Kirinyaga County Assembly Speaker David Wachira on Tuesday made history by becoming the first speaker to resign willingly from office.
Since the inception of devolution, a number of assembly speakers have been hounded out of office by unruly MCAs, with some like Nairobi's Beatrice Elachi fighting to be reinstated.
But in a letter served to the clerk, Governor Ann Waiganjo and the Majority Leader, Mr Wachira said he he will be leaving office on August 15th.
According to him, he is leaving office due to personal reasons. He thanked the assembly, governor and the office of clerk for working closely with him.
"I do hereby tender resignation as Speaker of the County Assembly of Kirinyaga due to personal reasons. My resignation takes effect on August 15th.
"Hopefully by then, the assembly should have completed the process of appointing a new speaker.I wish to thank Governor Ann Waiguru, the assembly and the clerk for cooperation during my tenure as speaker and chair of County Assembly Service Board," he said in the letter.
Kirinyaga County Assembly does not have history of wrangles unlike their neighbours Murang'a and Nyeri. Governor Waiguru, however, has been on spot over the state of health.
The assembly, under the clerk, will now conduct interviews for next speaker, who will have to garner majority votes from MCAs to take over office.
Just like parliament, the speaker cannot he an MCA. Should a sitting MCA contest and win, he or she must resign as the assembly representative to pave way for by-election.