ODM NEC MEETING HELD AT KEMPINSKI HOTEL NAIROBI ON JULY 29TH 2021. MEDIA RELEASE
The National Executive Committee (NEC) of the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) Party held its meeting this morning in Nairobi.
This meeting is being held at a very difficult time when the Country and indeed the entire world is still grappling with the Covid-19 Pandemic.
As a party we continue to urge our members to follow the health guidelines even as we thank the Government for efforts to source sufficient vaccines for the population.
We request that once these arrive the Government must embark on a mass vaccination to ensure we quickly reopen the economy.
We urge the Government to urgently come up with an economic stimulus programme including but not limited to cash transfer, support to SMEs, kazi mtaani and mashambani to alleviate the suffering brought about by the pandemic.
The NEC has expressed satisfaction with the response from the public to the ongoing recruitment drive, which has seen the party net more than 200,000 new members in the three weeks from July 1st 2021 following the waiver of membership fees.
We wish to remind the Public that only registered members will be allowed to participate in Party activities including Party Grassroots elections and Nominations and they should take advantage of the current window to register. It’s as easy as dialing *483*036# or visiting www.odmmembership.com. It’s FREE of Charge.
The NEC also received a report on the grassroots elections that are ongoing under the superintendence of the Elections Board. The exercise kicked off in Upper Eastern and will move to the lower eastern region this week.
We wish to request our members across the country to remain patient as the exercise rolls out, and desist from actions that would undermine the work of the Board.
The NEC also deliberated on question of resolution of the dispute regarding sharing Party funds with our former partners in the NASA Coalition and wishes to make the following observations.
The offer to make certain payments to our former partners was made on a strictly without prejudice basis because from a plain reading of the Coalition Agreement, we owe nothing to our partners.
They have argued before that all monies received by the Party was shareable equally amongst all Parties in the NASA Coalition which position has been dismissed by both the ORPP and the OAG because the money ODM receives is purely out of the number of votes received by ODM Candidates for Gubernatorial, Parliamentary, and Civic Seats and does not INCLUDE Presidential votes.
We have in the past encouraged our partners to have their claim processed through official channels like the ORPP or the courts but for reasons best known to them they declined instead opting to engage our Party Leader informally.
Our PL participated in these talks with utmost good faith and with an eye on settling the matter once and for all to free ODM to fully focus on its future. The offer made must be seen from this perspective, an ex gratia payment made in consideration of our long standing relationship and friendship.
The party is therefore dismayed by statements attributed to our former partners that the offer was somehow a vindication of their long running grievance and that the same was made in a desperate attempt to keep them in the Coalition. Nothing could be further from the truth.
We still hold that NASA is the past. To further demonstrate this point, the NEC of ODM has today resolved to formally exit the NASA Coalition.
The NEC has further deliberated on the future of the Party and its need to make new friends. We intend to embark on a programme to build new partnerships and extend the ongoing talks with our potential partners to the grassroots. To this end regional meetings and engagements have been planned with like-minded parties. The Schedule for these will be shared in due course.
EDWIN SIFUNA
SECRETARY GENERAL
Post Author
