30th Jan 2017: ICC starts fresh probe on witness tampering

The ICC is quietly compiling evidence of witness tampering in the collapsed cases against Kenya’s top leadership in a move that may resuscitate The Hague narrative ahead of the August election.

The Star has established that a team of eight ICC sleuths is in Kenya to collect and collate evidence of what they believe was massive witness interference in the now-defunct cases against President Uhuru Kenyatta and Deputy President William Ruto.

The team is also in the country to monitor top political leaders, including those who were not indicted in the now-collapsed Kenyan cases. Impeccable sources said the ICC agents have been in the country since November.

They are largely drawn from Tanzania and Rwanda and speak fluent English and Kiswahili. In both high-profile cases, ICC Prosecutor Fatou Bensouda indicated that she could press for new charges, decrying political meddling, lack of cooperation and witness interference.

Already, three Kenyans - journalist Walter Barasa, lawyer Paul Gicheru and Philip Kipkoech Bett - have been slapped with arrest warrants for witness tampering in the Ruto case.

Yesterday, ex-defence lawyers in the crimes against humanity charges cases confirmed the presence of the ICC investigators in the country.

“They are in the country and are investigating claims of witness tampering. I have met some of them,” said one of the lawyers, who, however, declined to be identified.

Withdrawing Ruto’s case, Bensouda said the judges have not blocked her office from pursuing Ruto and journalist Joshua Sang “with the same charges in future, or in a different form in light of new evidence”.

Bensouda said 17 witnesses that had been lined up to testify were induced to pull out, dealing a blow to her case.

“Prosecution witnesses in this case were subjected to intimidation, social isolation and threats to prevent them from testifying,” Bensouda said on April 6, 2016. In the Uhuru case, Bensouda said tens of Mungiki insiders were killed in a strategic cleanup operation to eliminate key witnesses.

“Mungiki members said to have interacted with [President Kenyatta] in person during the PEV were killed or forcibly disappeared in an apparent cleanup operation after the violence.

The pretrial period was marked by attempts to bribe and intimidate key witnesses,” she told the judges.

She named Solicitor General Njee Muturi and Kabete MP Ferdinand Waitutu as among the powerful individuals who influenced her key witnesses to conceal Uhuru’s involvement in the bloodshed.

Other sources said that the eight ICC investigators now in Kenya are trailing, filming and tape-recording top politicians on the campaign trail.

Among their key targets are President Kenyatta, DP Ruto and opposition leader Raila Odinga.

They are said to be working closely with some civil society groups to conceal their mission and are keen on obtaining both video and audio recordings of key meetings.

When the 2007 post-election violence happened in 2007, the ICC did not have investigators on the ground in Kenya and relied on local NGOs.

The judges however demolished some of the evidence and accused the prosecution team of doing a bad job.

It remains unclear whether the ICC could also be gathering evidence for possible violence before, during or after Election Day August 8.

The Star called the ICC outreach co-coordinator to Uganda and Kenya, Maria Kamara, five times, but she did not answer our calls. We also sent SMSs, which she has not respond to since Friday.

On Friday, we also emailed ICC spokesman Fadi el-Abdallah but there was no response too.

Among the issues that the Star wanted to clarify is if the ICC was watching Kenya during the political campaigns into the next general election and a confirmation that the court had dispatched its investigators into the country.

In the 2007/2008 post-poll investigations, the ICC relied heavily on the reports of local human rights groups and government agencies such as the spy agency NIS and the National Police Service.

The report by the Justice Philip Waki probe – the Commission of Inquiry into the Post-election Violence (CIPEV) – was the backbone of the subsequently flopped investigations that led to the collapse of the Kenyan cases at the ICC.

ICC Chief prosecutor Fatou Bensouda during the 10th Anniversary of the ICC - Social Event at City Hall in The Hague, 13 November 2012 Photo/ICC

Human rights groups such as the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights were among the organisations that provided evidence to ICC investigators of events in the country before, during and after the disputed election.

Six Kenyans, among them Uhuru and Ruto, were charged at the ICC with crimes against humanity.

The other suspects were radio journalist Sang’, former police commissioner Hussein Ali, former Cabinet minister Henry Kosgey and former Head of Public Service Francis Muthaura. The cases against the six VIPs were all dropped by the court, across a five-year period.

