It’s a big fight for political survival for the canny Weta

Bungoma Senator Moses Wetang'ula (centre) addresses the media in Parliament on December 2, 2015. MPs have proposed changes to the law on elections to seal legal loopholes that saved Senator Wetang’ula from being struck off the voters’ roll. PHOTO | JEFF ANGOTE |

What you need to know:

  • If found guilty, he may be struck off the voters register. And if removed from the register, Mr Wetang’ula would eventually lose his Senate seat for a second time as Section 24 of the Elections Act states that a person must be a registered voter to qualify as an MP.
  • Mr Wetang’ula, however, is no stranger to controversy and the political whirlwinds that are characteristic of our politics.
  • While his legal career is punctuated by brave acts like defending coup plotters and renegade student leaders, his political profile is dented by mentions in various scandals.
  • He also changes political sides swiftly, depending on where the wind is blowing. And he has been in every government since 1992 and only tasted Opposition in 2013. 

In August 1982, soldiers from the Kenya Airforce attempted to overthrow President Moi’s government.

The coup failed and the plotters accused of masterminding the coup were rounded up and charged.

Fearing a backlash, prominent lawyers refused to represent the accused, including coup plotter Hezekiah Ochuka. 

But a scruffy-looking bespectacled lawyer, who had just quit his job as a magistrate, took up the job that many considered career suicide.

That lawyer was Mr Moses Masika Wetang’ula, currently the Bungoma Senator and Cord co-principal.

And though Mr Ochuka was found guilty and executed, that act thrust Mr Wetang’ula into the national limelight.

“A lawyer must be ready to defend any person. That is what we were taught at university,” said Wetang’ula on that decision. 

Incidentally, his current coalition partner, Mr Raila Odinga, was among those charged. And since then, he has never left the stage.

BIGGEST BATTLE

And this week, the Bungoma Senator started his biggest battle to save his political career when the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) began hearings into allegations that he bribed voters during a by-election in 2013.

If found guilty, he may be struck off the voters register. And if removed from the register, Mr Wetang’ula would eventually lose his Senate seat for a second time as Section 24 of the Elections Act states that a person must be a registered voter to qualify as an MP.

The senator has of course denied the allegations and his Cord co-principals, Mr Odinga and Mr Kalonzo Musyoka, have accused the government of trying to lock him out of the 2017 political race.

Mr Wetang’ula, however, is no stranger to controversy and the political whirlwinds that are characteristic of our politics.

While his legal career is punctuated by brave acts like defending coup plotters and renegade student leaders, his political profile is dented by mentions in various scandals.

He also changes political sides swiftly, depending on where the wind is blowing. And he has been in every government since 1992 and only tasted Opposition in 2013. 

The 60-year old was born in Bungoma and attended Nalondo Primary School, Busakala Secondary and Teremi High School.

He later attended the University of Nairobi’s law school and immediately joined the Judiciary as a magistrate.

But he quit to start his law firm where he took on cases of renegades that other establishment lawyers could not.

SWINGING POLITICAL DIVIDES

His ability to swing from one political divide to the other was demonstrated in the late 80’s when he stopped defending fiery students and became President Moi’s lawyer.

“My relationship with Moi was excellent and he is still a friend of mine,” he said in an interview last year.

That special relationship yielded fruits after the 1992 elections when Mr Wetang’ula was nominated by Kanu.

To his supporters, joining Kanu was the perfect initiation into politics.

To detractors, he had betrayed the ideals he stood for when he defended pro-democracy detainees by teaming up with the oppressive Moi regime.

Mr Wetang’ula the lawyer, became a politician. And he has never looked back.

His ability to switch sides was also visible when he abandoned the Kanu regime as it faced an onslaught from Narc in 2002.

He defected to Narc and contested for the Sirisia parliamentary seat flooring poorly funded candidates.

The Kibaki regime appointed him an assistant minister and his first term as an elected leader was relatively scandal-free.

SCANDALS

It is when he became a Foreign Affairs Minister after the 2008 elections that Mr Wetang’ula hogged the headlines for the wrong reasons.

A parliamentary committee inquiry concluded that the government had overpaid by $15 million (Sh1.2 billion) in the purchase of embassy property in Japan.

He stepped aside in March 2010 and remarked: “The only thing I do, and must do, is to step aside when I am vindicated, I can assure you, I will be back.”

And after a few months, he was indeed back in the ministry after the team controversially cleared him.

But Kibaki transferred him to the Trade ministry and it did not take long before he was caught up in yet another storm.

Newspaper reports linked him to the Sh840 million sale of an oil block in Turkana.

In March 2012, he admitted that the law firm he founded handled the transaction but clarified that he resigned from the company, though it still bears his name.

“If I had Sh800 million, everyone would know. Perhaps I would have bought a plane that would make my campaigns easy,” he said.

Mr Wetang’ula found himself in the Opposition after the 2013 elections, which Cord lost to Jubilee.