Lamu's Marubu ditches UDA, cites frustrations from Timamy

Lamu Woman Representative Muthoni Marubu. [Courtesy]

Lamu Woman Representative Muthoni Marubu has decided against joining the ruling United Democratic Alliance (UDA) to defend her seat in next year’s elections.

“The intention is hereby withdrawn. Neither I, my team nor my political allies will participate in further UDA mobilisation grassroots elections or party activities.”

The MP, who had been elected as an independent candidate in the 2022 elections also accused Lamu governor Issa Timamy of undermining her efforts to popularise party in the county.

In a letter to Timamy, who serves as a deputy party leader in UDA alongside Deputy President Kithure, the MP alleges that the governor frustrated her efforts to build the party grassroots after refusing to pick her calls to organise meetings.

Timamy got the deputy party post after the party on which he was elected, Amani National Coalition, dissolved and joined UDA.

Marubu said that she undertook the assignment after she was asked to by President William Ruto as part of his re-election bid.

She said that she had organised 42 grassroots meetings across the county in three months of mobilisation for the party that did not clinch a single seat in the county.

Marubu accused the governor of an attempt to stop elections in the county which was declined by the Elections Board.

“Having failed at the grassroots, you then sought to use your underserved position un the party to reverse a democratic process simply because its outcome did not favour your politics of ethnic exclusion,” she said.

She alleged that Timamy was not seeking a repeat of the elections in the county but only in her Lamu West stronghold while leaving his stronghold untouched.

“If this were genuinely about electoral integrity, the entire county would concern you. It does not. This is deliberate political sabotage.”

She alleges that the governor was running an inclusive administration citing the replacement of the late deputy governor and the neglect of the Mpeketoni hospital which mainly serves the Kikuyu community.

She said that ancestry does not determine belonging alleging that the 2014 killings in the county was perceived as ethnic cleansing.

Marubu said that the mobilisation was done in entire county and allegations that the Kikuyu community was unlikely to vote for President Ruto in next year’s elections was false.

“There are many members of the Kikuyu community in Lamu who would vote for President Ruto through our political persuasion and mobilisation. To dismiss an entire community as politically unreachable defeats the very purpose of political mobilisation.”

She also called for the deregistering of people that she and her team had registered to join the party.