Anne Nderitu Should Quit- Azimio To Registrar of Political Parties

The Azimio la Umoja coalition, led by former Prime Minister Raila Odinga, boldly took on the Registrar of Political Parties Anne Nderitu over her handling of affairs of the Jubilee Party leadership.

The team comprising Raila, Kalonzo Musyoka, Martha Karua, and Eugene Wamalwa called for Nderitu to step down from the helm of the Office of the Registrar of Political Parties (ORPP).

In a statement read out by Wamalwa, the DAP-K party leader, during a press briefing on Wednesday, May 24, the coalition accused Nderitu of falling into a purported scheme by the Kenya Kwanza government to weaken political parties in their favour.

He claimed that political parties have lost confidence in her as her clients, accusing her of allowing President William Ruto's government to kill multi-party democracy.

Azimio la Umoja leaders during a press briefing on May 4, 2023. /RAILA ODINGA

“The Registrar of Political Parties Anne Nderitu must leave office in view of clear manifestations that she has been coopted into partisan and illegal schemes by Kenya Kwanza to cripple instead of protecting political parties.

"Anne Nderitu no longer enjoys the confidence of her clients who are political parties and whom by her mandate she is supposed to strengthen not to weaken as she is doing,” he stated.

Nderitu was at the centre of a storm after approving the ouster of Jeremiah Kioni and David Murathe from the Jubilee Party, which led to the leaders insisting that they will protect Azimio's affiliate parties by all means necessary, including Jubilee.

“The destabilization of the Jubilee Party is a do-or-die agenda, sponsored by the highest level of Kenya Kwanza leadership whose aim is to ensure Kenya Kwanza obtains a supermajority in parliament and amend the constitution,” the coalition added.

The calls for Nderitu to resign came hours after Jubilee Deputy Organising Secretary General Pauline Njoroge exposed loopholes Nderitu left open during a heated clash via email regarding the letter that approved Kioni and Murathe's expulsion.

"I faced the Registrar of Political Parties Ann Nderitu and asked her when she sent the letter recognizing the expulsion of Kioni and Murathe from Jubilee Party.

"She insisted the letter had been sent on 19th May 2023 via email. I told her that was a lie! I even asked her secretary to show me her email’s sent items so that I can confirm that the email was actually sent out on the said date. She declined," Njoroge wrote in a lengthy tweet.

According to Njoroge, Nderitu maintained that she recognised Kioni's expulsion on Friday, May 19 but she did not get the time to submit the letter to him. She went on to tell Njoroge that the order issued by the tribunal staying the expulsion of Kioni had been overcome by the event.

"Madam Ann Nderitu, digital footprints do not lie! As I told you yesterday, the letter expelling Kioni and Murathe was backdated, to beat the court order! You only sent that letter to Kioni on Monday, 22nd May 2023 at 7:04 pm! The court order had been given on 22nd May 2023 at 16:29," she said.

Adding that "Why were you sending emails at night? If indeed the letter was written on 19th May, why was Kioni served on the night of 22nd May, after the court order and after the NDC which he conducted as the Secretary-General on record? Really waiting to see how you defend these cooked documents, madam registrar."

Nderitu on her part dismissed claims of her taking sides, affirming that she did not act against the law in upholding Kioni and Murathe's ouster.

“We do not make decisions for parties. What we do is regulate the manner it is done so that the Political Parties Act is adhered to and the party constitution followed.

“We determine what has been brought before us using parameters set by the law,” she added.

Future Of Bipartisan Talks

On the stalled bipartisan talks, Azimio endorsed the decision by their team to suspend bipartisan talks and that the negotiations will be considered collapsed if nothing substantive happens within the next seven days.

“We endorse the decision by our delegation to walk out of the talks. Until Kenya Kwanza agrees to deal with the interim issues raised by our team, the talks will remain suspended,” the leaders said.

The party said it will communicate its next cause of action at a Parliamentary Group meeting scheduled for Tuesday next week (May 30).

The Azimio team in the bipartisan committee on Tuesday, May 23 called off the talks for seven days after the 14-member committee failed to agree on four fundamental demands; lowering of the cost of Unga, preservation of the election servers, suspension of IEBC reconstitution and for Kenya Kwanza to leave Jubilee alone.