Keep off student politics, Raila Odinga tells MPs

ODM leader Raila Odinga has faulted a Bill that seeks to regulate university student elections.

Speaking on Tuesday, he said the move amounts to interference with the rights of students to manage their own affairs.

Mr Odinga said entities like student organisations fall in the same category as private clubs where members have a right to make their own choices on who leads them.

“Students organisations belong to members and only they know how best to run their affairs. Parliament has no role and there is no way MPs can enact laws to regulate election of student leaders,” he said while delivering a public lecture at the University of Nairobi today.

He was responding to a question from a a Master’s student, Ms Angela Mbuthia, who had wanted the ODM leader to share his thoughts on the Bill that is currently before the National Assembly.

The proposed law was brought to the House by Garissa Township MP Aden Duale in 2016 when he served as Majority leader.

The Bill introduces an indirect form of electing student leaders and declares that such leaders will only hold office for a term of one year and can only be eligible for one more after that.

Further, it takes away the power of students to directly elect their leaders, which will be done through an electoral college system if the Bill becomes law.

As per the Bill, varsity student councils will be governed by a chairperson and vice-chairperson who must be of opposite gender, as well as a treasurer and secretary-general who will be secretary to the council.

“For the purpose of conducting the election of the members of the students council, the student association shall constitute itself into electoral colleges based on either academic departments, school or faculties,” the Bill says.

Students from each department, school or faculty in the university would be expected to elect three representatives, of whom at least one must be of opposite gender, from amongst persons who are not candidates.

The move is widely seen as a way to control the power of university students by the government.

The Bill was drafted in 2016 and was seen as an attempt by the Jubilee government to bar perennial student leaders like Babu Owino, now Embakasi East MP, who was at the helm of Student Organisation of Nairobi University (Sonu) between 2010 and 2017.