Evans Kidero was seen as an insider and key financier of ODM boss Raila Odinga’s campaigns.
But the former Nairobi governor has bolted out of the Orange party after his rival was handed a direct ticket for Homa Bay governor.
Has this ruined his relationship with the former Prime Minister? Why is he insisting on running for the seat? What is his relationship with local leaders?
And what are his plans for Homa Bay if elected? How does he plan to go against the ODM wave in Homa Bay?
He answered these questions to Star's political reporter Julius Otieno in an exclusive interview on a wide range of issues.
You have just declared you are going to run for Homa Bay governor as an independent candidate. Why so?
I have been an ODM member. I ran on ODM ticket in 2013 and 2017. I hope I was going to run on the ticket again in 2022.
We went through the application process, not to mention that we had started campaigning and spent quite a considerable amount of resources.
At the last minute, we were surprised to see an announcement being made that through consensus of seven candidates, which is not true because the people who were actually aspirants were eight, a ticket has been issued.
And at the meeting where there was consensus, there were actually six aspirants.
They were Hamilton Orata, John Mbadi, Oyugi Magwanga, Isaiah Ogwe, Akello Misori and Gladys Wanga. Otieno Lois and I were never invited.
So, it was a big surprise that there was consensus.
But, I guess this follows the four methods that the party said they would use in nominations.
The first one is direct nomination by the party, which is reserved in areas where there is only one and there is no competition.
The second is election by party delegates, which they said they would not use except for the President.
Number three was general suffrage, where all party members would participate.
Last but not least is through consensus where the candidates would sit and agree on whom they can favour.
So, what happened was not consensus because I was never consulted.
But even if I had been consulted, I would have still said no.
The party went against its nomination rules.
But be it as it may, the people of Homa Bay county deserve to have a voice in who they elect.
I believe, probably, the issue of gender came in, but it should not be a factor.
People should be elected on the basis of competency and the ability and passion to deliver results to the people.
Homa Bay has got the highest percentage of gender representatives because we have three female MPs and one woman rep.
In Migori, which is next door, there is a lady who applied to be governor yet she was not treated the same way.
So, there must be other reasons other than issue of gender.
Why do you think you were not invited to the consensus meeting that was chaired by the party leader himself?
I would not know. I would not tell why we were not invited.
But I also saw the meeting was attended by people who are not running for the governorship. I saw the CEC for Finance of Homa Bay and MPs in that meeting, yet they are not running for governor.
But, probably, I was not invited because they knew I would have insisted that the people of Homa Bay must be given an opportunity to elect their government.
The reason why Homa Bay has not developed in the last 10 years is because the current governor did not win the nominations in 2013, neither did he win in 2017.
So in the last two elections, the people of Homa Bay have not had the opportunity and chance to elect their leader.
This time they should do, so that they can also benefit from development like all the other counties.
How is your relationship with local leaders in Homa Bay, especially elected leaders?
It is perfect. I work with them very well and we will work together.
You notice that most of them did not attend the launch of Wanga’s governor bid. That can tell you the relationship between Wanga and those leaders as opposed to their relationship with me.
So, have you settled on someone as a running mate?
A number of people, but what is important is that we talk to the Homa Bay people so that they know the importance of electing the right leaders with the right agenda.
That [running mate] will come with time but what is important is getting our people to appreciate what the new team is going to do.
Which strategy are going to employ to fight off ODM wave in Homa Bay and win?
There is no fire but giving people the choice. Maybe in the past, they never had a choice.
But we also know that [ODM wave] is not necessarily true.
In 2017, Magwanga ran as an independent candidate and won but his victory was stolen from him.
He won in the High Court and in the Court of Appeal.
Does bolting out of ODM because a rival has been handed a ticket mean you were not loyal to the party from the word go?
You could look at it that way but ask yourself, what comes first? Is it people or the party? We should put the people first.
The fidelity and loyalty should be to the people because it is them who form the party.
What I am doing is being loyal to the people, the people of Homa Bay because the fact that I am not running on the ODM ticket does not mean I do not love my people. All my people are ODM.
You were considered an insider in Raila’s circles but you are now bolting out of the party. How has your relationship with Raila been?
My relationship with Hon Prime Minister is perfect. We even talked after that (Homa Bay consensus meeting). There is absolutely no issue at all.
When you talked, did he agree with your resolve to run as an independent candidate? Was he comfortable with it?
Raila is looking to represent Kenyans as the president and we are quite happy and we will support him.
The people of Homa Bay are the ones who want me to run as their governor. I am heeding to their call – the 538, 000 voters.
So, Raila did not persuade you in any way to shelve your bid?
No. Those issues have not been discussed. The [talks] were on totally two different platforms.
There are those who say you were given direct ODM ticket in both 2013 and 2017 and that you should not cry foul if another person gets it now.
That is not right. The same thing nearly happened to me in 2013. I was being asked to leave it for Margaret Wanjiru on the basis of gender.
We went with Wanjiru to the nominations but she got disqualified because she did not have the necessary certificate.
In 2017, nobody else presented themselves for the seat. I said it then that running Nairobi is not a walk in the park.
After you are elected in 2013, there were reports that you were supporting a party in Nyanza called Kalausi and that could have been the genesis of your perceived bad blood with Raila.
