Mwakwere’s alliance with Narc-Kenya is finally over

Amb. Mwakwere

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The end of the game is on for the Government of National Unity (GNU). It is now obvious the union is bursting at the seams.
Transport minister and Matuga MP, Mr Ali Chirau Mwakwere, could go down in history as the first Cabinet member to quit Narc-Kenya.
The soft-spoken Matuga MP, who celebrated his 62nd birthday last week, is today expected to lead a group of leaders from the region in making a major announcement at Chandaria Hall in Mombasa.

"Narc-Kenya did not treat Coast leaders as an integral part of the party," said Mwakwere. The minister has been presumed to spearhead President Kibaki’s re-election campaign and has acted as a major stabilising force in the GNU.
By yesterday, sources said 16 of the 21 Coastal legislators will join Shirikisho Party of Kenya (SPK), among them three Cabinet ministers.

Shirikisho secretary-general, Mr Yusuf Abubakar, said the party would create the post of party leader and deputy leader for the newcomers.
‘’This is not in our constitution but we have deemed it fit to create the posts to absorb the newcomers,’’ said Abubakar. He reiterated that SPK was committed to ensuring unity among all Coast leaders. He said Shirikisho stood for unity of all Coast residents irrespective of their colour, religious background or ethnic group.

No replacement yet for Maitha

At the same time, he said the party was still affiliated to ODM-Kenya. "We will still talk to other parties that are ready to work with us,’’ he added.
Since the death of the former Tourism minister "Hurricane" Karisa Maitha — a political power horse who rose from Mombasa streets to the Cabinet and to regional supremacy by his pushy personality — there is yet to emerge a replacement. Currently many are nostalgic Coast politicians who don’t hide their ambitions to slide into the late Maitha’s big boots.
GNU members Makwere, Cabinet colleagues Mr Morris Dzoro, Mr Suleiman Shakombo and Assistant ministers Mr Ananiah Mwaboza and Mr John Kingi have lately talked in a manner to suggest that their duty in the unity is over, or they desire revised terms of engagement.
With Mwakwere acting as their spokesperson, the leaders have twice this year demonstrated their determination to deal with President Kibaki and his political projects on their own terms and not taking instructions from State House.

Their clearest signal yet was their decision to snub the just concluded Narc-Kenya grassroots polls, dismissing them as "Chama cha Mungatana", to spite Assistant minister Mr Danson Mungatana, who has emerged as the face of the party in the region.
But this did not come as a surprise, considering the group managed to blackmail and threaten senior Narc-Kenya leaders and Government officials into backing Magarini MP, Harrison Kombe, during the by-election in April.

To avoid an acrimonious fallout, Narc-Kenya gave in to their demands and supported Kombe after the MPs threatened to sponsor a Shirikisho candidate against a Narc-Kenya at all costs. Keen on a Coast-specific political brand, the leaders have raised the stakes a notch higher, and expectations are high about what party they choose to join or enter into alliance with.
It is this realisation that perhaps drove Mungatana to say Mwakwere’s departure was long overdue and the party was happy they had left.
Assistant minister and Narc-Kenya insider, Mwangi Kiunjuri, warned the two to quit their hostilities and ensure their wars did not spill over into Government operations.
Perhaps Kiunjuri had in mind the reckless and ugly exchanges between Tourism minister and his assistant, Mr Kalembe Ndile, which have spilled into the streets.
Kalembe’s jarring salvos into Dzoro are said to have been encouraged by the hostility the Coast Cabinet members have generated due to their insistence on joining another party to compete with Narc-Kenya.

