[Garissa Township MP aspirant Farah Maalim. He wants most of the candidates in NASA to shelve their ambitions and help others win instead.] (Standard Digital news.)
Garissa Township MP aspirant Farah Maalim has called on NASA candidates for various seats to give up their ambitions and support one of their own for the coalition to win majority of the seats in both the senate and national assembly.
The former Deputy Speaker speaking in Garissa town on Thursday said Cord coalition lost a number of MP seats in Nairobi to Jubilee in the 2013 polls not because they did not have the numbers but because they had too many candidates who split their votes.
Farah said NASA may lose more seats if candidates from the coalition who lost in the party primaries and were now running as independent candidates and those from the coalition parties don’t sober up and agree to field and support one candidate.
“NASA party candidates should meet and chose one of their own to avoid dividing the votes further as it happened in 2013. Those who lost in the primaries should step down if they truly believe in NASA coalition course,” he said as reported by KNA.
“NASA has the biggest chance of capturing between 7 and 8 additional parliamentary seats in Nairobi if only the candidates from the coalition agree to shelve their political ambitions for the greater good of the coalition,” he added.
The Wiper party deputy leader noted that those who lost in the party primaries and have chosen to run as independent candidates will weaken the coalition.
“It is true that some of these candidates lost not because they were not popular but because of the low voter turnout and in some areas the bungled party primaries. But if you really stand for a party manifesto and its ideologies, then you should stick to it,” Farah noted.
“It’s always good to maintain party discipline and demonstrate that we are able to come together irrespective of whether we won or not,” he said.
He said that if the situation is not corrected now and NASA goes ahead and wins, then its presidential candidate could be weakened if he lacked the majority in the Senate and the National Assembly.
“It will be hard for our presidential candidate to run the government without a majority in the National Assembly, the Senate and County assemblies,” he stressed.
Farah will battle it out with National Assembly Majority Leader Aden Duale and ANC deputy leader, Abdi Yare Mohamed for the Garissa township Mp seat.