Speaker accused of being architect of Makueni County crisis

WOTE: House minority leader John Mwenze has accused the assembly’s speaker of being the architect of wrangles in the county.

Mr Mwenze , who is also the Nguumo ward rep, told the commission hearing a petition to dissolve the county government that Stephen Ngelu was to blame for the squabbles rocking the county as he had fuelled division among assembly members.

He said his actions had made it difficult for meaningful development to be realised.

Mwenze told the Mohamed Nyaoga-led commission that the assembly was divided down the middle, with one camp supporting Governor Kivutha Kibwana and the other the speaker.

He said the speaker always allows MCAs allied to him to hold sway in all matters of the assembly, with the pro-Kibwana MCAs even being kicked out of crucial assembly committees.

“If you are perceived to be supporting the governor, you become an automatic enemy of the Speaker.

“I am a casualty of that discrimination because I was non-procedurally removed as vice chairperson of the County Public Service Board,” Mwenze, a member of Prof Kibwana’s Muungano Party, told the commission.

He claimed there was open bias even during selection of MCAs to go on foreign trips, with the pro-speaker MCAs always being given first priority.

Mwenze appealed to the commission to try and reconcile the warring groups, noting that dissolving the county may not necessarily solve the leadership crisis in area.

He caused laughter when he said he feared he and majority MCAs in the assembly may not come back should the county government be dissolved and a new election held.

“Dissolving the county government should not even be an option,” he said.

Peter Mwanthi, representing a lobby group called Makueni County Amani Association, found himself hard-pressed to explain whose interests he was championing.

STINGING QUESTIONS

Kibwana’s lawyer Wilfred Nyamu also took him to task over a statement he said had been authored by the assembly’s lawyer, yet he claimed to represent a neutral entity in the matter.

The lawyer put him on the defensive with a series of other stinging questions, forcing him to seek protection from the commission’s chairman.

“The way he is pushing me is like he is going to punch me the next minute,” he said.

He, however, admitted that part of his statement had been authored by the assembly’s lawyer.

He told the commission the petition to dissolve the county government was not ‘pro-people’ and lacked merit.