Kisumu East constituency in Kisumu county is a place that all eyes are set as the country approaches the next general elections next year. This is a constituency where the incumbent MP Shakeel Shabir has been at the helm for close to 15 years where he is serving his third term after he was elected in the year 2007 on ODM party ticket and replaced Gor Sungu. For Shakeel who was re-elected for the third term as an independent candidate after the shambolic ODM party primaries that saw Nicholas Oricho handed over the ODM party’s nomination ticket and ended up losing the seat in an area considered the party’s stronghold, has to widen his scope if at all he wants to recapture the seat for the fourth time. The defeat of Oricho during the last general election is said to have angered O D M party Raila Odinga after Oricho was defeated even in a polling station next to his home, a move that did also not go down well with majority of the electorate therein.
Shakeel Shabir
A number of aspirants have started to warm up for the seat and have begun crisscrossing the constituency in a bid to unseat the incumbent. Having entrenched himself to the electorate mostly elderly women and youth, Shakeel has perfected the art of visiting every home that has been bereaved with essential commodities like maize flour, salt among other basic items for the common man until the locals have nicknamed him Onyango wuon mogo loosely translated as Onyango, the owner of the flour. This has been his trend since 2013 after recapturing his seat until today but the electorate seems to have been enlightened on the issue of providing maize flour without any meaningful development. They say the last 15 years have been not very smooth during the reigns of the current MP since there is very little development at the grassroots level.
Gor Sungu
It is against t h e record of minimal development that the electorate would like to have another person as the next MP come next year’s polls. Some of the leading contenders include James Mwamu who hails from Kolwa Central and has shown interest in the seat. Over 40 both primary and secondary schools within the constituency have benefitted from the kitty which is being spearheaded by Mwamu through Mwalimu James Japheth Mwamu Foundation. On January 1 this year, elders of in Kisumu East constituency enthroned Mwamu as an elder from the community and gave him a go ahead to contest the parliamentary seat in the coming general elections. In a pomp and colourful ceremony held at his home in Kolwa Central, the elders endorsed Mwamu for the MP’s seat. Mwamu, who is yet to declare his interest in the seat, will have to battle in ODM party primaries with Job Ndege, Nicholas Oricho and the current MP.
