The United Green Movement party has rolled out a programme to empower farmers at the Coast so they can be independent thinkers during electioneering periods.
UGM secretary general Hamisa Zaja said the party wants to revive the cash crops that used to make coastal residents rich and independent.
“That is the politics we want for 2022. We want to revive the agricultural sector at the Coast,” she said.
Speaking during the planting of 2,000 cashew seedlings at Mtomondoni in Mtwapa on Saturday, Zaja said Kenya needs a different brand of politics.
She said people are tired of political wars where leaders use the dais to insult each other or incite their followers against each other.
“They want politics that will put food on their tables and money in their pockets. We don’t want people to vote because they were given Sh200 by a politician,” Zaja said.
Zaja and UGM co-party leader Agostino Neto said past regimes killed the coastal economy so that residents can remain poor and dependent.
“If anyone wants to finish you, they will first kill your economy,” they said.
Neto said UGM will work towards reviving factories in the region that were killed to impoverish residents.
“If you are poor, you are given handouts and then you sing praises. They want them to come the next dry season for cash stipends,” Neto said.
He said UGM in October last year launched a campaign with an aim of planting one billion trees to help achieve the 10 per cent forest cover.
To achieve this, the party has established polling station committees for the various aspirants across the country to help.
These committees have a set a target of the number of trees they each need to plant.
So far, they have planted cash crop and fruit trees in Nairobi, Kwale, Tana River, Kilifi and other counties.
Neto said Coast people need cashew, cotton and coconut trees to empower themselves financially.
Lucy Mwagumba, a UGM member, said the Kilifi county government has announced plans to set up a cashew nut factory at Kakanjuni and farmers have to take advantage of that opportunity.
Mwagumba, who is eyeing the Shimo La Tewa MCA seat, said her manifesto focuses more on creating platforms to improve businesses in the ward.
She said brokers have for long swindled cashew farmers, giving them a raw deal.
“This time, after the farmers are empowered, they will know better than allow themselves to be exploited by the brokers,” Mwagumba said.
She urged farmers to plant cashew trees.
UGM Kilifi county coordinator Jimmy Tomboko said residents need food security.
The county has perennially suffered from hunger due to droughts.
“That is why we urge our people to vote for leaders who will have such interests as empowering our farmers economically at heart,” Tomboko, who is also eyeing the Kaya Fungo MCA seat in Kilifi county, said.
He said UGM is working towards ensuring farmers in Kilifi and the Coast region at large are able to produce enough food for their consumption, local market and export.
Edited by A.N
