Details have emerged about how the Kenya Kwanza administration schemed to ensure that President William Ruto's pet housing project easily sailed through the National Assembly.
Part of the strategy, which included whipping nearly all Kenya Kwanza MPs to attend the Wednesday sitting, also saw strategic political manoeuvres deployed to deny the opposition numbers.
It has now emerged that some of the opposition MPs deliberately snubbed House sittings, both on Tuesday and Wednesday, crucial days when the Affordable Housing Bill, 2023 was under consideration.
Some 66 MPs allied to the Opposition coalition did not show up on Tuesday to take their vote, handing their Kenya Kwanza counterparts an easy ride to push the Bill through the Second Reading.
The Bill sailed through after 141 ruling party MPs voted in its favour against 58 who voted against it.
This was the second time in months that most Azimio MPs were skipping crucial sessions when they are required most to undertake their constitutional mandate.
Some Azimio lawmakers were also a no-show when Kenya Kwanza passed the controversial Finance Act, 2023, which contained a raft of tax proposals opposed by the opposition as being punitive.
Then, National Assembly Majority Whip Silvanus Osoro publicly admitted that Kenya Kwanza influenced their opposition colleagues to skip the vote on the Finance Bill.
Aware that the Bill only required a simple majority to sail through the Second Reading, Kenya Kwanza mobilised 141 lawmakers.
With 66 Azimio lawmakers and another 83 government-allied MPs absent, Kenya Kwanza knew they had the numbers to ensure the Bill passed at the crucial Second Reading stage.
Osoro, who is also the South Mugirango MP, denied that MPs were intimidated to attend the sessions during debate, saying Kenya Kwanza allowed members to vote freely.
"We lobbied our members who saw the sense of voting in favour of the Bill. There was no intimidation targeting either our members or Azimio's," he said.
The Star has established that the Naivasha retreat of the Kenya Kwanza parliamentary group laid the ground for an elaborate strategy to ensure the the proposed law was passed within two days.
President Ruto directed the House leadership under Majority Leader Kimani Ichung'wah to spare no effort to ensure the legal framework for the housing project is enacted.
The head of state, who addressed the Kenya Kwanza MPs on Monday night, told them to support the Bill because it would create job opportunities for the millions of youths in their constituencies.
"We will implement the housing programme, I don’t want to say by all means possible, but I have said we will implement it," he said in Naivasha.
The President later held a closed-door meeting with the House leadership where it was resolved that the Finance committee would move an amendment to reintroduce the 10 per cent deposit for affordable housing buyers.
On Wednesday, Kenya Kwanza lawmakers managed to reintroduce a key provision requiring occupants to pay a deposit for housing units, a move aimed at bolstering the viability of the programme.
This was in response to concerns raised during public participation. Amendments to the Bill granted the Treasury Cabinet Secretary discretion to determine the deposit requirement, hence addressing some stakeholders’ apprehensions.
Earlier, the National Assembly’s Finance and National Planning Committee had rejected the requirement for a 10 per cent deposit for affordable home buyers.
The axing of the clause from the proposed law had formed part of the committee’s recommendations.
The deletion of the clause had been based on stakeholder concerns that the requirement would impact the number of individuals participating in the programm.
“The committee noted stakeholders’ concerns and agreed to delete the amount of 10 per cent as a deposit and further recommended that the deposit amount be prescribed in the regulations,” the committee said in a report.
It emerged that the committee's recommendation was meant to assuage public anger and lower political temperatures ahead of the Third Reading on Wednesday where it was agreed that the House would be moved to drop it.
With the master script already agreed upon, the Kenya Kwanza troops departed from Naivasha on Tuesday morning to the House for the all-important business.
On Thursday, a Kenya Kwanza MP told the Star that a winning formula was drawn in Naivasha and the script left to the House leaders to implement.
"Nothing happened by coincidence. The ground was laid in Naivasha and all of us informed about what to do," the MP who sought anonymity for fear of reprisals said.
On Tuesday, Kenya Kwanza MPs started by thwarting an attempt by Azimio leaders to employ filibustering tactics during the Wednesday sitting to block a vote on that day.
National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang'ula rejected a plea from Minority leader Opiyo Wandayi to delay the debate on the proposed law on Wednesday.
The Ugunja MP, a key ally of Opposition leader Raila Odinga, had asked the Speaker to defer debate from Wednesday to the following day to allow MPs to propose more amendments to the Bill.
Ichung'wah had, however, already marked Wandayi and swiftly countered the argument, insisting on the need to expedite the process.
The Kikuyu MP asked the Speaker to allow members to propose amendments but insisted on the need for the Bill not to be delayed.
“We should not delay the debate on this Bill, any amendments can be proposed, and we can even have a supplementary order paper, but this debate must come tomorrow,” he said.
“I want to see which MP is going to oppose this Bill, I want to see which MP is going to deny his electorate an opportunity to get a job because this Bill is about the creation of jobs, it’s about jobs for our people.”
It also emerged that, except for Githunguri MP Gathoni Wamuchomba, most of the Azimio MPs did not file their alleged proposed amendments to the Speaker's office.
The Standing Orders require that a member who wishes to move amendments to a bill during the committee of the whole House files them with the Speaker's office within 24 hours before the motion is tabled.
Wamuchomba had proposed an array of amendments including seeking to delete the 1.5 per cent housing levy and making the National Housing Corporation the implementor of the project.
Suna East MP Junet Mohamed claimed that the Executive had intimidated opposition MPs from voting against the Bill, saying his colleagues had complained they were being intimidate.
"The use of archaic ways has returned. The MPs are getting phone calls from ministers and PSs [Principal Secretaries] from their regions telling them that, 'if you don't vote for this Bill in this manner then you will not get development,'" the Minority Whip said after the vote.
The MP said he was writing a protest letter to the Speaker over concerns of alleged coercion, adding that Azimio MPs had forward proposed amendments.
“Azimio filed several amendments... Unfortunately, it looks like there are some instructions from the Kenya Kwanza regime that this Bill be passed without amendment,” Junet said.
He led a walkout of some 20 Azimio MPs the Third Reading.
However, National Assembly deputy Majority leader Owen Baya, Kilifi North denied that the Executive was threatening opposition lawmakers not to vote against the Bill.
"That is false. The government of Kenya Kwanza does not use intimidation or coercion to pass its agenda in Parliament. We are very democratic and that is why even some of our members have opposed our bills," he said.
The ruling party leadership has also refuted claims that it will punish MPs who opposed the proposed law, including Wamuchomba, Ruto's foremost critic.
"We will focus on the passage of the Bill. Punishing members is very trivial to us. We are looking at the bigger picture,'' Osoro said.
With the Bill now poised for Senate deliberation, the showdown between political factions over the housing agenda is expected to shift to the judicial arena.
The stage is being set for legal battles and constitutional scrutiny when the Azimio leader moves to court to challenge the Act once approved by the Senate and President Ruto assents to it.
The Opposition challenged the housing levy in court last year after the enactment of the Finance Act, 2023.
The High Court slammed the brakes on the levy deductions until a case filed challenging the tax was heard and determined.
Ruto wants to build 200,000 affordable housing units annually, which he has promised will create 600,000 and 1 million jobs each year.
In a bid to actualise this, the National Assembly has appropriated and ring-fenced Sh73 billion in the current financial year's budget towards the project.