(KDRTV) – Deputy President William Ruto has met former Kibra parliamentary aspirants in a move interpreted as trying to strategize for 2022 polls.
Former Harambee Stars midfielder McDonald Mariga and former NASA strategist Eliud Owallo both unsuccessfully ran for the Kibra by-elections in November last year but lost out to ODM candidate Imran Okoth.
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Mariga, who ran on a Jubilee ticket and supported by Ruto, came second in the polls with 11,230 votes, while Owallo came a distant third with less than 3,000 votes. He ran on an ANC ticket.
With football star @MarigaOfficial and politician @EliudOwalo at Karen residence, Nairobi County. pic.twitter.com/LeBVk7VW9R
— William Samoei Ruto, PhD (@WilliamsRuto) November 11, 2020
Owallo ditched ANC for Ruto’s Tanga Tanga movement in September this year and has been one of the strategists working on the DP’s entry into the Nyanza region.
If Owallo and Mariga were to come together, it would be a formidable force that may kick Raila out of Kibra, a constituency considered to be baba’s political bedroom.
The two are from the dominant Luo communities, and working together is likely to create a formidable force in the constituency.
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Mariga has gone underground since losing the elections a year ago. Perhaps it is time for him to avail himself to the electorate in Kibra and listen to people’s problems. Most of his critics accused him of not understanding the problems facing Kibra residents because he spent all his time in Europe, playing professional football.
Ruto wants a foothold in Nairobi politics, especially in slum areas where the hustlers live. Kibra is the best place to make a statement.
