How sibling rivalry saw William Ruto, Raila Odinga lose key seats
Lenny Kivuti (left) Aisha Jumwa, Gideon Mung'aro and Cecily Mbarire.
Infighting in their teams cost President-elect William Ruto and Azimio la Umoja One Kenya Coalition Party leader Raila Odinga a number of seats they could otherwise have bagged, an analysis of the results has shown.
Although the two leaders had plans of fielding a single candidate in every elective position, they later on both shelved the plans to avert a fallout in their respective camps.
Azimio, with around 26 political parties, was the most affected by intra-coalition competition, which also saw Dr Ruto’s Kenya Kwanza Alliance lose seats that he could have won if not for the sibling rivalry.
For instance, Devolution Empowerment Party (DEP) Embu gubernatorial candidate Lenny Kivuti lost to Ms Cecily Mbarire of United Democratic Alliance (UDA) by just 3,264 votes in the race that also had Jubilee’s Emilio Kathuri. Despite Mr Kathuri dropping out a week to the elections, he got 3,870 votes, which is slightly more than what Ms Mbarire defeated her fiercest competitor with. Both DEP and Jubilee are in Azimio.
In Kilifi, the Kenya Kwanza team lost to Mr Odinga’s Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) due to sibling rivalry between Aisha Jumwa Katana of UDA and lawyer George Kithi of the Pamoja African Alliance (PAA).
Ms Jumwa lost to ODM’s Gideon Mung’aro, who got 143,773 votes, while she polled 68,893. Mr Kithi got 64,326 votes.
Azimio also lost the Kwale governor seat due to intra-coalition rivalry after ODM, Wiper and Kanu all fielded candidates.
ODM’s Prof Hamadi Boga lost to UDA’s Fatuma Achani by 5,702 votes, a gap that could have been slimmed if Wiper and Kanu had not fielded candidates. A joint campaign effort in Azimio could have helped Prof Boga while Ms Achani and PAA’s Chai Lung’anzi working together could also have widened the gap. Wiper’s Chirau Mwakere got 9,639 votes while Kanu’s Gereza Dani received 2,310 votes.
Mr Lung’anzi came third in the race with 47,301 votes. Political pundits are of the view that the two camps found themselves in a delicate situation because asking those who were perceived as weak candidates to step down could have boomeranged on them since it was feared that the candidate asked to step down would have worked with the coalition’s opponent.
Additionally, banking on a high turnout due to having many candidates on the ballot forced both Dr Ruto and the former Prime Minister to give up on building consensus or forcing weaker candidates to drop out.
Both Dr Ruto and Mr Odinga were only brokering deals where candidates had reached an agreement to step down in favour of the other, while keeping off where there were no such deals. Mr Odinga had explained that fielding a single candidate was the only way of ensuring victory.
Azimio also lost the Taita Taveta Woman Rep seat to UDA’s Lydia Haika after fielding many candidates. Ms Haika got 38,363 votes against Jubilee’s Joyce Lay (22,076). Another Azimio candidate, Ms Gertrude Shuwe of the Democratic Alliance Party of Kenya (DAP-K), came third with 16,642 votes.
A similar situation was witnessed in Kajiado where political rivalry between Jubilee and ODM cost Azimio the senatorial. UDA’s Samuel Seki won with 125,696 votes, beating Judith Pareno (ODM) who got 99,943 votes. In Kwale, DP Ruto’s camp lost the Senate seat after Mr Issa Boi garnered 52,772 votes to retain his seat. He was followed by Kasemeni MCA Anthony Yama (UDA) who got 41,672 and lawyer Salim Mwadumbo (Amani National Congress, ANC) who got 16,902.
Azimio also lost the Kanduyi MP seat due to sibling rivalry between Democratic Action Party-Kenya (DAP-K) and ODM. The difference between Ford Kenya’s John Makali, who got 32,099 votes, and that of Wafula Wamunyinyi who garnered 20,240 votes is the same as almost the number of votes the ODM candidate Alfred Khangati got, which is 12,970 votes. Mr Odinga also lost the Vihiga woman rep seat to Kenya Kwanza affiliate ANC.
ANC’s Beatrice Adagala won with 52,507 votes against Violet Bagada of United Democratic Party (UDP) who got 40,508 votes.
Other Azimio candidates in the race were Ms Winnie Majani of ODM (32,472) and DAP-K’s Mary Amalemba (13,876).
