- Hassan Ali Joho is one of the firebrand politicians from the Coast and a key ally of ODM leader Raila Odinga.
- He was born on February 26, 1967.
Image: FILE
President William Ruto has nominated former Mombasa Governor Hassan Joho as Cabinet Secretary for Mining and Blue Economy in the latest batch of Cabinet nominees.
Joho's position is one of the negotiated Cabinet slots following a deal for the formation of the Government of National Unity between President Ruto and ODM boss Raila Odinga.
The President made the appointment at State House, Nairobi, on Wednesday, nearly a week after unveiling the first batch of his Cabinet nominees.
Joho is one of Raila's two deputy party leaders of the ODM party alongside former Kakamega Governor Wycliffe Oparanya.
The politician is known to be fireband and straight-talking since joining politics in 2004.
He was born on February 26, 1967.
He joined active politics in 2004 and went on to become the Kisauni party chairman for the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) between 2006 and 2007.
During the 2007 general election, he got elected the Kisauni MP through the ODM party ticket.
He also landed a role in late president Mwai Kibaki’s government as an assistant minister for Transport.
In 2013, he vied for the Mombasa governorship, a seat he held until 2022 after successfully defending it in the 2017 polls.
During the 2013 election, he was declared the winner after garnering 132,583 votes against 94, 905 votes of his closest rival Suleiman Shahbal who emerged second.
During the 2022 general election, he opted not to vie for any seat after being promised a cabinet position in the Azimio government.
He was to be Lands CS had Raila won the presidency in 2022.
In the 2017 election, he managed 220 576 votes to beat Shahbal who managed 69 322 votes.
He is currently one of the two deputy party leaders of ODM.
Education background
Joho sat for his Kenya Certificate of Primary Education (KCPE) at Tom Mboya Primary School in 1988.
After a year at home, he joined Serani Secondary School.
In 1993, he completed his secondary education attaining a mean grade of D- (minus) in the Kenya Certificate of Secondary Education (KCSE).
He would later enrol for a certificate course at Kampala University.
In 2008, he obtained a certificate course in business administration that allowed him to enrol for a diploma course in human resource management at the same university.
In 2009, he satisfied the requirements prescribed by the institution’s Senate for the award of the degree of Bachelor of Business Administration.