Jubilee officials yesterday told former Kakamega Senator Boni Khalwale to stop masquerading as the party’s 2022 gubernatorial candidate.
Kakamega county Jubilee Party chairman Moses Lumiti said that the branch had not endorsed any candidate for any position.
Lumiti said though the branch had accepted Khalwale to join the party from Ford Kenya, that did not mean that the party had endorsed his candidature.
The branch chairman told journalists that the party constitution will be followed in picking the candidates for the next polls.
“As a branch, we don’t have any leader with the mandate of making decisions for us and all decisions will be made from the grassroots,” Lumiti said.
The party officials were reacting to a recent endorsement of Khalwale’s bid by Mumias MP Ben Washiali.
Branch coordinator Raphael Welimo asked President Uhuru Kenyatta to stop inviting into the party “foreigners” who are out to wreck it from within.
“We are seeing this at the national level and this will not be allowed to cascade to the branches. We don’t want the party to disintegrate because of new entrants,” Welimo said.
The entry of Khalwale into the ruling party appears to have triggered bad blood between him and leaders from the region who earlier supported Jubilee and in particular Deputy President William Ruto.
Other Jubilee leaders from Western who have supported the DP’s 2022 bid have since gone quiet because they feel Ruto is giving Khalwale more attention.
Yesterday, the officials said that they were not opposed to new members joining Jubilee in the county but they must abide by its rules.
(Edited by O. Owino)
