President William Ruto has abandoned the much-hyped merger between his UDA party and ANC for fear of mass defections, especially by elected leaders from Mt Kenya, the Nation can reveal.
Instead, President Ruto's ruling UDA has persuaded Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi, who is linked to ANC despite relinquishing his top official position, to dissolve the party.
The change of tact is contained in the resolutions made by the ANC at its National Delegates Convention (NDC) held on Friday, February 7 at the Bomas of Kenya in Nairobi.
Outgoing ANC Secretary-General Omboko Milemba told Nation.Africa that the decision was necessitated by the need to protect UDA from a possible political haemorrhage.
"We held our NDC on Friday and agreed to dissolve the ANC and join the UDA. So we will all be in the UDA and that is the position," said Mr Milemba, who has since been appointed deputy secretary-general of the ruling party.
The same revelation was made by outgoing ANC national chairman Kevin Lunani, who said the decision was driven by a desire to rebrand the UDA ahead of the 2027 elections.
"We have agreed to disband and join the UDA. Why form a new party when we have a ruling party? Our members would now become UDA members," said Mr Lunani, who has since been appointed deputy leader of the UDA.
A clause which governs mergers of political parties provides for the defection of members who are unhappy with such a deal.
Section 11 of the Political Parties Act, which sets out the conditions for mergers, states that elected leaders, who oppose such a merger, are free to defect to other political parties or become independent.
"Where a party merges under this section, a member of the political party that has merged with another political party shall be deemed to be a member of the new political party," says subsection 7 of the Act.
“Despite subsection (7), a member who is a President, Deputy President, Governor or Deputy Governor, Member of Parliament or member of a County Assembly, and who does not desire to be a member of the new political party registered after the merger shall continue to serve in such elected office for the remainder of the term, and may join another political party or choose to be an independent member within thirty days of the registration of the new party,” the Act provides.
This provision would have provided a golden opportunity for the camp of former deputy president Rigathi Gachagua to trigger major defections of elected UDA leaders, particularly from the disaffected Mt Kenya region.
Mr Gachagua recently announced plans to launch his new party, which could be a major beneficiary of this development.
A number of elected leaders from the region have begun to align themselves with Mr Gachagua in response to the perceived growing political hostility towards the Kenya Kwanza administration. However, some have remained cautious, at least for now, to protect themselves from possible disciplinary action for going against the UDA position.
Such a mass defection would have had far-reaching political implications, including changing the majority and minority coalitions in both the National Assembly and the Senate.
It would also have denied the UDA of millions in Political Parties Fund, which is distributed according to the number of elected leaders in a party.
The UDA currently receives the highest amount. In the latest Sh1.2 billion disbursements, the UDA pocketed Sh558.49, followed by the ODM with Sh298.3 million.
Kenya Kwanza is currently the majority coalition, largely due to the numerical strength of UDA, which draws most of its members from Mr Gachagua's Mount Kenya and President Ruto's Rift Valley bastion.
However, the dissolution of the ANC could hurt Mr Mudavadi if some of his ANC members feel uncomfortable joining the UDA. The UDA has yet to make inroads into the Western Province, which has largely remained an ODM bastion. ODM and National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula’s Ford Kenya could be the main beneficiaries.
On January 17, UDA and ANC announced the merger of the two parties at an event at State House.
"Appreciating and reflecting on the shared and common ideals on the primacy of economic empowerment, peace and development, the United Democratic Alliance Party (UDA) and the Amani National Congress (ANC) have today merged as one party," UDA Chairperson and Embu Governor Cecil Mbarire said in a statement.
Under the Act, a political party may merge with another one by forming a new outfit or by merging with an existing registered party.
The merger agreement is then signed and deposited with the Registrar within 21 days of the signing. This subsequently causes the Registrar to withdraw and cancel the registration certificates of the merging political parties and to publish the dissolution of the merged parties within seven days.
After the merger, the details including the names, symbols, logos, slogans and colours of the parties shall be removed from the Register of Political Parties and such names, symbols, logos, slogans and colours shall not be available for registration by any person as a political party at the next election.
