United Democratic Alliance(UDA) made a wrong decision to chase away the Press from their function as delegates held a private deliberation.
This is an advantage to their opponents who now claim that the decision by UDA shows that the party is not transparent.
According to a statement from Raila Odinga’s campaign secretariat that was signed by Makau Mutua, UDA kept the media in darkness for two hours as they deliberated on Dp Ruto’s endorsement.
“Today, Kenya and the world witnessed how a Ruto-UDA regime would switch off the lights of democracy if-God forbid-it ever comes to power. In its most important function to date-the deliberations on the coronation of Mr. Ruto as UDA’s presidential candidate-Mr. Ruto decided to remove the media from where those deliberations were done,” part of the statement read.
“In effect, Mr Ruto decided to deny the Kenyan public and even their own members the opportunity to see for themselves how and why they took the decisions they did. The opacity and secrecy of UDA is a chilling reminder to Kenyans what Mr. Ruto would do if he captures state power,” Mutua said
According to Makau Mutua, the decision to choose a party’s candidate for the president of the republic must be open, accountable and transparent.
“It can not and must not be done in darkness where a small cabal of elites and oligarchs choose the presidential candidate,” Mutua said.
He further said that the media is the eyes of the people and should be allowed to cover all public events.
Mutua went ahead to compare how the endorsement of the presidential candidate was done in Azimio with that of UDA.
“As we all saw last Saturday, Azimio conducted its nomination of the Rt Hon Raila Odinga in full view of the media and public,” Mutua said.
He however said that the Azimio team is not surprised by DP Ruto and his UDA team reconfirmed their Anti-democratic DNA.
We unreservedly condemn the exclusion of the media from UDA’s NDC. pic.twitter.com/8zhPayHZMS
— Prof Makau Mutua (@makaumutua) March 15, 2022
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