The newly-formed Democratic Action Party has picked fresh fight with Azimio-OKAcoalition led by ODM leader Raila Odinga.
The Party has accused Raila of discrimination by not abiding to an agreement signed between the two coalition partners ODM and DAP Kenya.
On Tuesday, during a press conference, the party leaders blamed the former Prime Minister for issuing direct tickets to ODM aspirants and leaving the DAP Kenya aspirants in confusion.
They threatened Raila that they will not buy his idea of issuing direct tickets to aspirants in western region.
They reminded the former prime minister at politics in Kenya is divided in terms of ethnical basis and that he should issue direct tickets to aspirants from Nyanza region through his ODM party and leave the DAP Kenya party to issue tickets to the western region aspirants.
Earlier, The Democratic Action Party-Kenya (DAP-K) has dismissed reports alleging that the outfit has reached a zoning agreement with the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) for fielding candidates in Western Kenya.
According to the Wafula Wamunyinyi-led party, DAP-K has not inked any subsequent agreements with ODM despite recently joining Raila Odinga’s Azimio la Umoja movement.
The statement followed reports that ODM chief Odinga had inked a gentleman’s agreement with DAP-K that would see the two parties field individual candidates in their respective strongholds in Western Kenya.
Under the arrangement, DAP-K would retain the Bungoma and Trans Nzoia bases while ODM would field candidates in Vihiga and Kakamega.
DAP-K aspirants eyeing elective seats in Butere, Navakholo, Kwhisero, Lurambi, Matungu, Lugari and Ikolomani would allegedly also be allowed to defect to ODM where they would be issued with direct nomination tickets.
A day ago, Machakos Governor Alfred Mutua also led Azimio partner parties in threatening to quit Azimio-OKA coalition party that is fielding Raila Odinga as its Presidential flag-bearer.
Speaking to the press on Wednesday evening, Mutua claimed that since Kalonzo joined Azimio, major decisions made in the coalition have been done by the two top leaders – Raila and Kalonzo -at the expense of other party leaders.
The party officials issued a raft of demands to the Azimio la Umoja movement coalition, threatening to look for other political partners if their conditions are not met within the next 48 hours.
“The document needs to be renegotiated to ensure that all interests are taken care of. The agreement should not be decided by three parties In the same way that they have introduced zoning through some technical terms, we want them to be done away with. As explained we have our candidates across the country hence we cannot subject our members to such zoning programs that they are trying to bring.”
“We must be listened to in order to fully join them. It must be known that time is running out but we still have options that we can invoke anytime,” Mutua stated.
Mutua further raised issues with some clauses in the coalition agreement signed by the Azimio One Kenya affiliate parties. One of the issues he raised includes how the coalition plans to conduct its nominations noting that the bigger parties in the political outfit – Jubilee, ODM and Wiper – are planning to block small parties from participating in the August elections.
He also raised an issue with how former Jubilee Party secretary-general Raphael Tuju was appointed as Azimio campaign secretariat executive director.
“We feel that we have not been consulted, decisions have been made including the recent decision that Azimio will have a secretariat led by Raphael Tuju. We are only seeing it in the media. We are supposed to be coalition partners making decisions together,” he pointed out.
