Msambweni by-election was on Tuesday, a working day, that is why ODM lost -Hassan Joho

 

ODM party leader Raila Odinga and Mombasa governor Hassan Ali Joho in Kwale. FILE

ODM now prepares to battle it out with Jubilee ahead of Nairobi Gubernatorial seat saying there will be no handshake candidate. 

They are preparing after coming from a loss at Msambweni MP seat. 

ODM deputy party leader Hassan Joho said that the party defeat in the mini-poll in Kwale County and elsewhere does not gauge its popularity.

 

“Those thinking that the by-election was the measure of the popularity of the party are daydreaming. We conducted peaceful campaigns. As I have said before, according to us, the evening of December 15 marked the end of our campaigns. We have viewed the results. We must do a postmortem to understand what we did wrong; where we need to correct and what we learnt. That is the process of democracy,” said Governor Joho.

Governor Joho added that nothing unusual when the party’s candidate Omar Boga lost the Msambweni contest to Feisal Bader, an independent candidate.

The ruling party, which Dr Ruto is a member of, did not field a candidate in the contest in honour of the handshake between Mr Odinga and President Uhuru Kenyatta.

“It is not that Mr Boga did not get votes. He garnered over 10,000 votes, and the winner got slightly higher votes. Mr Boga did not get zero votes,” he noted.

Mr Joho blamed less voter turnout for the unfavourable results that the party got from the mini-polls.

“How do you explain a by-election on a working day? It was on a Tuesday. A working day. Voter turnout is roughly 40 Percent, and in some areas, it was 30 Percent. In general, the total percentage of voter turnout was less than 40 Percent. There is also a big chance that a lot of the people never came out to vote or never had the opportunity for their voices be known,” said Governor Joho.

 

“Only a fool would use this to determine that the popularity of the party has gone down. How is that possible? If you celebrate the Msambweni win, then you are lost,” he added.