- West Mugirango MP Stephen Mogaka claimed hired people were transported to disrupt Ruto's meeting and demand that he Kyabonyoru be the university site.
- “My President was troubled and because he wanted just one minute to speak to Nyamira people, he said if that is what you are making noise about, take it.”
Image: SCREENGRAB
West Mugirango MP Stephen Mogaka has apologised to President William Ruto over an incident at Kiabonyoru in Nyamira county on Monday.
The MP said the President reportedly settled on the location of a university in the area after some residents shouted over his speech demanding that he make the declaration.
He said the Commission of University Education should declare the location of the university as declared by the President null and void and pick a different location because Ruto settled on the site under duress.
“I want to apologise to the President of the Republic of Kenya for the behaviour exhibited in Kiabonyoru. Hired people were transported there to disrupt the President’s meeting and started demanding that he announce the university will be built there,” he said.
The MP was speaking during a funeral service in a video shared online on Friday.
During Ruto’s three-day working tour of the Kisii region, the President said the government had decided to construct the university at Kyabonyoru in Nyamira county after consultations with the area MP.
He made the announcement at the Kiabonyoru Secondary School in North Mugirango where he had laid the foundation stone for a dormitory.
It followed shouts from the crowd with demands that he declare Kiabonyoru the site where the university would be built, which he did.
“Tulikuwa tumekubaliana na huyu mjumbe wa hapa kwamba hii university ikuje hapa, na kwa sababu sasa ameende kunitangaza kwa raia, sasa maneno ndio hivyo,” he said.
(We had an agreement with the area MP that the university be built in this area and because he has reported me to constituents, that’s how it will be)
Ruto said he would give the initial Sh500 million for construction to begin.
But MP Mogaka felt that the President’s decision was involuntary.
“My President was troubled and because he wanted just one minute to speak to Nyamira people, he said if that is what you are making noise about, take it,” he said.
“That is not an issuance of a university to any location in Kenya or in Nyamira in particular. I’m a lawyer and I also can confirm that anything you are pressured to do…something you are coerced to do, that thing is null and void,” he added.
Mogaka said their focus on having a university in Nyamira is that the process is done using due process through a decision of the Commission of University Education.
He said as leaders of Nyamira County, they will await the commission’s decision on the new location where the university will be built.
“That is the decision that will apply and we do apologise that you were forced to cave in or succumb to undue pressure…and I invite you back to Nyamira in October and you will see how civilised [and] disciplined, how citizens living in Nyamira county living in West Mugirango conduct their business.”