Assembly approves Kisumu County Executive Committee

By Rushdie Oudia

Kisumu, Kenya: Kisumu County Assembly has approved all the ten Executive Committee members nominated by the governor.

The 35-member County Assembly adopted the list of the nominees presented to them after the appointment committee presented its report after vetting the candidates.

The three-day vetting process started on Monday and ended on Wednesday.

The list however was not approved without hitches that drove the approval to be done through a division in the Assembly.

The appointment committee had rejected two out of the ten nominees; Executive Member for Industrialisation, Enterprise Development and Transport, Hanif Rana and Member for Communications, Planning and Development, George Ongaya.

There were also questions as to how the candidates scored since the ratings were troubling. Kisumu North County representative Caroline Owen questioned how a person could score poorly in honesty and faithfulness yet he is excellent.

“This makes the integrity of the person to be questionable and he cannot be trusted with such a position,” said Owen.

However, Kolwa Central County Representative Kelvin Odhiambo moved a motion seeking to amend the list, so that it is adopted in totality including the two that had been found unsuitable for their dockets.

The Speaker, Anne Adul thwarted the member’s efforts to have the amendment sail through by ruling that understanding-order 60 of the assembly that states that a member should apply for amendment in writing, give to the clerk and thereafter to the speaker. This put the matter to rest.

There was confusion in the assembly after the ruling by the speaker after members insisted that the two be included in the list and the names be approved in totality.

Some of the members, however, were for the idea that the two be locked out. Kondele County representative Gabriel Ochieng said Ongaya performed poorly and should not be approved by the members since he understood little about his docket.

The speaker finally ruled that the matter be decided through a division in which the members who supported the candidates went to the right side of the speaker while those against went to the left.

The names were unanimously passed with only seven people going against the two nominees.

Earlier, intense lobbying among the members of the County Assembly delayed the commencement of the sitting which was scheduled to start at 9am but kicked off at 11am with claims of money exchanging hands rife.

The other eight nominees are Joseph Omulo (Treasury), Rhoda Ahonobadha (Environment Management), Barrack Otieno Abonyo (Water, Energy and Natural Resources), Elizabeth Ominde (Health Services) and Jenipher Kere (Education, Youth, Culture and Social Services).

Others are Stephen Orot (Agriculture), Vincent K’odera (Physical Planning) and Dr Rose Kisia (Commerce, Tourism and Heritage).