The Star has learnt that, as a result of the renewed ICC investigators, Inspector General of Police Joseph Boinnet was advised to set up a special team that will monitor all top politicians during the election period. The rationale is to have the police top brass covered in the event the ICC re-opens investigations against Kenya.

Boinnet, who spoke in Garissa last week, announced that the police will crack down on hate mongers during the campaign period.

“The National Police Service will deal very firmly with anyone who breaches electoral or Public Order laws or any other law for that matter”.

“We will be very firm with any persons who incite others, hire goons or seek services from outlawed criminal groups,” said Boinnet.

Mysticism and politics: Uhuru the rainmaker

By OSCAR OBONYO
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President Uhuru Kenyatta is shielded from heavy rains during the passing-out parade of servicemen and women at NYS Training College in Gilgil, Nakuru in 2014. PHOTO | FILE | NATION MEDIA GROUP 

Summary

• Andrew Kwena, a former senior civil servant who worked in the then intelligence outfit, describes Jomo Kenyatta as a very powerful and intimidating individual.
• Former Cabinet minister, Musa Sirma, explains that Moi settled for a gold-tipped ivory stick.
• The senior Kenyatta has claimed in his Facing Mount Kenya autobiography that one of his ancestors possessed divine powers.

Mysticism has long played a part in politics, hence the claim that President Uhuru Kenyatta was directly responsible for the sudden rain that recently pounded Nyeri County. 

Mysticism, alongside faith and intuition, may be the less scientific and reliable modes of knowledge in political inquiry, but are as exciting and believable to some.

Such is the case of the President, who started his voter registration drive meeting in Nyeri on January 20 with a short prayer in Kikuyu language, asking God to bless the community with rainfall. Strangely, the meeting was disrupted by an immediate heavy downpour. 

While some say this is sheer coincidence, other political supporters of Mr Kenyatta believe he possesses mystical powers. Indeed the development has generated a lot of excitement on social media with some people even viewing the President as a prophet. 

Coming at a time when Mr Kenyatta is in the middle of a crucial lap in this year’s political contest, historian Prof Macharia Munene opines that the rainfall — according to local belief — denotes good luck and symbolises the anointment of Kenyatta as the appropriate leader.

Such a deduction might neither be empirical nor rational, but it represents the beliefs that political players play on to build a strong support base. Kenya’s first President Jomo Kenyatta and first Vice-President Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, for instance, were revered and feared in equal measure because of their perceived supernatural powers.

Having staged their political activities during the pre-independence period, the duo and other leading politicians had to engage in secretive manoeuvres to evade arrest from the colonial government officials.

Owing to their well designed intelligence networks, Prof Munene says Kenyatta and fellow freedom fighters managed to evade arrests sometimes by a whisker — an act that convinced locals and troops allied to Colonial Governor Sir Evelyn Baring into believing they operated in mysterious circumstances. 

“Before his eventual arrest and trial in Kapenguria in 1952, for instance, Jomo Kenyatta had completely eluded traps laid by the colonialists. At one point, when completely cornered, he jumped onto a lorry transporting sacks of potatoes,” recalls the historian.

The senior Kenyatta himself has claimed in his Facing Mount Kenya autobiography that one of his ancestors possessed divine powers.

POWERFUL INDIVIDUAL

Andrew Kwena, a former senior civil servant who worked in the then intelligence outfit, Special Branch, and later in the Customs Department, describes Jomo Kenyatta as a very powerful and intimidating individual: “He spoke more powerfully with facial expressions than words. When he looked at you straight in the eye, you involuntarily looked the other way. His eyes were piercing and searching.” 

Mr Kwena, who upon retirement joined politics, also rubbed shoulders with Jaramogi among other high-profile politicians. He describes the former VP as “completely puzzling” with regard to his outfit and demeanour: “Like one who was constantly being pursued, he liked moving around incognito by camouflaging himself like an ordinary individual.”

In his Luo Nyanza backyard, there was talk about his magical walking stick. He would use it to punish or bless his political rivals and allies alike.

If he did not like a particular leader, he pointed the walking stick at him consigning them to the political cold. Jaramogi, for instance, reportedly gestured in favour of one of the pioneer Kenyan female politicians, Phoebe Asiyo of Karachuonyo, in 1979.  

Even the second President, Daniel arap Moi, was not left out in the display of mysterious powers. Former Cabinet minister, Musa Sirma, explains that Moi settled for a gold-tipped ivory stick, or rungu in Kiswahili.

