Uhuru sends allies to vote-rich Kisii

Will President Uhuru Kenyatta’s appointment of 12 people from Gusii to parastatal positions help the winning coalition wrestle the region’s support from CORD’s stranglehold?

This is the question political analysts and observers are pondering. According to lawyer and political observer Andrew Mandi, President Kenyatta announced his onslaught for the region by appointing politicians to champion the Jubilee agenda and woo their communities to back his bid for a second term in office.

“With the 2017 polls fast approaching, he (President Kenyatta) needs a wider appeal beyond his strongholds. And his ambitions are all manifested in the 302 appointments he made which were outright rewards to individual politicians as well as their ethnic groups,” says Mr Mandi.

Going by the number of seats CORD controls, the Gusii region is a firm Opposition playground. In the 2013 General Election, CORD won 12 National Assembly seats in Kisii and Nyamira counties, while Jubilee won only three. CORD also won both gubernatorial and senatorial seats.

But in a bid to sell Jubilee to the region, President Kenyatta appointed 12 people from Gusii as chairpersons and board members of various parastatals in April.

Those appointed are 2013 election losers from Kisii and Nyamira, including seasoned politicians who are now leading Jubilee’s foray into the vote-rich region. They include former South Mugirango MP Omingo Magara, who unsuccessfully vied for the Kisii County Senatorial seat, former MPs Robert Monda (Nyaribari Chache), Walter Nyambati (Kitutu Masaba), Henry Obwocha (West Mugirango) and former Kisii Mayor Samuel Nyangeso.

Other appointees charged with selling Jubilee in the region include lawyers Ken Ogeto and Gerishom Otachi, who represented the President in his ICC cases, former Law Society of Kenya Chairman Ken Nyaundi, and veteran Kisii political kingpin Simon Nyachae’s daughter Judy Nyachae and her brother Kenneth Bitange.

Last week, the 12 convened in Nyamira County where they announced what they termed as a huge comeback to the region’s political scene and “indomitable campaigns” for the President’s re-election. They said they had already formed a caucus, Gusii Parastatal Men Caucus, and created a campaign bandwagon with an eye on the 2017 elections.

But Mandi widely discredits the appointees, saying the team may not bring Jubilee much, and terms them as inconsequential to the region’s political set-up, sentiments shared by ODM chairman John Mbadi.

“All the people the President appointed are losers whom he rescued from misery so they could earn allowances in their various chairmanship positions given to them. They have no influence on the will of the people because they lost in the last elections,” argues Mbadi.

Magara, whose People’s Development Party was once a partner in the CORD Coalition, believes the regrouping of the appointees is a symbol of the immense powers the Jubilee coalition plans to use to win the region from CORD.

But the Opposition says it is not threatened by the appointees.

“We have a great following in the entire Gusii region and we still hold to our guns that the area is still dominated by the ODM party which has immense support,” says Timothy Bosire, the ODM National Treasurer and Kitutu Masaba MP.

As the scramble for the vote rich region hots up ahead of the 2017 polls, it will be interesting to see whether 2013 election losers can snatch the region away from the Opposition.