Kisumu Governor Professor Anyang’ Nyong’o is a man under siege after his allies turned foes light a fire under his seat in a bid to drive him out of town as the second governor of the lakeside county.
The team led by Senator Fred Outa, immediate former Governor Jack Ranguma and CAS Ken Obura has promised to field one of their face off with Nyong’o during the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) party nominations.
Others include former Kisumu County Speaker Onyango Oloo and former senior county employees Patrick Ouya and Richard Ogendo who were both fired by Nyong’o.
The that team spoke after a consultative meeting in a Kisumu hotel vowed to rally their supporters to kick out the Nyong’o administration from office by fielding one amongst them to run against the incumbent.
Save for Ken Obura, the rest of the team played key roles in the removal of Ranguma from office and replacing him with Nyong’o during the last general elections.
Senator Outa led the campaigns against Ranguma, who is apparently his kinsman from Nyando, that culminated into Nyong’o being declared the winner in the middle of the night in Thurdibuoro, Nyakach constituency, several kilometers from the IEBC gazetted Kisumu County tallying center in town.
Outa was also the battery that ensured Nyong’os campaign power never went down, especially in Kano.
After the Monday consultations, Outa did not have very kind words for his friend turned political enemy.
“We have decided to rally behind one of us to send Nyong’o home on election day. This time round, there will be no Thurdibuoro for any dubious activities,” He said.
Ranguma, still smarting from the ouster at the ballot and losing a court petition afterwards fell short of declaring Nyong’o a failure.
He said the sitting Governor had let the people of Kisumu down by undoing some of the good things he had implemented.
He said; “I served Kisumu well but when Nyong’o came, he made sure everybody has felt a pinch of his mismanagement. He must be removed from office.”
Ranguma reiterated that he was willing to step down for one of his colleagues if that would be the only ticket to send home the governor.
”I have served as Governor and all the people here can also serve us. We shall give you one of us to face off with him,” He added.
Ouya, Ogendo and Oloo regretted offering their support for the Governor to clinch the seat only for him to turn around and kick them out of his administration in a show of betrayal.
They said Nyong’o had shown that he could not be trusted even with the development agenda of Kisumu.
Obura asked the Governor to voluntarily step down and consider going for national politics to help ODM leader in the looming political show down against William Ruto and consequently serve in the Raila Odinga government after the elections.
He took issue with certain people who had been campaigning for Nyong’o saying that Raila and ODM needed him for another term as government.
“When Raila becomes the 5th president of Kenya, he will need Nyong’o to help run the country in a national position, not as governor,” he said.
He dismissed reports that ODM had a preferred list for various political seats in the county.
It is widely expected that Governor Nyong’o will present himself for the ODM nomination to fly the party’s flag on August 9.