Runyenjes MP Cecily Mbarire has challenged state agencies to help President Uhuru Kenyatta enforce integrity by ensuring all Jubilee aspirants are vetted before running for political office.
She said the president should lead by example by subjecting his top lieutenants to inquests into their financial dealings and audits of their social life to ensure they comply with Chapter Six of the Constitution, which spells out the leadership and integrity requirements for state and public officers.
Mbarire observed that President Kenyatta’s administration had been riddled with graft and integrity cases since the first year in office, but added that ensuring all candidates for various seats were properly vetted and proper scrutiny on their lives was a sure way of eliminating corrupt and tainted politicians.
She lauded the move by Jubilee to bar some candidates from contesting under the party’s flag, at the same time welcoming the idea of having all aspiring Jubilee candidates cleared by among others the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission, Criminal Investigations Department, Kenya Revenue Authority, Credit Referencing Bureaus, stating that this would cleanse Kenyan politics.
Speaking at her campaign centre in Embu town after meeting small-scale traders, Mbarire also supported the suggestion of having a lifestyle audit of every sitting politician to establish whether they had used their offices to quickly amass wealth through dubious means.
She emphasised that every aspirant had a right to fair treatment by the party’s top brass but was also quick to state that it was obvious that some leaders were too soiled by cases of financial impropriety, land grabbing general social misconduct to run for political office under Jubilee.
The legislator called upon her counterparts to respect the decision of the party to sieve out anyone who could not stand the integrity test and also urged the National Super Alliance (NASA) to emphasise on vetting of their aspirants in order to give the electorate ‘clean’ leaders for election in the August polls.
