Keep IEBC out of party nominations, urges Raila

Cord leader Raila Odinga has said political parties should have a free hand in deciding how to nominate their candidates.

Mr Odinga says the proposal that the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) be given a role in conducting party nominations amounts to “micromanaging political parties.”

“If a political party wants to invite the IEBC to conduct their nominations, that should be a free choice but don’t come up with the regulations to force political parties to invite IEBC.

"Political parties are private organisations. They should organise themselves differently,” he said at Orange House on Wednesday.

“Each political party should have their own nomination rules and they should not try to micromanage political parties. Let Jubilee also, now, attempt to conduct nominations. They have been criticising ODM for being undemocratic.

"Let them try to do these nominations and we shall see how far they are going to go. We will not be micromanaged. If we need IEBC, we will invite them but we don’t want it to be part of law. It should be voluntary,” he said.

The Cord leader was reacting to suggestions from the Jubilee coalition that nominations in political parties be conducted by the IEBC to make them credible.

ELECTORAL REFORMS

Party nominations are usually chaotic and acrimonious, and the Jubilee side says the electoral agency can help tame the irregularities often witnessed among parties where losers decamp or winners are denied certificates.

The Jubilee coalition says nominations can be held on the same day to stop hoppers from leaving their parties when they fail to get tickets.

These electoral reforms are being considered by the joint Parliamentary Select Committee charged with revising the structure of the IEBC and the general conduct of elections in general.

The Cord leader spoke when he hosted a group of Maasai political aspirants from Narok County at Orange House in Nairobi.

Led by Narok ODM chairman Charlese ole Nampaso, the group, composed mainly of aspirants in next year’s elections, said the Maasai community was still in Cord despite overtures from Jubilee.

They said they were in Nairobi to discuss “important issues of governance of this country going forward.”

“We have had fruitful deliberations with the ODM leadership and we are soon going to organise a big rally in Narok where we will make a declaration as a community so that we are able to move forward and make this country better into the future,” said former ICT PS Joseph Tiampati, who also vied for the Narok governor's seat on the Kenya National Congress Party in 2013 but lost to Samuel Tunai.

He said he had defected because “my people have asked me to stand on the ODM party.”

“The people of Narok are with you (Raila Odinga) as you continue to fight for the marginalised in this country, the Maasais being one of the most marginalised.
ODINGA: ALLOW NTIMAMA TO REST

ODM denied the meeting was a response to a meeting between Narok elected leaders and President Uhuru Kenyatta on Tuesday, arguing it had been previously arranged for Wednesday.

At the meeting, former Cabinet minister William Ole Ntimama led the other Maasai leaders in pledging to join the Jubilee party.

Mr Odinga urged Jubilee to stop using the former minister and allow him to enjoy retirement.

“We are re-energising ourselves. We are organising our party. We are not reacting to anybody. It is something that is ongoing and you will see us in parts of western [Kenya], you will see us in Nyanza, in the Coast. We are going to go all over the country in preparation for elections next year,” Mr Odinga said.

“What we want is to ensure there is a level playing field in elections. We see a scared regime acting in a very scared away,” he added.

The larger Maa-speaking land is generally not a Cord zone and there are only two MPs from the coalition: Kajiado Central’s Memusi Kanchori and Mathew Lempurkel of Laikipia North.

On Wednesday, Mr Kanchori, who also attended the meeting, said the crossing over of Mr Tiampati is a signal that the community would come back to Cord.