Gumbo declares 2027 Siaya governor bid as Oburu welcomes him back to ODM
He described his return to ODM as a homecoming, noting that he was among the party’s founding members.
James Orengo wants the big job at State House and it looks like his ODM compatriots are not standing on his way for the big job and now Jimmy is ready to go and good luck my friend.
In a rally in Siaya county next to James Orengo’s empty governor office, former Rarieda MP Nicholas Gumbo declared his intention to run for the Siaya gubernatorial seat in 2027
Gumbo made the announcement during a rally in Siaya, where ODM Deputy Party Leader Oburu Oginga formally welcomed him back to the ODM months after he rejoined the party from the United Democratic Movement (UDM).
“There is one person from Siaya who has been out of our party for a while, though he was a founder member. He is called Nicholas Gumbo, and I want to welcome him to the party,” Oburu said as he handed Gumbo the ODM party cap, symbolizing his return.
Speaking after his official homecoming, Gumbo wasted no time in declaring his political ambitions.
“I want to announce today, through our party leader, come next year, God willing, I will run to be the governor of Siaya to redeem this county,” he said to cheers from supporters.
“It is good to be back home. I am a founder member of ODM, and I am so happy to be home. Thank you, party leader, thank you, deputy party leader and thank you, Madam Chair Lady,” he said.
“Let us campaign to unite the party,” Gumbo urged, adding that internal cohesion would be key to ODM’s success in the next election cycle.
Oburu, in turn, signaled that the party was keen on consolidating its base ahead of 2027, saying ODM remains open to welcoming back leaders willing to work under its banner.
Gumbo’s declaration is expected to intensify early campaigns in Siaya County, with political alignments beginning to take shape well ahead of the 2027 polls.
The Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) party’s Linda Ground brigade on Saturday staged a rally in Siaya town, launching sharp attacks against Governor James Orengo and the rival Linda Mwananchi faction.
Led by ODM leader Dr. Oburu Oginga, the brigade dismissed the splinter group headed by Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna, Embakasi East MP Babu Owino and Governor Orengo, accusing them of undermining the party’s position in the broad-based government.
Dr. Oburu, flanked by ODM chairperson Gladys Wanga, insisted that the late party leader Raila Odinga had anchored ODM within the broad-based government, and vowed to maintain that course.
“Mimi naunga mkono juhudi ya Oburu Oginga ya kuanzisha mazungumzo kirasmi na chama cha UDA ili tuunde pre-election coalition agreement na Rais William Ruto,” said Energy Cabinet Secretary Opiyo Wandayi.
“In Siaya, we have had many issues. We elected a Governor, but he is now missing in action. Our Governor has left Siaya and is now moving around outside the county, so as Siaya people we now have to decide on the way forward.
The rally drew a high-profile lineup of MPs, Senators, Governors, and Cabinet Secretaries, including Treasury CS John Mbadi, Mining CS Hassan Joho and Energy CS James Opiyo Wandayi who directly accused Governor Orengo of plotting to dismantle ODM, escalating tensions within the party.
“The Governor of Siaya, I am a heartbeat away from your office, and you have abdicated your office and gone to Kakamega. You’re saying ‘Ruto must go’ and Siaya people are telling you ‘Orengo must go,’” said Ruaraka MP TJ Kajwang
“We want to tell Orengo today, you cannot use an old map to get to new places. We want to tell Orengo today that he must come back home and work for us; if not, he will not see the light of day tomorrow,” said Ugenya MP David Ochieng.
This situation could be good for everybody including James Orengo who can go to run for the big one or support whoever he wants for the presidency. Who knows if his candidate wins he could be appointed as Kenya’s next Attorney General and he is a legal specialist known all across the country. If that does not happen Orengo can retire from politics and keep doing his legal work.
For Dr. Oburu Oginga, Gladys Wanga, Simba Arati and others who are steadfast in ODM they will now have an opportunity to focus on what they want to achieve for the country now and after 2027 elections without endless bickering and dead noise from those who want to take ODM for themselves.
