Senior Jubilee stalwarts are toying with the idea to amend the Constitution and introduce the Parliamentary system.
This expressly brings back the Prime Minister’s position
According to the Star, the decision to put the discussion on the table has been informed by political turmoil brought by a Presidential system of government after every general election.
“We must find a way to make the country more stable and we should be able to accommodate more people in the leadership,” a Jubilee MP privy to the proposal and informal discussion said.
Currently, the country is undergoing a political crisis inspired by bungled August 8 polls.
The tiff is between President-elect Uhuru Kenyatta and opposition leader Raila Odinga.
In the fresh line of discussing the proposal, understandably, Deputy President William Ruto is in support of this.
However, the President is yet to be briefed on the both the proposal and discussion.
The Jubilee protégée added that: “At the moment, the positions of President and DP are the most important and as long as they remain like that, it will not matter who occupies them; they will always be seen as exclusive.”
On Tuesday, the National Council of Churches in Kenya (NCCK) proposed that Uhuru’s Cabinet be expanded to accommodate the Prime Minister, a deputy and leader of opposition.
NCCK Secretary General Canon Peter Karanja said if this happens, there will be more inclusivity in government.
He blamed the current Constitution for “political hostility” between government and the opposition for locking it [opposition] out of power.
“These divisions are expressions of unresolved grievances and perceptions of exclusion and denial of dignity of the opposition by the arrangement of power as defined in the Constitution of 2010,” said he.
He proposed that the slots be filled by persons from political party that got the second highest number of votes during general polls.
However, the proposal by Karanja was dismissed by Jubilee Aden Duale (Leader Majority in Parliament) and Kiambu County Senator Kimani Wamatangi.
Duale said: “We cannot make amendments to the Constitution to award jobs to people. That is not enshrined in the spirit of our Constitution. Kenyans voted for this Constitution to have a presidential system of leadership.
“We cannot bring Kenyans to a parliamentary system just because some people have seen the current Constitution does not give them leadership. We should only amend the Constitution in the interest of all Kenyans. This issue of giving jobs to people who have lost a presidential contest should not be there.”
However, ODMs Prof Anyang Nyong’o (Kisumu Governor) supported a Parliamentary system of government.
“First, it would remove the near-fratricidal wars we have every five years to elect one person to one post called the President. It is not worth it: too expensive, too divisive, too prone to give ruthless tycoons influence and access to the most powerful office in the land and too amenable to the politics of exclusion,” he said.