Kidero’s impeachment aborts yet again after only 1 MCA appears for debate

The Nairobi Assembly County Speaker Alex Mogelo was on Tuesday left with no option but to adjourn debate on Governor Evans Kidero’s impeachment motion after shockingly only one Member of the County Assembly showed up at the house chambers.

The sole member was Parklands MCA Jeffer Kassam.

Nairobi County has a total of 128 Members of the County Assembly (42 nominated) including Assembly Speaker Magelo.

The speaker later told reporters that the MCAs were away in Kisumu attending Intercounty games despite him last week calling for the members to debate the motion this week.

Gross misconduct

The impeachment motion was sponsored by Viwandani MCA Samuel Nyangwara, who argued that failure to disclose the debts had resulted in gross misconduct on the part of the governor.

The ward rep accused the governor of flouting procurement laws and acting contrary to the Constitution as well as the Public Finance Management Act.

In October, a similar impeachment motion failed to kick off after the Speaker adjourned the sitting for lack of quorum.

The speaker adjourned the house after all Cord and 20 Jubilee MCAs boycotted the session.

A section of the Cord MCAs instead convened at Boulevard hotel.

Some of their Jubilee counterparts claimed Kidero "paid" the ward representatives to boycott the sitting in a bid to frustrate the ouster bid.

The motion had been earlier suspended after Kidero obtained a court order stopping the county assembly from summoning him to appear before a select committee to answer audit queries arising from the county government's expenditure.

Unlawful summons

Through lawyer Tom Ojienda, the county boss argued the summons requiring him to appear before the county assembly to defend himself against allegations of corruption and abuse of office were unlawful and did not meet the requirements of standing orders.

However, Speaker Magelo accused Kidero of lying to the court in order to bar the county assembly from debating his impeachment motion.

Under a certificate of urgency, Magelo said that Kidero misdirected the court saying that the governor had been “summoned” while instead he had only been notified on the motion and invited to respond to allegations against him.

The case is to be heard on January 17, 2017.