“Although this is more of a culture of the Kalenjin, it did the trick for Moi. Among our people, leaders must carry something which signifies power,” says the former Eldama Ravine MP. 

Indeed a lot of mystery surrounded the Moi rungu, with some proclaiming unknown dangers in the event former President lost the “magic stick” or forgot to carry it along.

All in all, Sirma and Munene opine that the supernatural power attributed to political leaders is largely the creation of men and women aimed at elevating their preferred politicians to a demigod level.

ODM official hurt in morning road crash

By NYABOGA KIAGE
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Kisii County ODM chairman Samuel Omwando's car after an early morning road crash on January 29, 2017. PHOTO | NYABOGA KIAGE | NATION MEDIA GROUP 

Kisii County ODM chairman Samuel Omwando is nursing injuries at Tenwek Mision Hospital after he was involved in a road crash at Kemera on Kisii-Nyamira road.

The 5.00am accident occurred after a matatu collided with Mr Omwando's car.

Mr Omwando's driver and one of his political aides escaped unhurt.

Speaking to the Nation on phone, Calvin Omwando said his father was complaining of chest and back pains.

“We are currently at Tenwek hospital and we have not talked with him because doctors are attending to him,” he said.

29.01.2017 Amina’s election will rest on her own clarity of vision for Africa

By PETER KAGWANJA
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Kenya's Foreign Affairs and International Trade Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed. PHOTO | DIANA NGILA | NATION MEDIA GROUP 

 Summary

• Amina Mohamed is heir to Kenya’s historic role fashioning the future of Africa.
• Projecting its soft power on the continent, Kenya has invested heavily in humanitarian diplomacy and disaster management.
• But Amina will bring to the AU leadership her immense experience, skills and solid achievements.

Fundamentally, Kenya is the best-suited country to lead the African Union after South Africa. For decades, Kenya’s founding fathers have contributed immensely to the African dream of a continent free of colonial domination, poverty, ignorance and disease.

As the Chair of the AU Commission, Kenya’s Foreign Minister, Amina Mohamed, will move Kenya’s African-centred and assertive foreign policy under President Uhuru Kenyatta to a whole new level.

Conceptually, Amina will mark the triumph of Kenya’s growing soft power capacity now driving its foreign policy.

However, Kenya’s soft power approach to African affairs has always had its ideological naysayers. Writing in Pambazuka news on November 17, 2016, Horace Campbell argued that: “Kenya cannot lead the African Union”.

But Campbell has a hard task backing up his boorish assertion with sensible evidence. Instead, he resorts to parroting of the run-of-the-mill lingo and half-truths – routinely masked for centuries as “knowledge of Africa” – about those African states considered non-leftist.

His assertions are disquieting: “From championing impunity for suspected masterminds of crimes against humanity, to frustrating total African liberation and unity by working in cahoots with Empire; from publicly supporting Israel’s desire to join the African Union, to being a major conduit for illicit financial flows from Africa; Kenya is fundamentally unfit to lead the AU.”

Even more bizarre is his conclusion: “Its [Kenya’s] candidate for Chair of AU Commission in the January (2017) election, Amina Mohamed, is part of a deeply entrenched kleptocracy that has ruined Kenya and actively undermined African interests for over half a century.”

However, beyond the fireside prattles and posturing by churlish armchair scholars, an Amina election will reveal Kenya as an epitome of new Africa – a continent reborn and steered by a new assertive African leadership, the “Uhuru generation”.

AFRICAN LIBERATION

Paying tribute to the architects of African liberation during his inaugural speech on April 9, 2013, President Kenyatta urged the spirits of the founding fathers to “rest in peace with the knowledge that this generation is committed to fulfilling their dreams.”

Amina Mohamed is heir to Kenya’s historic role fashioning the future of Africa. In the 20th century, Jomo Kenyatta, the country’s founding father, was one of the conveners of the seminal Fifth Pan-African Congress (PAC) held in Manchester from October 15-21, 1945, who subsequently led their countries to political independence and galvanised the formation of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU), the AU predecessor, in May 1963.

Additionally, Amina is a proud heir to one of humanity’s most spectacular armed freedom struggles in Kenya, which inspired Africa’s liberation icons such as Nelson Mandela, Ben Bella (Algeria), Agostinho Neto (Angola), Samora Machel (Mozambique) and Sam Nujoma (Namibia).

