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The Nairobian

Kioni fires at 'dishonest' Mount Kenya leaders

Politics

By Denis Omondi | May 20, 2024

**Jubilee Party Secretary General Jeremiah Kioni during an interview on Spice FM on Monday, May 20, 2024. [**Screen grab]

Jubilee Party Secretary General Jeremiah Kioni has lashed out at some ‘dishonest’ Mount Kenya leaders who seemed supportive of the Limuru III meeting in private but rejected it at public meetings.

Kioni says that in the run-up to the meeting and even after, there has been a willingness to engage all the leaders but there exists a sincerity deficit, especially from elected leaders who are perhaps torn between supporting President Ruto’s agenda or the region’s interests.

He exuded surprise at some of the leaders who claimed to have been kept out of the loop about the much-publicised Limuru event.

“We will reach out but you must be willing. I cannot meet you over tea, almost four times, talking about Limuru III and then I see you before a church congregation saying you were neither informed nor invited. That level of dishonesty answers to the Kenya Kwanza regime,” said Kioni on Spice FM.

Days to the meeting, DP Rigathi Gachagua, congregated with churchgoers in Embu County and advised against the Kioni and Karua-led initiative while offering to handle the region’s grievances.

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“I am the senior leader in this region. My doors are open. Let Martha Karua and Jeremiah Kioni come to me. I mean well for this region, thus the best person to talk to,” said Gachagua.

He added: “There is no need of coming to disturb the people of Limuru amid flood challenges yet we have an office occupied by the senior leader from the mountain, at the level of the deputy president.”

According to Kioni, the meeting lived up to its billing and provided an opportunity for the community to address some of its worries that are only spoken about in hushed tones.

The former MP alleges a well-choreographed plan to neutralise Mount Kenya’s political power, a scheme he says was launched by then Deputy President, now President, William Ruto in 2017 to install his, mostly young, loyalists.

Kioni says that the new Haki Coalition, born on Friday, May 17, in the Limuru convention, shows the mountains ‘cry’ for Uhuru Kenyatta’s leadership.

The coalition will be used to push back at Kenya Kwanza’s excesses and for the realisation of the community’s aspirations, including the disputed ‘one man, one vote, one shilling’ revenue sharing formula.