The Political Parties Disputes Tribunal ruling nullifying Koitalel Ole Kenta’s appointment as Jubilee Party Secretary-General has returned Ngunjiri Wambugu’s earlier warning to the centre of the party’s leadership crisis.
Wambugu had sounded the alarm months ago, questioning the legality of Jubilee’s proposed leadership changes and the manner in which they were being pushed through.
Among the issues he raised was Kenta’s membership and eligibility to occupy a senior party office and the Tribunal has now found that Kenta was not a registered Jubilee member when he was appointed, and nullified the appointment, something that gives Wambugu’s earlier objection considerable political bite.
His complaints questioned a system in which major decisions affecting Jubilee were being made without, in his view, adequate regard for the party constitution, its organs and its membership.
”I formally questioned both their legality and the process through which they were being undertaken. Among the specific issues I raised was the membership status and eligibility of some of those proposed for appointment, including Hon. Kenta,” Wambugu’s statement reads in part.
At the time, those raising such questions were treated as obstacles. Wambugu says there were attempts to discipline and silence him for insisting that Jubilee follow its own rules.
The Tribunal ruling has now changed that conversation. The immediate temptation may be to replace Kenta and close the chapter. Wambugu argues that would miss the larger problem. If the party could appoint a Secretary-General who did not meet the basic membership requirement, he asks, what other decisions arising from the same leadership changes should now be examined?
Wambugu’s answer is the National Delegates Convention (NDC). He wants Jubilee to stop making another series of appointments from the top and instead bring its delegates together to examine the leadership structure, settle questions around mandates and membership, and give the party a fresh political mandate before 2027.
An NDC would force Jubilee to confront the process that produced the current leadership arrangement in the first place. For a party preparing for another general election, that question cannot be treated as paperwork. Political authority inside a party ultimately rests on more than occupying an office. It rests on whether the people entitled to confer that authority have actually done so through recognised structures.
That is the argument Wambugu was making before Friday’s ruling.
The Tribunal has not endorsed every complaint he has raised. But on the specific question of Kenta’s eligibility, the warning he put on the table has been borne out, and Jubilee now has a choice to either patch the immediate vacancy and carry on, or take the harder route and return the question of its leadership to the membership.
Wambugu has already made his preference clear.
