Only two outgoing governors beat the odds and got elected to Senate in the just concluded August polls.
Second term governors Ali Roba (Mandera) and Jackson Mandago (Uasin Gichu) are the only ones who managed to secure elective positions in their counties.
Outgoing Makueni Governor Kivutha Kibwana, Samuel Ole Tunai (Narok) , Sospeter Ojaamong (Busia) and Alex Tolgos (Elgeyo Marakwet) had attempted to renew their political lives by seeking various elective positions but failed.
Ojaamong lost the Teso South parliamentary seat to an Independent.
At the beginning of the devolved system, Ali Roba was elected as the first governor of Mandera County in 2013. He was elected on a United Republic Party (URP) ticket.
In 2017, Roba defied calls by the powerful Garre Council of Elders to step down in favour of Hasan Noor who was their choice. He went on to contest, and won in tightly contested election.
At the time, Roba said he would contest and leave it to the residents to decide the person they want as their governor, rallying the public to reject a declaration by local elders barring him from defending his seat.
The Garre Elders had announced that all elected elders from the county at the time, should be locked out of the 2017 polls.
In last week’s polls, Roba’s United Democratic Movement (UDM) pulled a surprise by winning two governor positions, 9 parliamentary seats and at least 35 ward representatives.
Mandera County Assembly Speaker Mohamed Adan Khalif was elected to succeed Governor Roba .
He polled 53,480 votes against his closest rival, former Industrialisation Cabinet Secretary Adan Mohamed who got 40,564 votes ballot.
On the other hand, outgoing Uasin Gishu Governor Jackson Mandago is now the senator-elect after clinching the seat with 252,800 votes.
He defended his decision to run for the senatorial seat despite serving the residents of the county as a governor for the last 10 years.
Mandago explained that he made up his mind to run for the seat to support the role of the senate in oversighting government activities on delegated legislation, administration, bills scrutiny and policy implementation.
“For us governors going to the Senate our agenda was to ensure all devolved functions and the funds meant for the same actually move to counties," he said.
"Funds retained in the Ministries of Agriculture and Lands of the national government that were meant for devolved functions, it is important we ensure all those resources move to the county governments.”
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