Sicily Kariuki: How Uhuru failed me in governor race and day Raila worsened it

In her new memoir, Breaking the Illusions, she claims Jubilee displayed a gender bias and that Mr Kenyatta did not keep his word on explaining to voters why she stepped out of the governor race and also did not follow through with a promise to reimburse her.

There was a titanic nomination battle in Nyandarua pitting Mrs Kariuki against the then incumbent governor Francis Kimemia. She had stepped down from the Cabinet to seek the seat, but Mr Kimemia also wielded influence and this had all the ingredients for a heavyweight clash.

In what must have posed a monumental dilemma to the Jubilee leadership in April of that year, a time when Kenya was mourning the death of its third President Mwai Kibaki, the party delayed giving out its ticket to a governor aspirant until the very last day — though the deadline was later postponed.

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On April 22, 2022, there was drama at the Jubilee headquarters as Mr Kimemia’s supporters demanded that he gets the ticket pronto. Insiders told the Nation that Mrs Kariuki had been offered the senator ticket but rejected it and stormed out of the meeting.

The watershed moment came on Friday, April 29, 2022 when she pulled out of the governor race “under coercion” as she puts it. She asserts that she was “very popular” on the ground by the time she withdrew from the contest.

Mr Kimemia would later lose the election to the current governor, Kiarie Badilisha of the United Democratic Alliance. Mr Kimemia got 52,197 votes against Dr Kiarie’s 158,268.

“I came face-to-face with a political party determined to keep me in a perpetual state of uncertainty as a plot was hatched to favour a male aspirant. As I invested my resources and garnered support from my family and friends, I not only championed my candidacy but also promoted the party among voters. The party, however, did not notice or care about my efforts, raising serious questions about its commitment to fairness,” writes Mrs Kariuki.

Her narration of the behind-the-scenes conversations over the nomination matter, contained in a chapter titled “The Price of Loyalty” show the dilemma she found herself in. Mr Kenyatta, possibly sympathetic to her plight, had asked her to return to the cabinet in the sunset days of his administration. He also promised to talk to Azimio la Umoja candidate Raila Odinga to have her in his cabinet if he took the top prize in the August 2022 General Election.

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Prior to Mr Kenyatta talking to her over the phone, emissaries had approached her to give her various alternatives. Mr Kenyatta’s call on April 27, she writes, built on the messages the emissaries had been delivering.

It is during that call that Mr Kenyatta told her that she could return to the cabinet, having resigned that February. She, however, saw a hurdle because this would be a new appointment that would require vetting by Parliament.

“What didn’t appear far-fetched was his assurance that he would negotiate with the Azimio leader to appoint me to his cabinet if he (Mr Odinga) won. I also told him that I had shouldered the campaign burden without any support from the party and that it would only be fair that I get some compensation, to which he promised to consider,” writes Mrs Kariuki, adding that Mr Kenyatta pledged to explain to Nyandarua voters that she got out of the race due to his request; that he promised to meet voters’ representatives as soon as he was done with Mr Kibaki’s burial.

“It shouldn’t surprise anyone that these ‘agreements’ are yet to be fulfilled,” she writes.

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Mrs Kariuki expresses disappointment at a visit by Mr Odinga to Nyandarua on May 5, 2022 where he made various announcements, among them that she had returned to the Cabinet and that Mr Kenyatta had asked him to appoint her as the Water CS if he became President.

Victory

“They were confident in Azimio’s victory and Raila’s visit aimed to pacify my supporters, who were angry that I was denied the ticket. I was indifferent since this (Mr Odinga’s announcement) is not what we had agreed with the party leader. I felt shortchanged,” writes Mrs Kariuki.

She notes that she agonised about the thought of returning to the Cabinet just four months to the polls . She knew it would draw sharp reactions from the public. She also writes that she suspects it might have been part of the game plan of the people who “had contributed to my being denied the ticket”.

“I consulted with my lawyer and my family and told them that returning to the Cabinet would be detrimental to my future plans. I believed that going back to the Cabinet would tarnish my image in the eyes of Kenyans. It could also be exploited by the opposition to harm my political career. Nonetheless, it was tempting to regain my salary, especially after heavy campaign spending had left me financially strained,” writes Mrs Kariuki, who notes that she would not be having the opportunities she has today if she returned to Cabinet.

“I would later encounter President Uhuru who inquired, ‘Why haven’t you come back to the office?’ I promised to call later. When we met in public a second time, he expressed his curiosity about my decision but by then, I had become politically wise and more attuned to the intricacies of politics,” she adds, noting that she rejected efforts to reconcile her with Mr Kimemia.

The Nyandarua intrigues are part of Mrs Kariuki’s narration of her career highs and lows, which begin from her days as an untrained teacher whose strictness led to a strike at Nyangwa Boys High School in 1986. She became a CEO at the age of 35, at the helm of the Fresh Produce Exporters Association of Kenya.

She notes that her career has spanned 32 years, in which she has held 12 jobs in nine organisations.

“That means that, on average, I have held each job for about two-and-a-half years, during which I have learnt many vital lessons on effective leadership and I am still learning,” writes Mrs Kariuki.

Her journey to the top echelons of Uhuru Kenyatta’s administration began when she applied to be a Principal Secretary (PS) in 2013 as the new administration of Uhuru Kenyatta and William Ruto gathered steam. “Many people were eager to be a part of the new administration under President Kenyatta,” she writes.

That saw her subsequently switch from the Tea Board of Kenya to be a PS and then eventually a CS.

During that time, she writes, there were times she agreed with the people who often say public service is a thankless job.

The book also takes the reader behind the scenes of Mr Kenyatta’s government in the face of scandals at institutions like the National Youth Service (NYS) and the Kenya Medical Supplies Agency; and key moments like the advent of Covid-19 in 2020.

In a chapter titled “Another NYS Scandal”, she revisits the year 2017, as Mr Kenyatta was campaigning for a second term, when claims of embezzlement of Sh9 billion hit the NYS involving top officials of the service and PSs. MPs were demanding her resignation and her family was shaken.

“Just around the time MPs wanted to impeach me, I recall one day returning home from work to find my two daughters quite traumatised. They had gone to the supermarket earlier in the day when a lady and a man approached them and asked, ‘Hello, are you not Sicily Kariuki’s daughters?’ The girls, so scared, scampered for safety. They never bought the items they needed,” Mrs Kariuki writes.

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The scandal would lead to the arrest of at least 20 suspects in May 2018, including the then NYS director-general.

The book also gives intimate details about Mrs Kariuki’s family life, for instance her upbringing in Embu where she would go for milk from the homestead of former Cabinet minister Jeremiah Nyagah, who was their neighbour, and admired the homestead.

She also writes about her husband, Kariuki Chege, who prefers to remain out of the limelight and also touches briefly on the death of her daughter in 2020. The daughter, Wendy Muthoni alias Noni, died on July 19, 2020 at the Nairobi Hospital.

“She was a third-year student at the university. To celebrate Noni’s short but impactful 21-year legacy, we established the Noni Kariuki Foundation (NKF) in her honour. The foundation helps us cope with the pain and brings profound meaning to her memory,” writes Mrs Kariuki.

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