Jubilee to hold county meets ahead of merger

NAIROBI: The ruling coalition will begin county meetings on January 16 to sell the new Jubilee Party to the grassroots ahead of parties' merger in March.

Officials say they will use the meetings to rally the public to participate in forming the county party systems and also ask new national identity card holders to register as voters.

Apart from national offices, the new party will have 47 county party leaders and a similar hierarchy reflected at the county level. This is aimed at building a party with strong grassroots support.

Jubilee affiliate parties are working towards a National Delegates Conference (NDC) in March to ratify the resolution of the merger into Jubilee Party (JP) ahead of the March deadline.

The party, which President Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto will use to seek re-election, will be launched by the end of March.

Jubilee Party National Steering Committee (NCS) co-chair Noah Wekesa said the party wants to be on the ground during the massive voter registration next month.

"We intend to use county meetings to tell people to register as voters. This will ensure we increase our support before the official merger," he said.

Jubilee Party has divided the country into two parts for the purpose of selling and popularising the merger before the official launch.

Wekesa is set to spearhead rallies in North-Rift, Nyanza and Western while his co-chair Senator Kiraitu Murungi (Meru) will lead another team to North Eastern, Coast, Central and Nairobi.

"County party leadership will be the focus, and it will be the county chairperson's role to sell the party to the people," Wekesa said.

The meetings will also act as forums to give the public proper information about the new political outfit and to sell ideas of the merger and allow the electorate to own the process.

Jubilee Party has a symbol of two people holding hands as a sign of unity and the slogan 'Tuko Pamoja' (we are together). The slogan has been translated into all 42 native languages in a bid to shake off the tag that the governing coalition draws support from only two communities.

The party's colours are yellow, red and black-a blend of TNA and URP colours.

Although the National Steering Committee (NSC) spearheading the merger had indicated that it is facing legal challenges and might lead to a Constitutional crisis, the ratification of the process by the parties will be one hurdle crossed.

Of concern to NSC is to sell the idea of forming Jubilee Party to senators, governors, MPs and MCAs.

And in order to reduce rebellion, NSC formed special committees each with two chairpersons to draw up the merger and Jubilee Party's structure.

Kiraitu said there was a legal challenge in the Political Parties Act which the legal affairs sub-committee was working on.

"We have pushed the deadline to March because of legal challenges. The law is clear on MPs and MCAs but is silent on the President and governors. We don't want to create a constitutional crisis," he said.

NSC is now exploring the possibilities of seeking to introduce amendments to the Political Parties Act to cure the anomaly.

And to do that, NSC had mandated the Onyango Oloo-chaired Legal Affairs Committee to explore ways that can be used in the present circumstances.

"We have not received a report from them," Kiraitu said.

The lawmaker reassured Jubilee supporters that despite the hitches they were facing in the merger, they were optimistic that come next year, there will be a Jubilee Party.

Oloo's team has up to the end of this month to present a report.

Talks are still ongoing in the new party structure for the positions that will be shared on the strength of the number of elected members in Senate and national and county assemblies.