kiringo of Igembe Central, while Joseph M’eruaki won on a TNA ticket and so was David Kariithi of Tigania East.

Linturi of Igembe South won on TNA ticket as did Kathuri Murungi of Imenti South, while Mwiti Irea alias Livondo won on an APK ticket like his Imenti North counterpart Rahim Dawood. Only Boniface Gatobu of Buuri who was elected on an Independent Party ticket to the disbelieve of political pundits.

After the discontent over the appointments surfaced, Meru Senator Kiraitu Murungi convened a highly charged meeting on December 31 at the Kinoru stadium where the matter become the central agenda.

Kiraitu said those opposed to Muthaura’s appointment were seeing things from a narrow perspective since he (Muthaura), was “one of their own.”

He, however, admitted there had been some historical injustices, which required correction but cautioned that the method should not be provocative and divisive.

Mithika day told the gathering that when Kiraitu was busy campaigning for his ‘Bus’ party, he was leading the Uhuru brigade.

“I campaigned with all the vigour alongside my army for the Jubilee presidential candidate by traversing the vast and rough terrain of the larger Meru. After he won, no reward for the good work and my army has turned against me asking me to give them what is democratically due for them,” he said.

He claimed all the State appointments had been done from a small area in Imenti and hence alienating the Nyambenes from their Imenti big brothers. Last Sunday, Mithika convened another rally at the Maili  Tatu  stadium attended by all elected Nyambene leaders.

At the meeting, Mithika repeated his earlier claims that President Kenyatta had sidelined him and his army by favouring the Imenti’s with plump State appointments.

“Am now going to retreat into the battle field with my army since we have forgotten while those who supported their own political parties ended up being rewarded,” he said.

Prodigal son

He likened the favour the Imentis were getting from the Government to the Biblical prodigal son who asked for his inheritance from his father only to squander everything and tuned out a pauper but on return home got a preferential treatment from his father. “How could I use all my resources taking Uhuru to every corner of the larger Meru conversing for votes for him which he overwhelmingly got only to dump me and my able army?” he posed.  An MP from Imenti who had been invited to the meeting, however, declined to attend and instead sent Mithika an SMS questioning why leaders should start retreating to their tribal cocoons at this point and time.

But defenders of the President accused the MPs of peddling unfounded claims and dragging the names of qualified civil servants in the debate. Aburi who has been a perennial critic and opponent of former Tigania East MP  Peter Munya (now Meru Governor), read out a list of alleged  State appointees from the Imenti at the  Maili Tatu meeting  amid shouts of toboa, toboa yote (Tell it all).

He later paraded professionals from the Nyambene living in the Diaspora and also said those others working and living in the area were also present.

The purpose of parading the professionals, who included professors, it emerged, was to prove that despite the area having such qualified individuals, non had received any State appointment.

At the meeting only Kirimi Kabeeria from Igembe South was acknowledged to have been appointed Ambassador to Brazil by the leaders present. But even as Mithika was leading the onslaught against the alleged inequality, it also emerged that Munya, is from Nyambene, as is the Meru County Woman Representative Florence Kajuju as well as the Deputy Governor Raphael Muriungi.

“As you can now see, the entire Meru County Government is under the Nyambene’s contrary to what Linturi is alleging,” said Joyce Kagwiria, a resident of Tigania area.