Raila Dismisses Claims of Split in Azimio Following NADCO Report

The Azimio La Umoja Coalition Party Leader, Raila Amollo Odinga has denied the existence of a fallout in his camp over the National Dialogue Committee (NADCO) report.

Speaking on Citizen TV in an interview on Wednesday, December 27 Raila said that various dissenting opinions from allies are what the coalition encourages; freedom of expression.

Mr. Odinga stated that the Azimio front, led by Kalonzo Musyoka, had made significant progress in the talks, particularly on some of the key issues they had raised.

“Those other members of Azimio who are talking are just addressing what we all agreed on about the issue of cost of living,” Raila said.

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“What they may not know is that there was agreement on fundamental issues that we had raised as Azimio.”

According to Raila, the only point of contention in the report was the rising cost of living, which his team insisted was entirely in the hands of the Kenya Kwanza government.

“Where there was no agreement was on the cost of living, and our team insisted that it be recorded, they said it was the work of the government to reduce the cost of living and not the opposition,”Raila said.

“Our team said in the report that they disagreed with the Kenya Kwanza team on the cost of living, because the Kenya Kwanza team said they would do it in their own style at their own pace,”

The opposition leader stated that the Azimio team chose to carry on with the negotiations in spite of the disagreement over cost of living because of the advancements they had achieved on the other fundamental concerns they had brought up.

Azimio had tabled several issues for the talks, including an audit of the 2022 Presidential Elections, the establishment of the IEBC, and respect for multi-partyism.

“We said, fine, us we will continue to press you to reduce the cost of living, our position was should we walk out because of the disagreement?” the ODM leader said.

“We thought that we had achieved some considerable progress in the other issues and said we proceed with the report, but still press the government to reduce the cost of living.”

The opposition, according to Mr. Odinga, will continue to press the government to reduce the cost of living, particularly taxation.

Some of Azimio’s allies have spoken out against the NADCO report, including Martha Karua, who urged Kenyans to reject it, calling it a fraud that “has not addressed key issues that forced Kenyans to take to the streets after the elections.”

Former Defence Cabinet Secretary Eugene Wamalwa also spoke out against the report, stating that he would not sign it because it “would not do justice to the single most important issue to Kenyans; the cost of living.”

Jeremiah Kioni, another leader who cherry-picked the report, claimed that the report only addressed what the Kenya Kwanza team brought forward and ignored everything the Azimio team proposed.