In the 21st century, Uhuru captures Kenya’s commitment to the African dream in his message to the nations of Africa and the African Union: “We assure you that in Kenya, you will continue to have a partner and an ally”.

In 2013, he unfurled Kenya’s most ambitious and assertive and Africa-centred foreign policy. “The future of Kenya”, he declared, “depends not only on our national unity but also on deepening our bonds with our brothers and sisters in East Africa and Africa as a whole.” The mantle of implementing this policy fell on Amina, Kenyatta’s topmost foreign affairs manager.

But Amina has rightly based her election bid on Kenya’s pivotal role in building the AU as a vehicle for what Mandela and Thabo Mbeki popularised as African Renaissance.

In the 2002-2004 hiatus, Kenya joined Africa’s efforts to establish a continent’s peace and security architecture as the primary instrument for promoting peace, security and stability as enablers of sustainable development on the continent.

SEARCH FOR PEACE

In the pursuit of this agenda, from 2005, Kenya has been the custodian of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) that saw the birth of Africa’s newest nation – South Sudan – in 2011. In Somalia, Kenya has spearheaded the search for lasting peace, war on terrorism and hosted Somali refugees.

In January last year, Kenya was elected, for the second time, one of the five member states serving for a three-year term in the powerful 15-member Peace and Security Council (PSC) of the African Union.

Projecting its soft power on the continent, Kenya has invested heavily in humanitarian diplomacy and disaster management.

In September 2014, the country gave $1 million (KSh 100 million) to Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia to help in the fight against the Ebola disease.

“Standing in solidarity with our African brothers and sisters during times of adversity is part of our foreign policy,” President Kenyatta said.

Further, Kenya has contributed to bolstering the capacity of Africa’s criminal justice system. During the AU Summit in January 2015, Kenya contributed $1 million (Sh100 million) towards the establishment of the African Court of Justice and Human Rights, the continent’s version of the International Criminal Court (ICC).

But Amina will bring to the AU leadership her immense experience, skills and solid achievements. “My credentials, especially in building consensus and carrying out reforms, are critical in bringing everybody together,” she said.

In less than four years as Cabinet Secretary for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Amina has successfully rebooted Kenya’s global image from a country facing the threat of international sanctions to a preferred destination for global trade, investment, massive flow of foreign direct investments (FDI) and events and people shaping the 21st century.

Significantly, Amina served as the host and co/chaired the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) 10th Ministerial Conference on December 15-19, 2015; the 14th session of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad) on July 17-22, 2016; and the Sixth Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD VI) on August 27-28, 2016, the first on African soil.

But Amina’s election will rest on her own clarity of vision on the future of Africa.

Prof Peter Kagwanja is the Chief Executive of Africa Policy Institute and Visiting Scholar at the University of Nairobi’s Institute of Diplomacy and International Studies (IDIS).

CIA dossier exposes intrigues of Kenyatta Odinga power games

By ELVIS ONDIEKI
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President Jomo Kenyatta with Vice President Jaramogi Odinga, in cap, during a past meeting. PHOTO | FILE | NATION MEDIA GROUP 

Summary

• Dossier discusses among the issue the way the Kenyan military ranks took a tribal dimension after the coup as Mr Moi strived to have a firm grip over the security agency.
• The document centred on the state of affairs after the September 1983 General Election in Kenya.
• Another document reveals how US spies followed closely the quarrels between Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania that led to the collapse of the East African Community.

It took a court order to compel the Unites States top spy agency to publicly release de-classified documents, and when it finally posted them online on Tuesday, it offered a treasure trove for those who would wish to know what Washington’s intelligence officials have been thinking about Kenya over the years.

From hints on how the US capitalised on the desire by former President Daniel arap Moi’s to be in control after the botched 1982 coup; to how US oil companies coerced founding President Jomo Kenyatta to relax sanctions on Idi Amin’s Uganda using the Mombasa port to what American presidents in the 1970s were told about Kenya in their daily briefings, the papers provide new insights into the undercurrents in Kenya’s political scene in the eyes of the US.

One of the documents posted on the website of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) details the realities of the Moi regime a year after the unsuccessful August 1, 1982 coup.

Among the issues it discusses is the way the Kenyan military ranks took a tribal dimension after the coup as Mr Moi strived to have a firm grip over the security agency.

“Mr Moi has long been uneasy about heavy Kikuyu representation in the military and has exhibited his prejudice by promoting members of his Kalenjin tribe into senior positions,” says part of the document released in 1983 by the US Directorate of Intelligence.

