The entry of former Water, Irrigation and Sanitation Cabinet Secretary Sicily Kariuki into the Nyandarua governor’s race has complicated political calculations for Governor Francis Kimemia.
Like Mr Kimemia, Ms Kariuki is an experienced leader, having worked in various capacities in the public and private sectors for over 30 years.
Governor Kimemia, on the other side, was a civil servant in the Interior ministry, where he started his career as district officer, rising to secretary to the Cabinet in former President Mwai Kibaki’s administration.
On Tuesday, a day before she resigned, Ms Kariuki experienced for the first time how it feels to be outside the government. She was on her last assignment in Ndaragwa constituency to inspect the Leshau-Karagoini water project and launch two others in the same area.
Though she landed in a helicopter, Ms Kariuki did not command the official company that she used to on such previous official tours. The tens of fuel guzzlers that used to be part of her motorcade of county police bosses, the county commissioner and their assistants were nowhere to be seen.
Instead, her motorcade was led by police station commanders, while the county commissioner and his deputies delegated the welcoming of the CS to assistant county commissioners.
Humble, accessible leader image
The former CS has lately cut the image of a humble, accessible leader and mother, endearing herself to Nyandarua residents as Mama Musoo (Muthoni) and as Ms Kariuki, not as Sicily the CS.
What is likely to give Governor Kimemia and other contenders sleepless nights is Ms Kariuki’s perfect oratory skills, mobilisation skills and campaign team managers, with experienced strategic politicians led by former Nyandarua County Assembly clerk Nderi Ndiani, from Ndaragwa constituency, and politician Gichuki Mwangi, who is from Kinangop.
Both Mr Kimemia and Ms Kariuki are in Azimio la Umoja and are likely to square it out in the Jubilee Party nominations if none choses alternative Azimio affiliate parties.
Governor Kimemia is the Jubilee leader in the county and has been a strong defender and supporter of the party and President Uhuru Kenyatta.
“I will be where the President will be, and he has already declared that he is taking charge of the Jubilee Party to the next level,” Ms Kariuki said.
But among the hiccups Ms Kariuki is already encountering is how to convince Nyandarua voters that she is not a project of nominated MP Maina Kamanda and Jubilee vice-chairman David Murathe.
United Democratic Alliance candidate Dr Kiarie Badilisha, also eyeing the governor’s seat, says Ms Kariuki is a latecomer who cannot stand on her own feet.
“She does not know anything about Nyandarua, and relies on her chief campaigners to show her the way. We also know that she is a project of (Mr) Kamanda and (Mr) Murathe,” Dr Badilisha said.
“Nyandarua leadership positions will not be determined by foreigners. Ms Kariuki initiated no development project of her own in Nyandarua in all years she was in ministerial positions.
“Let her list any health facility she constructed when she was Health CS. In water, she was completing projects started by others.”
Mr Badilisha said the former CS failed to use her position to end the leadership wrangles dominating the county for most of the past five years.
“She had the powers and resources to unite the county. As a CS, she was the voice and eye of the President. She should have called for a ceasefire, and invited the clergy to broker the peace. She had direct access to the President but failed to ask for his intervention.”
But Ms Kariuki said she was approached to contest the governor’s seat by residents tired of the disputes.
“We had season one of the fights in the first regime and season two in the current regime. I have heard what the residents have said and there will be no more such fights in my regime,” she said.
In the 2017 campaigns for the General Election, Ms Kariuki, Mr Kimemia, Woman Representative Faith Gitau, Speaker Wahome Ndegwa and the Nyandarua county commissioner at the time, Samuel Kimiti, now in Bungoma, were the face of Jubilee in campaigns in Nyandarua.
They formed a formidable team that gave Jubilee an overwhelming win, ensuring that all MP seats in Nyandarua and top county positions were taken by the party.
But this was not without internal conflicts, with the team divided between some party candidates and independents and loud whispers that President Kenyatta was against Governor Kimemia’s candidacy.
At one time in Ndaragwa constituency, the CS, while distributing relief food to needy families at the deputy county commissioner’s office grounds, Ms Kariuki said residents should be left to elect local leaders of their choice but elect UhuRuto at the national level.
The statement was translated to be in favour of Mr Kimemia’s main challenger, Dr Badilisha, as an independent candidate.
Speaker Ndegwa has openly declared at several public forums and in the media that Governor Kimemia was not his preferred candidate.
