Journalist accused of creating and spreading fake nude photos said to belong to Kakamega Senator Cleophas Malala have admitted to having been hired by sports CS Rashid Echesa to tarnish the Senator’s image.
Cleophas Malala and CS Echesa have been embroiled in a nasty political duel with Malala accusing Echesa of disrespecting AU’s High envoy for Infrastructure Development Raila Odinga.
CS Echesa is a selfless defender of the deputy President William Ruto and has often refered to Raila as a nobody, a trend that has not augured well with many political leaders from the Western Region led by Cleophas Malala.
Echesa took their beef a notch higher by paying some journalists to photoshop Malala’s image to portray him in a compromising situation with a non-existent woman.
Malala got wind of the staged plan to tarnish his image and acted quickly enough by alerting the police who responded by arresting three journalists who have since admitted to be CS Achesa’s hatchet men. The three journalists are David Ndolo, Stafford Ondego and Alex Njue.
According to Malala and the police, they allegedly took the senator’s image, cropped the head and placed it on a naked body.
Malala said there was a demeaning photo of the said official in a lodging with a woman in a compromising position.
“When the photo went viral, the official told the journalists to photoshop the image and replace his face with mine,” Malala said.
“I was tipped about what happened and I got police to arrest the journalists,” Malala said at Bunge Media Centre on Wednesday.
Malala further claimed that Echesa paid the journalists Sh5,000 through M-Pesa,a claim that has been confirmed by the journalists in question.
Cleophas Malala and Sports CS Rashid Echesa have been engaging in a war of words ever since Malala became CS.
Echesa once cautioned Mr. Malala to stop taking ill of the deputy president William Ruto since it is the DP that actually built him his home at a cost of 7 million shillings.
“It’s so unfortunate that my brother Malala is calling the Deputy President a thief yet Mheshimiwa Ruto built a Sh7 million house for him when he was still an MCA.” Rashid told host Ken Indimuli of Bungoma based Nyota TV.
“It’s me who took Malala to Mr Ruto’s home in Eldoret where Malala begged for a house because he was still staying in a rental house, a whole MCA.”
Malala on the other hand has often referred to Cs. Rashid Echesa as a class 7 dropout who didn’t even understand his roles as a CS.
The political battle for supremacy between these son’s of Luhyia land seem not to be ending soon. It might infact get worse an even have other casualties in form of their die-hard supporters.
On July 29, three people were injured after rival supporters of the two clashed in Mayoni ward, Matungu after a rally. Malala complained that the CS had allegedly sponsored the attack on his convoy which he denied.
Is this how deep corruption has eaten the society?