National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula has dismissed Azimio leader Raila Odinga for claiming that he is not fit to hold office. In a statement, Wetang’ula said the former Prime Minister should get his facts right, before displaying such public outbursts.
“Get the facts right before such outbursts! Misplaced, misdirected & unhelpful anger Mr Raila Odinga,” Wetang’ula said.
The National Assembly Speaker’s remarks comes after Raila, during a rally and an ODM membership recruitment drive in Nairobi’s Kamukunji Grounds, said that the move by Wetang’ula to appeal the Court of Appeal ruling against the Housing Levy was unfortunate. Raila said on Sunday that the decision by Wetang’ula to move to the Supreme Court is irregular as he oversaw the passage of the Housing Levy as speaker of the National Assembly.
“Moses Wetang’ula does not deserve to be speaker of the National Assembly,” Raila said.
According to Raila, the speaker can only move to court after consulting MPs who have employed him.
“The law emanated from Parliament and President Ruto signed it into law, now that some people have gone to court, the Speaker, all over the world has no authority to move to court,” the Opposition leader said.
On Wednesday last week, the Speaker filed a notice of appeal on the Appellate Court’s ruling on the Housing Levy. “The national assembly and the speaker of the national assembly being dissatisfied with the decision of the court of appeal intend to appeal to the Supreme Court against the whole ruling,” read the notice.
On January 26, the government suffered a major setback after the Court of Appeal declined to suspend orders barring the state from deducting housing levy from Kenyans.
By Lean Simatwa