Unfulfilled promises leave Wajir residents more disgruntled in Uhuru’s second visit

President Uhuru Kenyatta waves during Wajir rally on Saturday. (Courtesy)

WAJIR—Jubilee leaders spent the better part of Saturday in Wajir County as President Uhuru and William Ruto used their second visit to welcome defectors to the party.

Eldas legislator Aden Keynan, Tarbaj MP Mohamed Elmi, Wajir senator Abdirahman Olow, Wajir County deputy governor Abdihafidh Yarrow, Wajir West and North members of parliament Abdikadir Ore and Mohamed Saney respectively declared their defection to Jubilee party from ODM.

They were welcomed by DP Ruto and Uhuru as well as the Leader of Majority in the National Assembly Aden Duale.

Duale said the region has never been well represented as Uhuru’s admistration has done.

“Your father’s (Mzee Kenyatta) administration, Moi’s and Kibaki governments did not include Somalis and Muslims to the level we’ve had in Jubilee,” the Garissa legislator said.

He was echoed by Tourism Cabinet Secretary Najib Balala and his Industrialisation counterpart Aden Mohamed who argued that the Jubilee government enjoined more Muslims and Somalis in the high positions without a prior agreement before the 2013 elections.

They named Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed, Najib Balala, Majority Leader Aden Duale, Tourism PS Fatuma Hirsi and the Industrialisation CS Aden Mohamed.

“The Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) signed an MOU with the Muslim community before the 2007 elections, but the Jubilee government has not gone to that level since we believe in inclusive government,” Najib Balala said.

The same argument was used  by the DP Ruto who was a fellow Pentagon member in the 2007 ODM election leadership.

“Our agenda is all inclusive and no region will be marginalized,” Ruto said.

Soko Mjinga eviction

Eldas MP Aden Keynan said local women who trade vegetables and fresh produce at the local market are threatened by eviction order by a private developer.

“Those women need your help in addressing that problem because the private developer maintains that the land belongs to him,” he said.

“Soko Mjinga is the biggest market in Wajir and if the eviction order sees the light of the day, the mothers will lose their source of livelihood,” Wajir senator Olow said.

Wajir East member of Parliament Abass Sheikh Mohamed reminded the president of the promise he made in his  last visit. “Mr President, you said you will deliver a high capacity engine for the local KPLC (Kenya Power and Lighting Company). We remain under constant power outage,” he said, expressing the message most resident came to hear Uhuru address.

In his maiden visit to the county on the 20th May last year,Uhuru pledged that he would deliver the engine to address the power outages “in two weeks” since the town is served by an old low capacity engine.

In his defense, the president promised, once again, that he would deliver the engine without offering a specific timeline.

National Youth Services

To empower the youth, President Kenyatta said the National Youth Service – through the Youth Empowerment program – will employ 1000 young people from the Wajir.

“In the next six months, we will use Kshs 53 million in paying the youth of Wajir County under this program. That is part of our efforts to improve the lives of Kenyans,” the Head of State said.

At the end of the rally, a lot of people left the venue disappointed because their leaders failed to express their concerns and deep-seated fear.

The president, apart from launching any government project, did not discuss much when he was handed the microphone to address the resident and his speech lasted less than ten minutes.

In this visit, the president launched a single project—open the Jubilee office in Wajir County.

All across the 56-minute public rally at Orahey, chants of NASA and Joho could be heard although the speakers did not bother to react.