Lang’ata Member of Parliament (MP) Nixon Korir has become the latest Kenyan politician to be brought under the spotlight over accusations of tribalism.
These claims were fueled by a snapshot of a document showing part of Lang’ata constituency’s CDF beneficiaries in which members from a certain community dominated the list.
On the photo now doing rounds on social media, most recipients of Korir’s school bursary held names from the Kalenjin community with only a handful of students from Central and Nyanza filling out the rest of the entries.
The list has already sparked reactions from some strongly opinionated Kenyans like popular Twitter personality Ike Ojuok who heavily condemned Nixon Korir’s clear show of nepotism.
“Lang’ata constituency desperately needs an MP who can serve them without discrimination, Nixon Korir is an ethnic jingoist.
See the list of CDF beneficiaries. 80% are from one community. This is NOT right,” he wrote in response to the viral photo.
It is common knowledge that issues such as corruption, political patronage, nepotism and tribalism have strongly plagued the CDF bursary award process in many Kenyan constituencies.
Worse still is the little regard for defined bursary eligibility criteria as in many instances students from high socio-economic backgrounds tend to receive a lot more bursary support than their counterparts from humble backgrounds.
This is often a result of political pressure exerted on the constituency bursary fund committees.
As of the publishing of this post, MP Nixon Korir was yet to clear the air over some of these latest accusations which, among other things, could jeopardize his future as a legislator.
This is given the fact that Mr Korir seat seems to be attracting lots of suitors, including Raila’s Personal Assistant Silas Chepkeres Jakakimba who recently declared his interest in the seat.
Others who have shown interest in the position include media personality Felix Oduor aka Jalang’o as well as City Lawyer Steve Ogolla.
All the three aspirants reportedly seek to contest the controversial Lang’ata seat on the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) ticket.
