The late Grace Mboja is received by Jubilee politicians in Kilifi on February 25, 2017, after defecting from ODM. [Photo/ the-star.co.ke]
Former ODM women congress chairperson Grace Mboja defected to Jubilee after she was mistreated by leaders in the opposition, former Kilifi Deputy Governor Kenneth Kamto has claimed. Speaking on Friday, Kamto said the opposition used and dumped the late Mama ODM despite having served the political outfit diligently. Kamto said that he appointed Mboja as a personal assistant but the county government under the leadership of Governor Amason Kingi allegedly refused to pay her.“Mboja was mistreated in ODM and she was very bitter about it. She vigorously campaigned for the party but got nothing. I took her as my personal assistant in my office but the Kilifi county government refused to give her an appointment letter,” said Kamto.“She worked for one year without being paid a single cent. It was a case of use and dump in ODM and that is what hurt Mboja. She had to decamp to Jubilee because she was being mistreated in the party she served so diligently,” he added, as quoted by The Star. Mboja died on Thursday at the Coast General Hospital where she was admitted to the ICU after suffering a stroke. A section of ODM critics has attributed her death and that of Shimo la Tewa MCA Bakari Ali and ODM Kilifi chief campaigner Kingi Ngombo to frustrations from the ODM party.Kilifi North MP Owen Baya, however, dismissed the claims, saying the deaths of the three politicians are not linked to the ODM party.“Mboja went to Jubilee and expected a nomination though I had warned her that Jubilee would get her nothing. If we could connect her death to politics then I would say its Jubilee because that’s where she served last. For Ngombo, he was admitted twice with stroke when he was an MCA so claiming that he died after being frustrated in ODM is not true,” said Baya.