“The US embassy believes that the largely Kamba and Kalenjin senior ranks of the army are discriminating against middle-grade Kikuyu officers,” it adds.

The document centred on the state of affairs after the September 1983 General Election in Kenya.

“We believe Mr Moi will be able to remain in power over the next few years,” its authors said.

“No well-organised dissident movement or opposition leader with a strong national following has emerged. Moreover, Moi has shown a talent for outmanoeuvring potential opponents and for playing off the country’s ethnic groups against one another.”

WASHINGTON PROTECTION

Analysis of the document reveals how the US was confident Mr Moi would remain loyal to Washington for protection against the Soviet Union and other powers that may have considered sponsoring dissent against him.

“As long as Mr Moi continues to be in office, we believe that Kenya will retain its basically pro-US policy and will look to the United States for still greater economic and military aid in return for allowing continued US military access to Kenyan facilities,” it says.

Among the nearly one million documents released is also a report revealing the power battles between Mzee Kenyatta and one-time Vice-President Jaramogi Oginga Odinga in the 1960s, which are bafflingly similar to the duel between their sons that is currently at a crescendo ahead of the August General Election.

Titled Kenya’s Fight against Subversion, the document had been released earlier under restricted access. It can now be reached by anyone with an internet connection.

The paper was authored a month after Jaramogi, the father of Cord leader Raila Odinga, had resigned from his Vice President position under Mzee Kenyatta, the father of current President Uhuru Kenyatta.

Jaramogi’s family on Friday marked 23 years since he died.

CAPABLE ADMINISTRATOR

In the 1966 dispatch, he is described in not-so-rosy terms especially on the ethnic perspective his appointments took. Because of CIA’s belief that Jaramogi was being supported by socialist states, the negative perception is understandable.

Besides the Odinga-Kenyatta duel, it also explains how Mr Moi, then Interior Minister, was seen as a potential heir to Mr Kenyatta because he had made a reputation “as a tough, capable administrator”.

Another document reveals how US spies followed closely the quarrels between Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania that led to the collapse of the East African Community.

The 1983 report titled Kenya-Uganda-Tanzania: Uneasy Neighbours, authored by the US Directorate of Intelligence, betrays Washington’s aversion to Tanzania’s pro-socialism outlook, making it appear the US may not have been for the idea of Kenya teaming up with it.

As an analysis of the impact of the weakening ties, the authors state: “Kenya is likely to look to the United States for greater support as a result of rising tensions with its East African neighbours.”

They add: “Mr Moi’s view that the combined forces of Tanzania and Uganda are a serious military threat will provide added impetus to his requests for military aid.”

Another document shows US oil traders may have had a hand in making Mzee Jomo Kenyatta lessen port sanctions imposed against the dictatorial regime of Idi Amin.

“The Kenyan government has reportedly informed US oil company executives that all restrictions on the shipment of petroleum products to Uganda are lifted. This applies even to jet fuel,” says an August 21, 1976 report from “the situation room” labelled as top secret.

Many more topics are canvassed in the various available documents, which have caused a buzz worldwide for the information they have made known. However, many sensitive details are blacked out from pages, making some documents a hard read.

According to the BBC, previously the de-classified documents were only available on four computers in the back of a library at the National Archives in Maryland, US, between 9am and 4.30 pm daily.

“A non-profit freedom of information group, MuckRock, sued the CIA to force it to upload the collection, in a process which took more than two years,” says the BBC.

While announcing the release of the documents, CIA said the released batch consisted of 930,000 documents, totalling more than 12 million pages.

The CIA post quoted its Director of Information Management Joseph Lambert saying: “Access to this historically significant collection is no longer limited by geography. The American public can access these documents from the comfort of their homes.”

Uganda Commissions Region’s largest Solar Plant in Soroti

Honorable D’Ujanga Simon, Minister of State for Energy, together with representatives of Access Power, EREN RE and donors celebrated today the inauguration of the solar power plant in Soroti.

Made up of 32,680 photovoltaic panels, the new 10 megawatt facility is the country’s first grid-connected solar plant and will generate clean, low-carbon, sustainable electricity to 40,000 homes, schools and businesses in the area.

