Nakuru County Senator Tabitha Karanja has issued a statement to clarify her remarks made during the recent impeachment motion against ex-Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua.
In her address on the Senate floor, Karanja’s comments were interpreted by some as a call to revert to the dictatorial regime of former President Daniel Moi, a characterization she vehemently denies.
“I wish to correct the insinuations of the statement which I made on the floor of the Senate yesterday during the impeachment motion and which has now been misinterpreted intentionally by my detractors for the purposes of tarnishing my intentions and meaning,” she stated, articulating that her words had been taken out of context.
Karanja explained that her intention was not to advocate for a return to an oppressive regime but rather to propose a revision of the process for selecting running mates for the Deputy President and governor positions. She argued that this change would empower the appointing authority, namely the President or governor, to hire and fire their deputies without public or parliamentary involvement.
“I wish to hereby categorically state that I did not at any one time mean or refer to us going back to such things but actually, I meant that choosing a running mate for Deputy President/governor position be revised so as to allow the appointing authority, who is the President/governor him/herself, power and authority to hire/fire their deputies accordingly,” Karanja clarified.
According to Karanja, this proposed change would help streamline what she described as a “rigorous, tedious, tiresome, and obviously very expensive exercise meant to only resolve a very singular disagreement by individual political leaders.”
“As you have all witnessed, this pull and push almost brought our country to a standstill,” she added, highlighting the political tensions that have recently surfaced.
In her remarks, Karanja referenced the past, recalling that during the Moi era, the process of appointing and replacing the Vice President was much more straightforward.
“Those who can remember, the hiring and later firing and then again re-hiring of the late Vice President Prof. George Saitoti was not anything compared to what we have had recently in our country,” she noted
