Raila’s Internal Task Force Exposes the Decay in ODM Causing its Lose in Popularity

A task force constituted to unmask why ODM did poorly in 2017 has reported that the party’s primaries have been described as the biggest vice of the party.

Party nominations have been blamed for the weakening of the party, and the loss of many good members of the party. The party elections are thought to lack credibility and do not meet the standards of being free, fair and democratic.

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It accuses the ODM Secretariat, the National Executive Committee and National Elections Board of running down the party by bungling primaries.

The consequence of the bungled polls, the report states, caused mass walkouts of both supporters and aspirants, leaving ODM weakened.

The Secretariat is headed by executive director Oduor Ong’wen; Nominated Senator Judy Pareno chairs the party’s NEB.

National chairman John Mbadi chairs the NEC.

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“The party structures, especially the NEC, NEB and the Secretariat, have been blamed for conducting their business in a manner that is not transparent and accountable and [they] are thought to be in the business of deliberately staging for the chaotic and violent elections as a way of facilitating favourites to end up as nominees of ODM for the general elections.”

Most ODM members interviewed returned a harsh verdict on Ong’wen’s team, saying the Secretariat has failed to effectively run the core party functions.

“Grassroots party programmes are non-existent, especially outside the election season. ODM’s popularity at the grassroots is not backed with activities unless there is an election,” the report states.

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Consequently, ODM may abandon universal suffrage for Electoral College system in conducting party primaries.

The new move of picking candidates for the party in elections by use of delegates instead of elections at polling stations was suggested by the task-force.

The report was represented to party leader Raila Odinga on Monday at a Nairobi hotel when he chaired a National Executive Council (NEC) meeting.

The task-force, chaired by lawyer Catherine Muma, argues that the current system (universal suffrage) was archaic and often resulted in violence, voter bribery beside being an expensive affair.  The team was of the opinion that if the Orange outfit trusted delegates to elect grassroots and national officials, it would also be okay if the delegates picked candidates.

The internal report of the five-member team chaired by Mumma called over-reliance on Raila “a big problem”.

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The ODM electoral performance has declined over the years, with the party having moved from 100 of 210 MPs in 2007, to 78 of 290 MPs in the 2013 elections, and finally to 58 of 290 in the 2017 elections.There has been a similar decline across all elective cadres. In the 2013 and 2017 General Elections, under the Constitution of Kenya 2010, ODM experienced declines in the number of elected governors (from 16 in 2013, to 13 in 2017).The number of elected Women Reps declined from 15 in 2013, to 11 in 2017, while that of elected MCAs reduced from 382 of 1,450 in 2013, to 333 of 1,450 in 2017.The only increase was among the number of elected Senators that went up from 11 in 2013 to 13 in 2017

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