Deputy President William Ruto has suffered a huge blow after seven aspirants in Matungu parliamentary by-election rejected his offer to withdraw their candidature for the United Democratic Alliance (UDA) party candidate.
According to a report by the Nation, the aspirants refused to drop their bid in order to support DP Ruto’s preferred candidate following a closed-door meeting in Nairobi.
UDA, a party associated with the deputy president is said to had invited a section of independent candidates from Matungu constituency but failed to convince them.
The aspirants later told the media that they had been duped into the meeting and have since dissociated themselves from the party maintaining that they will contest in the by-election without the support of any political party.
On January 7, 2021, the team was invited to Nairobi to meet UDA party leaders former Machakos Senator Johnston Muthama who is the party chairman and his former Kakamega counterpart Boni Khalwale, the deputy party leader with promises to get support from the wheelbarrow party.
The aspirants also rebuked Khalwale and the UDA leadership accusing them of deceiving the public that they had come together under the ‘Hustler unity’ in the by-election.
Each of the aspirants was invited individually and duped that a survey had been conducted and revealed that he was the most popular candidate and best placed to work with the DP.
However, they later realized that everyone of them were told the same thing raising suspicion.
The seven aspirants included former Constituency Development Fund (CDF) committee chairman Khamis Athman Wangara, Mr Murunga’s’s widow Christabel, former constituency manager Odanga Pessa, former Ford Kenya party youth leader Bernard Wakoli, Paul Posho, Seif Omoro and Anzelimo Kongoti.
“We got surprised when all of us met at Mr Muthama’s office in Gigiri. We were then told to move to Muthama’s home in Runda where we were asked to drop our ambitions in favour of Alex Lanya Wamukoya,” said Mr Wakoli.
Wakoli said that he rejected the proposal from DP Ruto’s team and stormed out of the meeting after discovering that they were being duped.
UDA is last week issued a certificate of nomination to Alex Lanya Wamukoya, a renowned contractor in Kakamega county.
