The Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) has its own changes it hopes the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) push will bring about, Suna East lawmaker Junet Mohammed has said.
Speaking on Wednesday, the National Assembly Minority Whip said that the former Prime Minister Raila Odinga-led side wants changes that will reintroduce the powerful Premier post, a seat Raila held between 2008 and 2013.
He suggested that the party is not satisfied with the current setup, where the BBI taskforce has proposed a skeleton Prime Minister, to be picked from the National Assembly by the president.
"ODM Party’s stand is such that it would like to have a Prime minister with some powers to run the country and not a skeleton Prime minister," said Junet.
He claimed that Deputy President William Ruto sees the entire issue as an attempt to scuttle his 2022 presidential bid, hence his discomfort with the proposed changes.
Though Ruto has since declared his support for the BBI report, Junet is of the idea that he is opposed to the document, fearing that it was crafted to battle his presidential ambitions.
"The Deputy President and his people think the BBI is trying to stop him (Ruto) from becoming President. He’s opposed to BBI same way he was opposed to the new constitution in 2010 where he led the NO! brigade," he added.
Though Ruto says that he supports the details of the document, he remains lukewarm on how the proposed changes should be implemented, either through the parliament or a referendum.
The BBI founders, President Uhuru Kenyatta and Raila have openly supported a referendum, saying that the decision to pass or reject it lies in the hands of Kenyans.
But Ruto's allies have openly rejected this, arguing that Kenya has no finances to carry out a referendum exercise, and adding that the referendum would further divide Kenyans.