Musalia Mudavadi, the architect of the National Super Alliance Coalition (Nasa), has criticized his former political partners for entering into post-election pacts with the ruling party, Jubilee.
Speaking a day after Wiper Democratic Movement and Chama Cha Mashinani signed post-election cooperation deals with Jubilee, Mudavadi said the new entities are not legal entities since the parties are yet to formally exit Nasa.
“If you develop a pattern or habit that you can enter a coalition or agreements and then break them at will, it will only be a matter of time and people will come to the conclusion that if you enter into any agreement with these individuals you are in trouble because they have a reputation of not honouring what they signed up to,” said the Amani National Congress leader.
So far, the Orange Democratic Movement, Wiper Party and the Chama Cha Mashinani have signed a post-coalition cooperation deal with the ruling party, leaving only Ford Kenya and ANC in Nasa.
However, Mudavadi warned that the new Jubilee pact may not be legal since his former partners have not yet legally exited Nasa.
“If you are truly unhappy with Nasa, then cast the first stone…Some people want to do something but they want to make others look bad…they want others to be seen as the ones who walked out of Nasa and betrayed what we stood for,” said Mudavadi.
The ANC leader dared his former allies who are trooping to Jubilee to formally exit Nasa.
“What we have now is largely a speculative debate where politicians and the media and every other Kenyan are imagining what kind of different political formations we can have in place. None of them has crystallised into a legal formation yet,” said Mudavadi.
Despite the tribulations facing Nasa, Mudavadi has been engaged in highly-publicised activities as he seeks to build another super alliance.
Last month Mudavadi, his Narc Kenya counterpart Martha Karua, former Gatanga MP Peter Kenneth and former MP Sally Kosgei held a meeting at Nairobi’s Runda estate where, according to a press statement released later, “they discussed the challenges facing the nation and agreed to, jointly with other like-minded people put heads together in search of sustainable solutions.”
The meeting came hot on the heels of similar others that Mudavadi had held with an array of politicians allied to Deputy President William Ruto.
Mudavadi, Karua and Kenneth were unsuccessful presidential candidates in the 2013 General Election.
During the talks, a declaration was made to support President Uhuru Kenyatta and Opposition leader Raila Odinga in their bid to unite Kenyans, with Kakamega Governor Wycliffe Oparanya, his Bungoma counterpart Wycliffe Wangamati and Devolution Cabinet Secretary Eugene Wamalwa as the community’s spokesmen.
On the other hand, Mudavadi, Karua and Kosgei were part of the 2008 Serena Peace talks chaired by former United Nations Secretary-General, the late Kofi Annan, that brokered the accord that led to the formation of the Grand Coalition Government.
The Runda meeting came the same day that some Luhya leaders were hosted by trade unionist Francis Atwoli at his Kitengela home to discuss the perennial subject dubbed ‘elusive Luhya unity.’
Just this week, Oparanya and Wamalwa had to fend off attacks that they are being used to scuttle efforts to unify the Luhya community.
Amidst the Jubilee’s neutering of opposition parties, Mudavadi’s only remaining partner in Nasa Moses Wetangula has been fighting for his political career having lost his post as Senate Minority Leader to James Orengo and nearly being kicked out of Ford-Kenya leadership.
Wetangula is now putting down a rebellion that saw him temporarily ejected as party leader, a manoeuvring Musalia claimed was engineered by Raila Odinga’s party, ODM.
Raila’s party was the first to ‘walkout’ of Nasa after the former Prime Minister entered into a post-election coalition dubbed handshake with President Uhuru Kenyatta on March 9, 2018.
But the Uhuru-Raila handshake has been credited with ending political tensions resulting from two bruising General Elections that nearly split asunder the country.