Credit: APO

The project was developed under the Global Energy Transfer Feed in Tariff (“GET FiT”), a dedicated support scheme for renewable energy projects managed by Germany’s KfW Development Bank in partnership with Uganda’s Electricity Regulatory Agency (ERA) and funded by the governments of Norway, Germany, the United Kingdom and the European Union. The GET FiT programme helps renewable energy sources become more affordable and therefore more accessible in Eastern Africa.

The $19 million Soroti Solar Plant is in part funded by the European Union – Africa Infrastructure Trust Fund through the GET FiT Solar Facility equivalent to 8.7 million euros in the form of result-based premium payments per kWh of delivered electricity.

The project is financed by a mix of debt and equity with the senior debt facility being provided by FMO, the Netherlands Development Bank, and the Emerging Africa Infrastructure Fund (EAIF).

Credit: APO

The inauguration ceremony was attended by Uganda’s Minister of State for Energy, Ambassadors from the EU, Germany and the Netherlands, as well as key stakeholders from Access Power and EREN RE; TSK, the contractor who built the plant; FMO and Private Infrastructure Development Group (PIDG) company, The Emerging Africa Infrastructure Fund (EAIF) as financiers, and other key officials.

The H.E. Ambassador Kristian Schmidt, European Union Head of Delegation to Uganda said in his speech: “Uganda is a good place to invest in solar energy. The regulatory framework is conducive and Government rightly recognises Uganda’s energy future must be renewable. It is great that this is now triggering private sector interest in solar power generation. The European Union is proud that our grant contribution ensures the realisation of the Soroti Solar Plant, and I hope this is only just the beginning for many more to come.”

The ERA Chief Executive Officer, Eng. Ziria Tibalwa noted, “that the Access Solar Uganda 10MW grid connected solar P.V project we are launching today is so far the largest in the East African region. We are so proud of this outcome of our stable and favorable regulatory environment that has produced such a leading project in the East African Region. We congratulate Access Solar and the people of Uganda upon this milestone.”

Distributed by APO on behalf of Access Power.

‘Mine Boy’ writer Peter Abrahams found dead in Jamaica

Peter Abrahams. His novel Mine Boy is one of his popular books. FILE PHOTO

SUMMARY

• The newspaper said Abrahams had experienced at least five break-ins at his home in four months in 2016, which resulted in an alarm system being installed.
• Mine Boy, which was a literature set book in Kenya in the 1990s, is considered the first African novel written in English to attract international attention.

Peter Abrahams, a South African-born Jamaican novelist, journalist and political commentator most popularly known in Kenya for his novel, Mine Boy, was found dead at his home in the Caribbean island nation on Wednesday, the Jamaican daily The Gleaner reported.

According to the newspaper, police reports said the 97-year-old was found dead in his remote Red Hills, St Andrew home in a pool of blood and investigators were uncertain about the cause of his death.

“They (police investigators) don’t have any reasons to suspect foul play, but they are not ruling out anything at the moment,” Superintendent Stephanie Lindsay, the head of the Jamaica Constabulary Force Corporate Communications Unit, told The Gleaner.

“Blood was found at the scene, but based on what the investigators are saying, there is a possibility he could have fallen from the wheelchair, but there is a lot of blood at the scene.”

The newspaper said Abrahams had experienced at least five break-ins at his home in four months in 2016, which resulted in an alarm system being installed.

Mine Boy, which was a literature set book in Kenya in the 1990s, is considered the first African novel written in English to attract international attention.

The book follows the life of miner Xuma and his humanitarian act of defiance against white brutality.

It highlights labour discrimination and appalling housing conditions in South Africa, exposing the conditions of blacks under white regime in the country. It was published in 1946.

I will spill secrets of how Uhuru rigged 2013 election, says Oloo

Summary

• Mr Oloo said the “files of secrets” he carried away from Jubilee Party would help the opposition alliance to defeat Mr Kenyatta in the August poll.
• Mr Oloo claimed Mr Odinga, who ran on a Cord ticket, won the last elections.
• Mr Sakaja and National Assembly Majority Leader Aden Duale said Mr Oloo defected to ODM to save his political career.
• Kabete MP Ferdinand Waititu accused Mr Oloo of being a traitor and said Jubilee was content with his defection.

Former TNA secretary-general Onyango Oloo on Wednesday said he would spill all the tricks that the Jubilee coalition used in 2013, including inflating the number of votes in its strongholds to help President Uhuru Kenyatta win the elections.

