Days after Orange Democratic Movement leader Raila Odinga asked Coast leaders to abandon their plans for a regional party, Kaya elders yesterday backed the initiative.
The Mijikenda elders said a regional party would unite the communities.
Addressing the press at Uhuru Gardens in Mombasa, the elders threw their weight behind Kilifi Governor Amason Kingi’s call for the formation of a regional alliance. Led by their chairman, Mr Stanley Kenga Mbeo of Kaya Ribe, they termed those opposed to the negotiations led by Mr Kingi as “insincere to Coast people”.
“We’re here to fully support [Mr Kingi’s] efforts to unite the Coast with the formation of a regional party. He’s moderating a complex political conversation,” Mr Kenga said.
Last week, Mr Odinga differed sharply with the Kilifi governor during a Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) rally on the formation of a regional political alliance. Speaking in Ganze, the ODM leader said he played a key role in Mr Kingi’s success when he supported him in the 2007 parliamentary polls and later nominated him to the Cabinet in the grand coalition government. But the elders condemned Mr Odinga’s sentiments.
“We hold onto the belief that God bestows leadership on those he wishes. For a national leader to claim that he picked and made someone a leader at the Coast is a mockery of God and the people,” Johnson Hinzano from Kaya Giriama said.
Chequered political history
Mr Hamisi Juma Mwaviko, from Kaya Digo, added: “We’ve a chequered political history as a region. Since the pre-independence reign of Mekatilili wa Menza, the first regional liberal struggle by Ronald Ngala, founder of Kadu (Kenya African Democratic Union), to Karisa Maitha, who enhanced the region’s political profile. Now Kingi is as our shepherd. We shall support him.” Maitha died in 2004.
“Whether these talks will result in an alliance of Coast political parties or a merger of all parties into one for the region is anyone’s guess. Time has come for the region to chat its path towards unity and development,” Mr Kenga said.
Elsewhere, Kaloleni MP Paul Katana said it was wrong for Mr Odinga to “block” a regional party on claims that it was a “security threat”, and accused him of inventing tactics that were aimed at “sabotaging and continuous oppression of the region” by forcing them to stay in ODM.
Speaking at Maoro Primary school in Mwanamwinga ward during the ground-breaking ceremony for five classrooms, he warned Mr Odinga against taking the region for granted.
He said that, after a long period of supporting ODM and other parties, the region resolved to form its party to use as a bargaining tool on the national stage.
“We should be respected as politicians and leaders who were elected to serve our people. They gave us the power to make good decisions on their behalf. Coast people realised that the only way for them to be listened to at the national table during the distribution of the national cake is to form their party,” the Kaloleni MP said.
