Rift MPs disagree over boundaries plan

An effort by Rift Valley members of Parliament to come up with a harmonised memorandum for the creation of the region’s new administrative boundaries has failed to materialise.

This follows emerging conflicts between ODM and PNU legislators to reach consensus on various contentious issues that arose during a recent public hearing meeting held in Nakuru.

The 49 elected and two nominated MPs from the political divide forming the Grand Coalition Government had submitted conflicting recommendations to Interim Independent Boundaries Review Commission during the November 6 meeting at Old Town Hall.

When they finally met on Thursday to fine-tune the two documents, the seven-man team comprising of Mr Isaac Ruto, Mr Mwangi Kiunjuri, Mr Lee Kinyanjui and Mr Josephat Nanok allegedly failed again to midwife a harmonised document.

Other MPs include Professor Margaret Kamar, Mr Joseph Nkaisery and Mr Katoo ole Metito who were entrusted with formulating a policy guideline for administrative and political representation.

One of the committee members said the contentious issues arising from their latest meeting was how to strike a balance on that proposes for additional 29 more constituencies/districts to match the region’s population and land mass.

Mr Isaac Ruto of ODM intimated that one of the contentious issue so far was the one-man-one-vote proposal which his PNU counterparts were supporting as opposed to that of one-man-one-kilometre.

ODM, Mr Ruto said was fronting for a hybrid system that would capture all the interest of the regions diversity to ensure that the region gets 28.6 per cent of the total constituencies envisaged to be created and the existing ones.

Through consultation with the Rift Valley Parliamentary Group, the special committee would once again hold another meeting next week with a view of resolving the stalemate before a final harmonised document was handed over to Andrew Ligale-led review commission.

The ODM team feels that since independence the region has been given a raw deal whereby despite having the largest population distribution and land mass.

“As a province at independence Rift Valley had 13 out of 41 districts which reasonably represented a fair share based on its land mass and population which both equals 31.7 per cent but this has significantly distorted under the current distribution to 23.6 per cent (60 out of 254 districts) instead of 81,” said Mr Ruto. 

The MPs want to build a consensus not just as people of Rift Valley but also put into consideration the interest of other regions so that at the end of the day their recommendations appeared to be in harmony with the country at large.

PNU on the other hand wants the creation of new districts/constituencies based on urban, rural and sparsely populated constituencies so as to avoid the gross differentials of constituency populations.

“That we need to apply the deviation of constituencies between urban, rural and sparsely populated constituencies to be legislated by parliament immediately and be within the limits recommended by the Kriegler Commission (a maximum of 20 per cent)

ODM vowed to push for an equal share in parliamentary representation to ensure that they were slotted a third of seats through the establishment of 29 more constituencies.