Then it is all good and as a Siaya resident we will see who our new governor will be in 2027. The first Siaya Governor, Cornel Rasanga used to be my neighbour in Bondo Town and we used to talk to him when we were home. We will see the new one and look at what they can do for the county.
James Orengo told a rally in Kakamega on Saturday that from now he will only take instructions from Edwin Sifuna about what to do in politics. Great, how about James Orengo runs for any seat as member of the new SISI NDIO SIFUNA political party and they can roll it on and win any seats they want in 2027 General Elections. I am ready to offer some advice, for free, on how to get this new kid in the block getting high up there.
Kenyans saw this drama in 1992 and some of us were already alive then and were activists and when the FORD opposition came up and Kenyans were very hopeful that finally President Moi was going to be thrown out of office because the opposition was everywhere in Kenya.
Then all of a sudden, the big FORD opposition party which Kenyans were sure was going to bring down the Moi dictatorship started petty fights among leaders and the result was the emergence of two FORD parties. Keneth Matiba led the FORD Asili group at MUTHITHI HOUSE in Nairobi and Jaramogi and others led FORD Kenya at AGIP House. Come election time Moi beat the crap out of all of them and they had nobody to blame but themselves.
After that there were more FORD parties and they all died their natural deaths and left Moi in power. Mwai Kibaki had his own DP opposition party and there was nothing they could do because of endless internal fighting until Raila Odinga joined Kibaki in 2002 and they took out the Moi dictatorship.
Maybe that is the reason why everybody is talking about what Raila Odinga wants them to do because that is one politician who once he made up his mind about what was good for Kenya, he was going for it and was ready to take whatever comes in that battle.
Today we have ODM as one of the biggest political parties in Kenya only second to the ruling UDA party and the greed for power or just some recognition which is useless is forcing the big ODM to try turning their party into a new ten ODM parties to serve individual interests. It is not going to happen.
Learn from FORD nightmare in 1992 when they thought they were already in government and Moi was just warming the seat for them. At some point even Simon Nyachae after helping Moi do all the terrible things he was doing formed his own FORD PEOPLE party after retiring which was a joke for him to become a Kenya president himself.
ODM leaders who want to go that FORD route should do it on their own and just form their parties and they will learn how tough it is to actually build a party from the ground up.
The mainstream ODM leadership cannot afford to fall into that trap. ODM team keeping their party has to move on and so far, they have promised those who want to run away that they are free to do so because nobody is going to waste their time expelling them from ODM.
One strange thing is that this Sifuna and Orengo team right now are no longer talking about ODM National Delegates Convention (NDC) which has been called for March 27 2026 and it is at that gathering that ODM members will decide who their leadership is and what plans they want those leaders to have for the party and the country. That is one month away from now and Kenyans will know what ODM NDC wants the party to do and decide for themselves if that is good for them to work with ODM.
This was the ODM NDC which picked Raila Odinga to run for the presidency in 2022 and the delegates are just regular ODM members and leaders and they do their job to give their party the direction they expect and want the party to take.
SISI NDIO SIFUNA party has now suspended their rallies for 30 days because of Ramadhan and that is a good gesture from them. ODM NDC is also one month from now. By the time Sifuna and company are ready to go back to the streets ODM NDC will be done and ODM members would have chosen their direction and Sifuna and company will be part of the ODM NDC if they chose to go.
Whatever path the ODM NDC takes they will wait to see if Sifuna and Orengo want to fight that too which will mean they are fighting ODM as a party and it is no longer a situation of personalities. Things are looking rough coming up. That is what Kenya politics has always been.
There is something emerging from the rallies, which is the fact that there is endless squabbling and everybody is fighting the other person. Even in those rallies Kenyans can see different groups in the same rally fighting each other because they support something else. There disturbing situations like in Mbale Town, Vihiga Linda Mwananchi rally where there were mobs in the rally then they started to fight and one person was killed.
If this goes on and becomes a pattern, Kenyans may reach a situation where they are just exhausted with the fights in the opposition and may decide to stick with the devil they know than a nightmare they can see and have no clue about.