Mr Oloo, who ditched the Jubilee Party for Raila Odinga’s Orange Democratic Movement, said the “files of secrets” he carried away from the President’s party would help the opposition alliance to defeat Mr Kenyatta in the elections set for August this year.

He claimed Mr Odinga, who ran on a Cord ticket, won the last elections, adding: “I know what happened. Raila was to be sworn in as the President and I have a lot of secrets to that effect which I cannot share publicly.”

“It is not a laughing matter. I have come with a lot of secrets in several files that I will share with Raila as we prepare to take over the next government.” Mr Oloo said during a rally at Kisumu’s Jomo Kenyatta Grounds in a dramatic about-turn by one of the foremost staunch defenders of the Jubilee administration for the past four years.

Mr Oloo’s former colleagues in Jubilee, however, laughed off his claims, saying he had no access to any secrets.

Nominated MP Johnson Sakaja, who was the TNA chairman, said Mr Oloo was not privy to any secrets that he could sell to ODM.

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“He has nothing. All he dealt with was administration. There is nothing that we have to hide. We did our job and won the elections. There will be no such thing as rigging, unless he decides to make up stories,” he said by telephone.

Mr Sakaja and National Assembly Majority Leader Aden Duale said Mr Oloo defected to ODM to save his political career and should stop lying to the former prime minister.

POLITICAL SURVIVAL

“I think his move is just for his own political survival and to chart his political path. Beyond that, anything that is malicious is totally uncalled for.

"Political realignments are normal in this season, but first of all, to say you have moved with the infrastructure of TNA is false. The merger was never about any individual positioning but what we all believe in. The entire infrastructure understood that and moved to Jubilee,” said Mr Sakaja.

Mr Duale played down Mr Oloo’s defection, saying: “He has joined many other politicians who have defected from their parties to others. Nothing new in him going back to a party from his region.”

Speaking in Nyeri during the burial of Archbishop John Baptista Mugecha on Wednesday, Kabete MP Ferdinand Waititu accused Mr Oloo of being a traitor and said Jubilee was content with his defection.

The Jubilee Party was born out of a merger between President Kenyatta’s TNA, Mr Ruto’s United Republican Party and other, smaller parties.

Announcing his defection, Mr Oloo, who was received at the rally by Mr Odinga, accused the Jubilee administration of presiding over corruption, saying he would not allow his people to be in a “political outfit that didn’t have the interest of Kenyans at heart”.

“The Luo people have a saying that you can do business with a thief and a witch and remain clean but when you marry them you also become a thief and a witch,” said Mr Oloo.

Mr Odinga and Cord co-principals Kalonzo Musyoka (Wiper), Moses Wetang’ula (Ford Kenya) and Amani National Congress leader Musalia Mudavadi have joined forces in the National Super Alliance (Nasa) that they are hoping to use to kick out Jubilee in the elections.

MORE DEFECTIONS

Mr Odinga said he expected more defections and put the Jubilee administration on notice that it was living on borrowed time.

In what appeared to be a change of heart on electoral laws, the Cord leader said even with the changes, the opposition would beat Jubilee emphatically.

He said Nasa was the way to go, adding that even in Ghana, President Nana Akuffo-Addo won with 54 per cent against his rival's 43 per cent even as the country adopted a manual backup system in the polls. The former prime minister is on a tour of Busia, Siaya and Kisumu to rally residents to register as voters.

“They (Jubilee) are full of insults and their master of affronts is Deputy President William Ruto. We have persevered for long and cannot continue any more.

"We are approaching this election as a matter of life and death. We know their tricks of rigging and have sealed all the loopholes,” declared Mr Odinga.

'AMORPHOUS SECRETARIAT'

He added: “Oloo is our lost son who has ... left the enemies and returned home. We welcome him. We know he has a lot of secrets from our opponents to share with us. We will make use of them.”

Mr Oloo charged that forces allied to URP had hijacked the new Jubilee Party and claimed that politicians who had not played any role in bringing Jubilee to power had benefited and elbowed out the founders.

“TNA was neutral and was founded on ideologies we believed would take Kenya to the next level and unite them. However, little did we know we were being led into a vile and vicious political conmanship,” he said, adding that Jubilee is run by an amorphous secretariat led by a man whose party was not part of the Jubilee pact.

The secretariat is led by former Cabinet minister Raphael Tuju.

Additional reporting by Rushdie Oudia, Nelcon Odhiambo and Grace Gitau.