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Shock as Governor Kabogo concedes early defeat


Kiambu Governor William Kabogo on Tuesday evening appeared to concede defeat moments after the tallying of votes in the Jubilee nominations started and wished his challenger Ferdinand Waititu “well’.

However, the flamboyant governor said he did not agree with the results because there had been “obvious” irregularities.

The Governor who spoke to journalists at OakPlace in Kiambu, said his rival Mr Waititu —who is also the Kabete MP — had been seen with returning officers at a secluded meeting on the eve of the nominations, and a car was later found stuffed with ballot papers for the governorship race.

He alleged that he had submitted a memorandum to the Jubilee Party officials listing the irregularities from disappearing ballot papers, to partisan polling officials, something the Party reportedly promised to check before nominations began. That didn’t happen, he told reporters.

“It has been a long journey in Jubilee and I have done my best. But since it seems like there are huge powers that need to keep me away, I am saying that for now I am doing what it is that that memorandum said: I don’t agree with these nominations,” he told journalists.

WAITITU LEADING

“Rumours are that I am a threat to someone. I don’t know whether that is true but as fate will have it, you bite it one step at a time. So I want to say I don’t agree with this nominations. The petition is with the party, the party can do whatever it is that they deem fit to do,” he added.

Mr Kabogo spoke just after ten polling stations filed their results showing Waititu leading him by about 8,000 votes.

Why did he jump so early?

The Governor who has been campaigning with one of the rarest armoured cars in town argued it was “obvious” the trend of the results won’t change.

“If you love novels, when you read one sentence, you would know what the next will lead to,” he said.

“I am not going to waste my time arguing with what is obvious,” he added.

The nominations in Kiambu had been postponed from Friday, following what the party said were logistical challenges.

ACADEMIC PAPERS

But the County, President Uhuru Kenyatta’s home area, was seeing one of the fiercest rivalries for the County Governor’s seat.

Mr Waititu, a loser for the same seat in 2013 in Nairobi shifted his base to Kabete following the death of Kabete MP George Muchai in February 2015, so he could establish local popularity.

The two sued each other over academic papers with Mr Kabogo claiming the Kabete MP never attended University in India as claimed.

The case was thrown out last December only for Mr Waititu to file claims demanding compensation from the case.

On Friday, Mr Kabogo alleged ballot papers had disappeared. On Tuesday evening, he claimed he had found the Kabete MP with the county elections coordinator and presiding officers in a secluded meeting with the Governor’s aspirant.