{"id":19302,"date":"2020-12-17T21:02:47","date_gmt":"2020-12-17T21:02:47","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.com\/kenya\/?p=19302"},"modified":"2020-12-17T21:02:47","modified_gmt":"2020-12-17T21:02:47","slug":"raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/policy\/raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again","title":{"rendered":"Raila on his political grip, beef with IEBC and working with Ruto, again"},"content":{"rendered":"

AfricaPress-Kenya:<\/strong> Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga has always been a man carrying around an invisible weight.<\/p>\n

For ages now, he has carried the weight of the aspirations of millions of supporters and their undying quest for change.<\/p>\n

Then in 2018, in an apparent shift of direction, he announced that he and\u00a0President Uhuru Kenyatta would work together.<\/p>\n

Yet in that new direction that Raila took, he is still carrying a weight.<\/p>\n

\n
More recently though, especially after his party\u2019s candidate lost in the Msambweni Constituency by-election on Tuesday, the former prime minister is bearing a new weight \u2013 the weight of his words \u2013 that the outcome of the poll would be indicative of the popularity of the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) that he and President Kenyatta are aggressively pushing.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

It was evident in the way he leaned forward on his desk at his Capitol Hill Square office as he talked on the phone, as\u00a0ODM Director of Elections Junet Mohamed stood close by.<\/p>\n

In an unexpected turn of events, ODM\u2019s candidate lost to one of the party\u2019s own who left to vie as an independent candidate and who, to prove a point to the former PM, was backed by allies of Raila\u2019s nemesis Deputy President William Ruto.<\/p>\n

But if Raila\u00a0(pictured)<\/strong>\u00a0is unsettled by Omar Boga\u2019s loss to Feisal Bader, it is not because it portends a similar denial of the constitutional change drive he is championing.<\/p>\n

The ODM leader has been on a relentless drive to popularise the BBI initiative that is borne from his 2018 Handshake with President Kenyatta.<\/p>\n

But what is his personal interest in the document?<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was never meant to benefit Raila Odinga. I am just an individual. We are addressing national issues. We were not that selfish to look at ourselves. Raila will only be here today, tomorrow there will be someone else,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

Raila, while avoiding any discussion on a fifth attempt at the presidency, says his immediate interest is to ensure what he and Uhuru agreed on is implemented.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is why I do not even want to talk about 2022 because it is an event that will come and go and Kenya will remain,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

But Raila\u2019s immediate concern is the apparent reluctance of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) to play ball.<\/p>\n

The BBI secretariat delivered to the commission some four million signatures required in their push to have a referendum, but the IEBC insists that they do not have the funds for the verification exercise. Raila says IEBC\u2019s statement proved\u00a0why they do not have confidence in the electoral body.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey are in office and earning a salary every month, but elections are every five years, so what is it they do in office every day?\u201d he asks.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy do they need money to verify a signature? They need to use what they have.\u201d<\/p>\n

Raila\u2019s complaint against the commission is that it has been extravagant in its demands for money.<\/p>\n

\u201cIEBC must be brought down to earth and come up with realistic figures about the cost of running a referendum,\u201d he says. While he enjoys that status that has gotten him the president\u2019s ear, Raila\u2019s relationship with President Kenyatta has come with criticism that he has become a government apologist and the opposition subordinate.<\/p>\n

The former PM also now has to defend his inaction and silence over graft, and endorsement of those accused of corruption.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would be the last person to try and cleanse people who are accused of corruption,\u201d he says, \u201cwhat goes on in this country (corruption) pains me a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n

He also says he has not ceased fighting for democracy. \u201cWe are not quiet, as you can see we are not part of the Government.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yet, being a pseudo part of government is the very accusation levelled against him and the legislators in his party.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is not just opposition voice is missing, it is just that now we can do it in a different way, what is called constructive opposition where you don\u2019t just oppose for the sake of opposing but also offer solutions. My own Members of Parliament have been speaking up about several other issues in Parliament,\u201d says Raila.<\/p>\n

His language, initially one of agitating for the masses who were feeling oppressed by the Government, has mellowed.<\/p>\n

While the Government is taking flak for the poor management of the Covid-19 pandemic, Raila says it has performed well.<\/p>\n

He, however, insists that his comments recently to medics that they were holding the Government at ransom by threatening to strike while people were dying, were taken out of context. The former PM says he is not averse to working with Ruto.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey say politics\u00a0makes\u00a0strange bedfellows. We worked with Ruto before and he says that we chased him from ODM but we did not, he was the one who left,\u201d he says, agreeing to the possibility that he could work with Ruto again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

AfricaPress-Kenya: Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga has always been a man carrying around an invisible weight. For ages now, he has carried the weight of the aspirations of millions of supporters and their undying quest for change. Then in 2018, in an apparent shift of direction, he announced that he and\u00a0President Uhuru Kenyatta would work […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":19297,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,8,12],"tags":[235,493,2496,242],"class_list":["post-19302","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-homepage-english","category-policy","tag-bbi","tag-dp-william-ruto","tag-msambweni-by-election","tag-raila-odinga"],"yoast_head":"\nRaila on his political grip, beef with IEBC and working with Ruto, again - kenya<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga has always been a man carrying around an invisible weight.For ages now, he has carried the weight\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/policy\/raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Raila on his political grip, beef with IEBC and working with Ruto, again\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Former Prime Minister Raila Odinga has always been a man carrying around an invisible weight.For ages now, he has carried the weight\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/policy\/raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"kenya\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AfricaPressTunisiaa\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2020-12-17T21:02:47+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sites\/28\/2020\/12\/raila_unbowed_by_msa5fdae5ffa18e8.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"671\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"465\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"cfeditoren\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/policy\/raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/policy\/raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"cfeditoren\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/#\/schema\/person\/068c7ab4e9634ae78ec5d54ec46598bb\"},\"headline\":\"Raila on his political grip, beef with IEBC and working with Ruto, again\",\"datePublished\":\"2020-12-17T21:02:47+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/policy\/raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again\"},\"wordCount\":842,\"commentCount\":0,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/policy\/raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/static.africa-press.net\/kenya\/sites\/28\/2020\/12\/raila_unbowed_by_msa5fdae5ffa18e8.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"BBI\",\"DP William Ruto\",\"Msambweni by-election\",\"Raila Odinga\"],\"articleSection\":[\"all news\",\"homepage-english\",\"policy\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/policy\/raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/policy\/raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.africa-press.net\/kenya\/policy\/raila-on-his-political-grip-beef-with-iebc-and-working-with-ruto-again\",\"name\":\"Raila on his political grip, beef with IEBC and working with Ruto, again - 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