TROUBLE IN RAILA’S CAMP AS ORENGO LEADS ASSAULTS ON BBI

One faction is pushing for amendments, while another wants bill taken to a referendum in its current form

Allies of former Prime Minister Raila Odinga’s are sharply divided on how to proceed with the BBI Bill.

This played out just a day after the joint parliamentary team submitted their reports to the speakers of the National Assembly and the Senate.

While some MPs are pushing for an amendment to the Kenya Constitution (Amendment) Bill, 2020, another faction is demanding that the document is taken to the referendum in the form it was submitted to the IEBC.

Siaya Senator James Orengo and MPs Otiende Amollo (Rarieda) and TJ Kajwang’—all members of the joint Justice and Legal Affairs Committee that was considering the Bill—have been pushing for amendments, arguing that Parliament cannot play a ‘flower girl’ role in the crucial law change process.

The division escalated yesterday after 11 MPs from Luo Nyanza came out to contradict the position earlier taken by the Orengo team, demanding that not even a comma be added or removed from the Bill.

Tellingly, the Orengo team gave the Serena press conference a wide berth, confirming the building implosion in the Raila camp.

There is disquiet in ODM circles that Raila’s troops have been the BBI’s engine, a document seen by critics to favour Mt Kenya, yet President Uhuru Kenyatta has not demonstrated intentions to back Raila for the presidency in 2022.

However, MPs led by Ugunja’s Opiyo Wandayi expressed opposition to any alteration of the Bill, including correction of the alleged typographical errors identified by the joint committee.

Wandayi is also ODM’s director of political affairs. He described attempts to correct the minor errors as a ploy to derail and scuttle the referendum process.

“The latest effort to derail the handshake and the BBI is the contest over the contents of the Constitution of Kenya (Amendment) Bill as proposed by the BBI,” Wandayi said.

“It is in this context that we have convened here as elected leaders of the Luo community to express singular and undivided support for the BBI Bill as endorsed by the people of Kenya and the majority of county assemblies.

“We reject any attempt to alter that Bill whether the alteration is for grammar, the flow of sentences, the wording of law or semantics.”

The leaders said they were speaking on behalf of the Luo community.

Besides Wandayi, others were Gladys Wanga (Homa Bay Woman Rep), Eve Obara (Kabondo Kasipul), Peter Masara (Suna West), Jared Okelo (Nyando), James Nyikal (Seme), Aduma Owuor (Nyakach), Ong’ondo Were (Kasipul), Gideon Ochanda (Bondo), Walter Owino (Awendo) and Tom Odege (Nyatike).

They called on the Luo nation to disregard any confusion around the BBI and back the Bill, which they said seeks to right all the wrongs that have seen the community suffer during every election cycle.

The BBI, they noted, is a welcome effort to make election violence a thing of the past.

“No community has suffered the ravages of election violence like the Luo from 1992 to 2017. There are our people who were displaced from many parts of the country never to return in 2007-08 violence. Hundreds were killed. Many businesses were looted never to recover,” Wandayi said.

“We urge all Luo leaders, all our people in our four counties of Siaya, Kisumu, Homa Bay and Migori to ignore negative forces, ignore those who want to do things the same old way, and embrace BBI and support President Uhuru Kenyatta and his brother Raila Amolo Odinga. Any other route will take us to the very same destinations we have been to before.”

But speaking to the Star on the phone, Otiende said he was not aware of the briefing terming the comments premature.

“I do not know why anyone should find it necessary to call a press conference to say what will be said in Parliament, anyway, and that which is already in the report,” he said.

“The recommendation is that we support the Bill, I don’t know how anyone can comment on a report that they have not seen or read.”

The Rarieda MP maintained that the Wandayi team should have waited for the report to be tabled in the house before commenting on it.

“The report was only submitted to the speaker this morning (Monday). I thought anyone who wants to comment on the report at least waits and sees the report. You cannot comment on the basis of what the newspapers say about the report,” Otiende said.

Source: The star