- Atwoli and outspoken Kakamega Senator Cleophas Malala say they will not allow the Mumias meeting to take place, accusing its organisers of playing Tangatanga politics.
- Political scientist Amukowa Anangwe says the two meetings are unnecessary drama.
Image: HILTON OTENYO
A potential clash between the authorities and Tangatanga MPs looms in Western on Saturday after politicians who organised the cancelled Mumias meeting swore to continue with the event.
Parallel rallies are set for Kakamega county even though the police cancelled the one organised by allies of DP William Ruto on security grounds. The BBI meeting, which was the first to be organised, will go on in Bukhubngu Stadium. The two meetings have widened the rift between Western Kenya leaders.
The Bukhungu meeting is spearheaded by Cotu secretary general Francis Atwoli and Kakamega Governor Wycliffe Oparanya, while the Mumias one was organised by former Sports CS Rashid Echesa and National Assembly Majority chief whip Ben Washiali under the Western regional development consultative forum. The latter will be held in Boma grounds, Mumias.
The Handshake proponents say the Kakamega meeting is part of a series planned across the country to popularise the document, but ANC, Ford Kenya and other rival parties see it as a launching pad for Raila's presidential campaign line-up ahead of 2022. Hence, tension is simmering ahead of the events.
On Wednesday Atwoli and outspoken Kakamega Senator Cleophas Malala said they will not allow the Mumias meeting to take place. They accused its organisers of advocating Tangatanga politics, which is associated with DP William Ruto.
Atwoli, Malala, nominated MP Godfrey Osotsi and Kakamega Woman Representative Elsie Muhanda inspected Bukhungu as Echesa and former Senator Boni Khalwale inspected Boma Grounds. Moments later, the police cancelled the Mumias meeting and peaceful demonstrations planned by Malala. Citing the need to maintain peace, the officers warned that any violation of the order will attract criminal responsibility.
But Echesa and DP Ruto allies from the region dismissed the order, saying they will proceed with the meeting, perhaps signalling a likely confrontation with the authorities.
"All those talking about and planning the Mumias meeting will not attend the meeting. They will not leave their houses and will only be set free after this (Bukhungu) meeting is over. We cannot allow people bidding for outsiders to embarrass the Luhya leadership by holding a parallel meeting," Atwoli said.
Political scientist and former Medical Services Minister Amukowa Anangwe said the two meetings are unnecessary drama. He said intimidation of the organisers of the Mumias meeting and its cancellation was in bad taste and unconstitutional.
“When you see leaders beginning to behave this way, it demonstrates a lack of wisdom or loss of direction either way. Kenyans have a constitutional right to assemble and the two venues — Kakamega and Mumias — are miles apart,” he said.
Prof Anangwe said Uhuru gazetted the extension of the BBI team charged with prosecuting the report last Friday and stakeholders should wait to be given direction on which roles they should play in the process.
Malala said residents will be ferried on buses to Bukhungu from all the 33 constituencies in the larger Western region. "I have talked to OCPD Peter Katam and asked him to cancel the Mumias meeting because as the senator of Kakamega, I will not allow a parallel meeting to take place here in the county," Malala told supporters at Bukhungu Stadium.
The Kakamega meeting, billed as a BBI forum to adopt and endorse the report by the Yusuf Haji-led taskforce, will be attended by Handshake-allied leaders and state officials. ODM leader Raila Odinga, Western governors and MPs are among those expected at the event.
The Mumias meeting is to be attended by Ruto-allied politicians. Organisers say its agenda is to discuss socioeconomic issues affecting the region. Though Amani National Congress (ANC) leader Musalia Mudavadi and his Ford Kenya counterpart Moses Wetang'ula were expected at the Mumias meeting, they have remained mum about it and instead dismissed the Kakamega meeting as an ODM affair that has nothing to do with the BBI report.
Speaking on Inooro TV on Wednesday night, Mudavadi said he was waiting for the BBI Steering Committee to release its timetable to make his presentations. He warned that the BBI should not be used to breed divisions among Kenyans.
Lugari MP Ayub Savula of ANC, however, said he will be in Kakamega and urged Mudavadi and Wetang’ula to attend the meeting since Kenyans support the BBI report. He said the two can only defeat possible ill motives behind the meeting if they attend. That aside, President Uhuru Kenyatta's decision to gazette the BBI technical committee gives the meeting a clean bill of health, he said.
Echesa said the Mumias meeting will go on even after police outlawed it.
“The police have no right to cancel a meeting which they have been notified of because that is a constitutional right that cannot be taken away. Our meeting was permitted by police on January 8. We read mischief in the same police licensing demonstrations by Malala two days later," Echesa told the Star on the phone.
Atwoli said there are only two groupings in Kenya today. "You are in either the BBI or Tangatanga,” he said.
He said unemployment will only end if the country has a constitution that guarantees shared prosperity as envisaged in the BBI, adding that those opposed to the report are after raw power for personal aggrandisement.
President Uhuru Kenyatta last Friday extended the term of the BBI taskforce to June 30 to validate its report and come up with a roadmap for its implementation.
The extension opens a window for amendment of the report based on fresh views that will be given during the validation process. Rival political formations have differed on its implementation, with Tangatanga accusing ODM of hypocrisy in the wake of countrywide political meetings over the BBI.