A radical shake-up is underway at the Orange House, the nerve centre of Raila Odinga’s ODM party.
Sources say most top officials will be sent packing. The overhaul is a 2022 rebranding strategy as implied by an internal task force which found the secretariat moribund and the centre of corruption and bungled nominations.
While Raila has been tight-lipped on his political game plan, he is widely expected to face off with DP William Ruto in the 2022 presidential race.
The shake-up is planned ahead of ODM’s relocation to its new Sh170 million headquarters in Lavington, Nairobi, bought from former Bahati MP and once vibrant trade unionist Fred Omido. The acquisition puts ODM in a league of its own as probably the only local political party with its own premises.
The Star has established that the grand housecleaning, expected next month, is being discussed by the Secretariat Management Committee (SMC) — a new organ formed last June.
The current secretariat staff are expected to exit by November when the party will recruit fresh professionals.
Those likely to be shown the door include executive director Oduor Ong’wen who has been at the helm for five years.
The other long-serving directors are Joshua Kawino (finance and administration), Philip Etale (communication), Wafula Buke (political affairs and strategy) and Rosemary Kariuki (director of membership, recruitment and retention).
The party is said to have terminated Buke’s contract under unclear circumstances. Insiders privy to the ongoing high-profile deliberations say the current staff will be free to reapply for positions. Successful applicants will be given clear job descriptions and regularly appraised.
The Star has established that it is the thinking of the party to engage an independent professional body to recruit and recommend names to the SMB.
To attract and retain high calibre staff, ODM last month rolled out a provident fund scheme to be managed by Britam Insurance for its employees. Employees will have 7.5 per cent of their earnings channelled to the insurer with a similar percentage from the employer.
“These are some of the things we have undertaken to motivate staff and ensure their future is secured and to make the jobs competitive,” a source familiar with Orange House affairs said.
He said they want professionals to run the secretariat. “Even if they are going to be members of ODM, they must be professionals. Look at this issue of party register, which was a mess in the Kibra primary. It is because of either incompetence or people who lack integrity,” the high-placed source said.
A recent internal audit singled out the secretariat as one of the crucial organs which have failed in their mandate and contributed largely to the worrying dwindling fortunes of the Orange party.
The shocking task force report by the Catherine Mumma-led team and touted as the party’s moment of truth, heavily indicted the secretariat.
It said the secretariat is completely out of touch with the grassroots membership and has resorted to relying on “figureheads to obtain grassroots’ intelligence”.
“ODM party primaries have been described as the party’s biggest vice. Party elections are thought to lack credibility and do not meet the standard of being free, fair and democratic,” the report reads.
“The party structures, especially the NEC, the NEB and the secretariat, have been blamed for conducting their business in a manner that is not transparent and accountable and are thought to be in the business of deliberately staging the chaotic and violent elections as a way of facilitating favourites to end up as nominees of ODM for the general elections,” the report concluded.
The Secretariat Management Board comprises chairman John Mbadi, Edwin Sifuna (secretary-general), Junet Mohamed (director of campaigns), former Kitutu Masaba MP Timothy Bosire (treasurer) and EALA MP Abdikadir Aden (organising secretary). The others are ODM Women League leader Beth Syengo and Mike Rubia, the secretary for labour and human resource.
The board has been meeting fortnightly since its inception in June during ODM’s National Executive Council meeting in Nakuru. It has also proposed radical changes to have the secretariat run by a professional headed by an executive director, who is directly answerable to the management board.
Unlike in the current setup where the executive director heads the secretariat and reports directly to NEC, in the new setup the SMB will link the secretariat to NEC.
The executive director will come immediately after the board in the new pecking order and beneath it will be five directorates, instead of the current four.
Under the directorates, they will also be relevant junior staff competitively recruited by the board.
In the proposed organogram, the five directorates will be finance and administration; membership, political affairs and policy; communication, and the directorate of strategy.
“What we want to do is ensure these directors are professionals. We’re going to come up with the qualifications and job descriptions for each of these directorates. Then below them, there will be various officers. Like under finance, we’ll have accountants,” the source said.
According to the source, the party is also moving from its traditional arrangement where an internal auditor was domiciled within the finance directorate. Instead, they will use the services of an independent office of the internal auditor only answerable to the SMB.
“We don’t want an auditor who is answerable to the executive director or directorate. Best world practice is that we have an internal auditor responsible for the highest organ in the party so he is not compromised and is able to do an independent evaluation,” stated the source.
A check by the Star at Orange House, which has housed ODM for over a decade, revealed the party had moved all the containers that had been serving as its stores in the premises owned by Raila’s former aide Caroli Omondi.
The new office sits on 1.88 acres and had an old building which the party has refurbished even as they ponder putting up a new block in the compound.