That is not entirely true because if it were, I would not have received the ODM ticket in 2017.
There has been a perception you have been of financiers of Raila’s presidential campaigns. Will that continue?
That is not correct. Nobody can claim to fund Raila’s campaigns and I think it would be a wrong perception to I think or say that I made contributions.
If elected Homa Bay governor, what should the people there expect in the first 100 days? What is this Homa Bay manyien?
Homa Bay has received about Sh100 billion and there are projects that have been done somewhere halfway.
Take for example, right now there is no water, even in the hospitals.
There is no water in Homa Bay town yet it is near the lake just because electricity to the water treatment plant was disconnected.
Those are things that should not happen.
So, they are one continuation of normal services, which we will continue with, and completion of projects that had been started.
We will take over where the current regime is because public money has been spent on them, and they must be completed.
Two, we will start new projects.
In health, Homa Bay hospitals must be built properly.
We will make sure there drugs in hospitals.
A majority of our services are given by social health workers including those we call Nyamrerwa, who are not paid. They will be paid within the first month that we go in.
We will ensure every subcounty has got a 200-bed hospital with all the departments of medicine, medical surgery, orthopedics theatres and equipment are working.
Currently, just to get an x-ray you have to go to Kisii.
We will make sure doctors are paid. They have not been paid since December, they are on strike and nobody is attending to them.
So, within the first 100 days, it will be about normalization of services so that people of Homa Bay can get services.
Number three will be issue of schools. ECDE teachers have not been paid for three months.
We will ensure that food security.
We will talk to investors so that there is investment in cotton, food processes, canning, and potato and cassava processing and cereal processing into flour.
In the fish industry, the fish is today taken all the way to Thika.
We will make sure our roads are done properly and ensure there is security and people work to deliver services to the Homa Bay people.
Many people in Homa Bay are cane farmers. You were in charge of one of the biggest millers in the region. How will you turnaround the fortunes of these farmers?
In the first place, we can actually have a total of three cane factories each doing 10,000 tonnes a day.
The factory that is available is only doing 2,000 tonnes a day. We will attract investors.
Last but not least, farmers are not being paid. We will make sure they get cheap inputs. We will attract investment in a new factory.
Farmers will be paid and we will improve payment to farmers as well as ensuring there is higher capacity for cane processing.
You have listed so much that you intend to accomplish. But you are going to handless a much less budget than you used to at City Hall.
The amount of money that every county gets is based on a formula and the formula is poverty index, area and population.
If you take a population on Nairobi which is five million, Nairobi was getting about Sh13 billion a year.
If you divide the Sh13 billion by five million people, it is about Sh26, 000 per head per year.
Homa Bay gets Sh7 billion. Divide that by one million people, each person gets Sh7, 000. So, Homa Bay gets three times as much as Nairobi was getting.
How will you improve own source revenue?
Homa Bay is one of the richest counties. We have a National Park that has got the highest number of black and white rhinos. We will be able to develop the tourism industry.
We have got the hot springs, the cement processing within Homa Bay and all the other resources that are there.
What stops someone from harnessing the natural resources that are in Homa Bay and we have the capacity?
We will assemble a very competent team to do exactly that.
What is your opinion on ODM’s decisions to conduct opinion polls and give direct ticket?
I think the opinion polls are very subjective.
Because of Covid 19, they were doing the interviews by phone and sometimes you call somebody and they are in Mombasa, have transferred their votes and the numbers change but they still answer you. You are not sure who you are talking to.
Two, a loyal voter is that old lady in the village who carries water on her head. Who probably does not even have a phone.
The loyal voter is that mzee who is looking after cows, whose son has not gone to school because he does not have fees.
You did not seek their opinions. That's why I'm saying opinion polls are very subjective. You must use other methods to validate your results.
Furthermore, even if you talk about the opinion polls, the ones we had I was more than twice as popular as Wanga and Magwanga. Why didn’t they use the opinion polls?
Why did you decide to leave Nairobi for Homa Bay?
Nairobi is spoilt for choices of development partners. It is spoilt of choices of people who are competent, those who can run it because everybody lives here.
But Homa Bay, having gone 10 years, and we recall the person who was chairing the devolution committee that came up with the formula of allocating funds was Odhiambo Mbai.
So, Homa Bay paid the ultimate price in their son being killed because of devolution yet Homa Bay is the last in everything.
We are doing badly in HIV Aids control, child mortality and in building ECDE classes. People who do not have latrines, we only come second to Baringo.
So when you want to look at various parameters or performances, you look at it from the bottom.
It is up to us to go and change that and not anybody else. That is the reason why I went to Homa Bay.
Ten years into devolution, do you think Nyanza has transformed?
I think Nyanza counties have not done as well as it should be.
In health, infrastructure, water, transport, in attracting investments, in creating conducive social environment for businesses, in youth programmes and in women programmes, we have not done as well but the worst is probably Homa Bay.
What can you say as we conclude the interview?
We have an opportunity to have a good president. Raila Odinga. So we will come out and Kenyans should come out in their numbers to vote for him on that day.
But secondly, Kenyans must elect leaders of their choices. Not the ones imposed on them.