However, Immigration Assistant minister, Mr Ananiah Mwaboza says they have no apologies to make and put Mungatana and Narc-Kenya on notice about a repeat of the referendum vote in 2005 when the Banana campaign associated with Narc-Kenya lost.
It is significant that Narck-Kenya has never launched the party at the Coast like it has done in other regions through public rallies.
The referendum defeat by the Orange campaign left Government–leaning Coastal MPs shaken, and they are said to have sponsored registration of United National Democratic Alliance (Unda) as a fall back should talks with Shirikisho fail.
It was particularly sobering that despite rigorous campaigns by Government, led President Kibaki, who liberally distributed goodies like land and titles, Coast voted "No" to the Wako Draft.
Signalling Mungatana that they will be taking the fight to Garsen, the Mwakwere group has invited leaders from Garsen and Tana River District. "Mungatana has only two choices: either join us or face us at the General Election. We will not be used as rubber stamps anymore. Any Coast MP who is not with the majority will have himself to blame," says Mwaboza.
Only occasionally tossed to the limelight like when caught accepting suspect offers from hotels as Labour Minister, being cast in unflattering light associated with Nairobi night life, denouncing a notorious British envoy who accused Cabinet members of vomiting on his shoes, Mwakwere has largely kept his peace, hardly ever noticeable in a crowd.

He is a complete opposite of his predecessors at Transcom House, former Cabinet minister, Dr Chris Murungaru, and Internal Security minister, John Michuki.
Mwakwere’s rebellion seems to be blooming late in life and is now the centre of attraction in the evolving political events at the Coast, and which have potential to influence things beyond the region, as they decide to enter into horse trading alliances with political groupings like ODM-Kenya, Narc-Kenya or Kanu. Until the Narc-Kenya brigade stirred the Coast last month with the just concluded grassroots poll, Mwakwere’s presence or absence never registered on the national radar.
Until 2002, he served in the Foreign Service, doing stints in Washington, Zambia, Qatar, Dubai, among others before coming home in 2002, and getting elected to Parliament through Liberal Democratic Party’s and Narc.

In Kibaki’s first Cabinet, he was an Assistant minister for Foreign Affairs, serving under Kalonzo. Top dogs like Maitha and Mvita MP, Mr Najib Balala, cast a shadow on him, until unexpected events beyond his control came to rescue him. Following the Busia plane crash, in mid 2003, that claimed then Labour minister, Ahmed Khalif among others, Mwakwere was elevated to a full minister, replacing Khalif. It is around this time that Mwakwere hit the headlines, when he was caught accepting complimentary treatment at a Coast hotel, whose management and employees had a labour dispute before his desk.
During the LDP insurgency that followed the MoU dispute, Mwakwere played good boy, for which he was rewarded with the plum Foreign Affairs docket following the demotion of Kalonzo to the relatively colourless Environment ministry.
His stint at Foreign Affairs coincided with the lowest point in relations with the increasingly assertive Kibaki’s State House and foreign envoys, who resented newly introduced etiquette for ambassadors and high commissioners to clear with Foreign Affairs before seeing the President, unlike before.

In late 2005, Mwakwere was to hit the round again, this time across Uhuru Park, thanks yet again to unexpected events: the Anglo Leasing monster that claimed his predecessor, Dr Chris Murungaru, and the historic Referendum on the Draft Constitution, that saw the entire LDP brigade kicked out of Government.
After the Government lost the referendum vote, President Kibaki threw out the rebellious LDP members from his Cabinet. This ended with another Cabinet re-organisation, which saw Mwakwere deployed to Transcom House on Upper Hill.
Mungatana has displayed little regard for Mwakwere. On Friday, he described him as running scared, fearing he may not be re-elected.

"If you have not worked for your constituents, you will be voted out, regardless of whichever party you join," Mungatana mocked Mwakwere.
For some, it has been apparent that Narc-Kenya’s high command never forgave Mwakwere over the Magarini by-election saga with Shirikisho.
This is the reason, the party’s rank and file stepped over Mwakwere, picking Mungatana as interim secretary-general besides doing all party business through the younger Garsen MP.
Whatever happens today will have far- reaching implications for Mungatana, GNU and Mwakwere’s political evolution, and will determine losers and winners.
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The Sunday Standard
By Gakuu Mathenge, Caroline Mango and Philip Mwakio