Cabinet reshuffle The cabinet and the government are an awkward mix of four factions: a) old guard politicians almost all Kikuyu or Meru who were prominent in Jomo Kenyatta's government in the 1960s and 70s and took charge of State House in the early days immediately after Kibaki's election; b) new guard and technocratic politicians led by the tough Justice Minister Kiraitu Murungi but drawn from a wider ethnic base with a clear agenda for economic and social reform; c) Odinga's LDP and its supporters who can command votes from more than 60 MPs; d) the independents including some of Kombo's Ford-Kenya and some waverers from the NAK and LDP factions who are a force for cooperation in the coalition...
Kenya group doesn't want to reduce the presidency's powers although 18 months ago the same politicians argued that Moi (and his Kikuyu predecessor Jomo Kenyatta) had skewed powers to the executive and destroyed Kenya's Independence constitution...
Some in Odinga's camp fear a replay of 1966 when his father Jaramogi Oginga Odinga walked out of Jomo Kenyatta's government and took just three MPs into opposition...
The LDP group claims that the Kikuyu and their allies want everything as under the late President Jomo Kenyatta and have coined the term 'Mount Kenya Mafia' to discredit Murungi Michuki and their allies Chris Murungaru (Minister of State) and Finance Minister David Mwiraria (the 'Four Ms')...
Under Moi and his predecessor Jomo Kenyatta the constitutional powers of the Presidency were sharply increased at the expense of the other two arms of government...
Some draw parallels between Mount Kenya and first President Jomo Kenyatta's inner circle with its combination of powerful political and economic influence...
(Persecution complexes abound in western Kenya where people remember Kikuyu dominance during the era of the late President Jomo Kenyatta father of Uhuru...
Professor Nick Gatheru Wanjohi a senior KANU official in the 1980s who only recently joined NARC was appointed Vice-Chancellor of the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture; the students soon went out on strike...
Vol 43 No 25 |
- KENYA
- ZIMBABWE
Moi the mild-mannered disciple of first President Jomo Kenyatta and scorned by the Kikuyu elite now asserted himself as a political hard man...
Jomo Kenyatta was dead Moi is still alive with all his political wits about him...
Moi agreed at length in stilted Kikuyu that the son of Jomo Kenyatta Kenya's first President would make a fine third president...
When the British colonial authorities released Mzee Jomo Kenyatta from gaol Oginga Odinga made way and backed him for national leadership and was later gaoled for threatening Kenya's conservative status quo...
The betting is off for an historically neat succession in which President Daniel arap Moi hands over to Uhuru Kenyatta the leadership of the Kenya African National Union; Moi took over when Uhuru's father Jomo Kenyatta first President of independent Kenya died in 1978...