Lamu, KENYA: Lamu Members of the County Assembly-MCAs are set to take their oath of office on Tuesday this week.
A total of 20 MCAs,10 elected and 10 nominated shall be sworn in at the Lamu County Assembly Hall.
The swearing in will be followed by the election of the assembly speaker on the same day.
The speaker race has attracted six candidates all of whom are losers of the recent general election.
The candidates for speaker include gubernatorial loser Abdalla Fadhil,senatorial losers lawyer Waihiga Mwaure,Hassan Albeity and Mohamed Hashim who is also the outgoing speaker.
Others are Lamu West MP loser Abdu Kassim and Muthoni Marubu who vied for the Lamu women rep position as an independent camdidate.
Four Lamu MCAs who retained their seats in the last general elections have asked the newcomers not to stress governor Fahim Twaha like their counterparts did to former governor Issa Timamy, making it hard for him to make strides in development matters.
The MCAs,James Komu of Hongwe ward,Anthony Njomo of Bahari,Paul Kimani of Mkunumbi and Azhar Mbarak of Shella wards pleaded with the incoming MCAs to harbor a spirit of cooperation with the governor in order to make it easier to develop the county.
Out of the 10 MCAs in the last assembly,only four managed to retain their seats while six were shown the door.
They observed that his predecessor Issa Timamy faced hell at the hands of MCAs of the last county assembly who visibly frustrated the governor by opposing every single proposition he had thereby making it hard for him to effectively deliver on many of the development projects he had.
The four said healthy working relationship between the county assembly and the governor would make the assembly’s work a lot more easier and productive if they all were to have a common shared goal of serving the people of Lamu.
They opined that the bad blood between the outgoing governor and MCAs made the work of the county assembly very difficult.
James Komu of Hongwe observed that two years after the 2013 general elections,the county assembly was unable to pass any laws or bills due to the impasse between the MCAs and the governor.
He however said he believes the charming relationship between the current governor Fahim Twaha and the MCAs of the second house was a clear indication that things will be more at ease and that the county assemblies functions will move smoothly than before.
“So many things didn’t happen and we wasted a lot of time.Seems however things are different this time round.Most MCAs have a good relationship with the current governor and that will make work easy,”said Komu.
The six incoming MCAs in Lamu are Jonathan Mketta of Witu ward,Yahya Shee of Mkomani,Abdalla Baabad of Kiunga,Deko Barissa of Basuba,Fahad Dini of Faza and Anab Hajji of Hindi wards.
Hajji is the only woman elected as MCA in Lamu.
The Jubilee Party has the majority members with three elected MCAs while Amani National Congress -ANC which is in NASA has two.
The ten elected MCAs are Yahya Shee of Mkomani Ward-Jubilee, Abdalla Baabad of Kiunga Ward-Jubilee, Anab Haji of Hindi Ward-Jubilee, Jonathan Mketta of Witu Ward ANC, Deko Barissa of Basuba Ward-ANC, James Komu of Hongwe Ward-MCC, Paul Njuguna of Mkunumbi Ward-Safina, Anthony Njomo Maina of Bahari Ward-PDU, Azhar Mbarak of Shella Ward-ODM and Fahad Dini of Faza Ward-KANU.
