ODM SG Edwin Sifuna maintains Coast region is ODM zone even if the Tangatanga MPs form their regional party

ODM SG Edwin Sifuna. FILE

ODM SG Edwin Sifuna bounces back to the statement that was issued by the Coast parliamentary group through Kilifi North MP Owen Baya.


The SG rubbished the claims of ODM leader Raila Odinga was losing touch at the Coast. He says Coast is ODM and will remain ODM zone despite forming their regional party.


Sifuna told the MPs that the majority of them are not members of ODM while a few who are members have had troubles with the party.


“The first noticeable thing about this group was that there was no single Senator in it, meaning that the MPs were purporting to deal with a matter they had no business discussing,” Sifuna said.


“A majority of the members who issued the statement are not even members of the ODM Party and the few who are have had long known leanings to the Tangatanga side of Kenyan politics, making their views very easy to contextualize,” he said.


Sifuna cited Malindi MP Aisha Jumwa was expelled from the party and ‘is hanging on her seat only courtesy of a court order.


He reiterated that Raila has had strong bonds with the coast people because of his firm stand on Coastal land rights, devolution, education, employment rights and mainstreaming of minority issues.


“Raila Odinga's name is not a development blueprint. Neither does cutting nonexistent links with ODM amount to a development project,” he said.


But the MPs, through Baya, hit back at Sifuna, terming him ‘a lazy thinker’ for always linking those critical of the party to Tangatanga the Jubilee faction supporting Deputy President William Ruto’s 2022 presidential bid.


“The labelling of all the people who criticize the party as Tangatanga and associating them with the DP is a tired and tattered label that can only be used by lazy thinkers who cannot withstand criticism. It is no longer a destructive political missile. Its political potency is dead,” he said.