President William Ruto has lined up a series of rallies in Nairobi to popularise his cooperation agreement with veteran opposition politician Raila Odinga starting today.
The week-long extensive tour of the capital will see the President launch projects in some of the constituencies, including roads, hospitals, lighting projects and schools, as he seeks to meet elected and grassroots leaders of both his United Democratic Alliance (UDA) and Mr Odinga’s Orange Democratic Movement (ODM).
“He is on an extensive development tour of Nairobi starting on Monday running to Friday. He will be commissioning and launching projects that are in line with the Bottom Up Economic Agenda (Beta), from the Affordable Housing projects, Education, TVET among several other programmes that have been lined up,” State House Spokesperson Hussein Mohammed said.
President William Ruto and opposition leader Raila Odinga sign an agreement between UDA and ODM in the presence of their party members.
Photo credit: Pool
Nairobi has largely remained in the grip of Mr Odinga’s ODM, with most members of Parliament (MPs) and County Assembly (MCAs) elected on its ticket, making it a perfect choice for the President to begin the popularisation drive after the signing of the pact last Friday. It was not immediately clear whether Mr Odinga will join him, but his ODM MPs have been briefed to join Dr Ruto on the tour set to begin in Kamkunji constituency.
The tour is also likely to set the tone for Nairobi politics going into the 2027 General Election as politicians begin to align themselves with different formations. Just like in past political deals, the Friday cooperation between Dr Ruto and Mr Odinga is likely to leave a trail of political casualties and beneficiaries in the city.
The tour by the President comes barely weeks after Mr Odinga appeared to endorse Governor Johnson Sakaja , a member of UDA, for a second term in office, placing him as a likely major beneficiary of the arrangement.
Kibra MP Peter Orero and his Makadara counterpart George Aladwa told the Nation that their constituencies have been listed for the tour, with national development projects lined up for launch. In Kibra, which Dr Ruto will visit on Friday, Mr Orero said the Head of State will launch 13 classrooms at Ayany Primary School and construction of a Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) institute. The constituency has traditionally backed Mr Odinga, and is part of former Lang’ata, which he represented in Parliament.
“Some of the projects to be launched are the complete lighting of Kibra Drive, and laying of the foundation stone for the second and third storey buildings at TVET,” Mr Orero said.
But Embakasi Central MP Benjamin Gathiru, aka MejjaDonk, a close ally of former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua, told the Nation that he is not aware of the tour, suggesting possible sidelining of perceived critics. “If it is about projects, I don’t know of any national government projects that would require launching; what we have are classrooms constructed by the Constituency Development Fund,” he said.
Mr Sakaja said Nairobi stands to benefit greatly from the truce as it would provide the necessary environment for development. He said the city is usually a major casualty of political instability.
He said the tour will also act as a follow up meeting between the President and Nairobi MPs, who had in a meeting at State House last year rolled out a plan to construct additional 5000 classrooms in Nairobi.
The ambitious project was to be done jointly between the national government and the county, with the Sakaja-led administration tasked with constructing additional Early Childhood Development and Education (ECDE) centres.
“For Nairobi, I started with appointing CECs across the divide. One thing we have benefited a lot as a county is the good working relationship across the party lines and now with the President and former Prime Minister agreeing to work together, we stand to benefit more,” said Mr Sakaja.
Apart from launching projects, Mr Sakaja said they will also use the tour to listen to the ground on what the people want from both national and county governments.
Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga and Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja inside Nyayo Stadium in Nairobi during 56th Jamhuri Day celebrations on December 12, 2019.
Photo credit: File/ Nation Media Group
“We will be listening to the grassroots leaders; both the ODM and UDA leaders at the grassroots. You remember during our meeting at State House we pushed for Nairobi MPs to get Sh1 billion more for construction of classrooms,” he said.
With Mr Sakaja’s endorsement for a second term by Mr Odinga, Embakasi East MP Babu Owino and his Westlands counterpart Tim Wanyonyi are the perceived immediate political casualties of the pact. The two have indicated their plans to run on ODM against the incumbent.
In the past, political players have engaged in horse trading and sharing of key seats in the city by affiliate parties. Parties have in the past negotiated for positions to respond and to appeal to various voting ethnic blocs.
For instance, in 2022 polls, Azimio of Mr Odinga fielded Polycarp Igathe (Jubilee Party) for governor, Edwin Sifuna (ODM) for Senate and Esther Passaris (ODM) Woman Rep, among others in a delicate balancing act that factored in popularity of the individuals as well as the numerical strength of ethnic blocs in the city.
In UDA, the party also factored in ethnic arithmetic in picking its candidates. The party fielded Mr Sakaja for governor, Bishop Margret Wanjiru for Senate and Ms Millicent Omanga for Woman Rep.
In the negotiations, Mr Wanyonyi was one of the ODM governor aspirants, who had to sacrifice his ambition for the coalition to accommodate interests of affiliate parties as well as ethnic dynamics. Bishop Wanjiru was also prevailed upon to scale down her ambition for governor, in favour of Mr Sakaja.
In a previous interview with Nation, Mr Sakaja said his kind of politics made it easy for him to work with politicians from across the political divide. He said he easily campaigned even in the opposition areas in Nairobi during the 2017 and 2022 elections.
In 2017, he won the senate seat alongside Mike Sonko, who was elected governor, against Mr Odinga’s wave in Nairobi.
“When I won the senate seat in 2017, Jubilee didn’t win Nairobi that time. The presidential vote was not pro Uhuru, Raila won in Nairobi. But Sonko and myself were able to win governor and senate seats,” said Mr Sakaja.
“It is because we were never engaged in divisive politics. You have never heard me insult leaders in the opposition. I don’t do that; so I would go to ODM areas and be able to campaign freely. Many of my colleagues could not do that. So I could get both Jubilee and ODM votes to win the senate seat,” he said.
In the 2022 poll, he said he was able to win the governor seat because he could easily appeal to both opposition and UDA supporters.
“UDA lost both the Senate and Woman Rep positions. We (UDA) got four out of 17 MP seats. Out of the 85 MCAs seats, we got only 35,” he added.
