Kiraitu Murungi
He said he is confident that the alliance, whose symbol is a bus will take off including the envisaged membership drive slated for next month.
“We are not turning back and we want to reassure everybody that the Alliance is going strong. We want to win that election in the first round with fifty plus one percent of the votes,” Murungi told a news conference held at the party’s headquarters on Sunday afternoon.
He added; “From the look of things we see the ODM, the UDM block and PNU Alliance as the main political parties that will be governing the political destiny of this country.”
He said affiliate parties will not be stopped from conducting their activities but at the same time appealed to parties to consolidate their energies towards strengthening the Alliance
Murungi refuted claims that the party is sidelining some of its members in the run up to the joint presidential primaries.
“The political future in this country lies in democratic consolidation; you cannot consolidate democracy with million of small political parties which no one even hears about,” he said.
At the same, he confirmed that the Alliance’s National Executive Council was considering a change of name to the Alliance Party of Kenya after both the Registrar of Societies and that of Political Parties expressed reservations that it may lead to confusion.
“There has been discussion within our party whether there is need to change the name from PNU Alliance to The Alliance Party of Kenya. But it’s a proposal which we have made to the Registrar of Political Parties, no final approval has been given so the name of the Alliance still remains until the legal process is completed,” Murungi explained.
At the same time, PNU Alliance Party has moved its membership recruitment launch from Tuesday January 10 to Friday 13.
Murungi said the decision was reached in order to allow Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta and Vice President Kalonzo who are currently in South Africa for the ANC centenary celebrations to be present
The alliance which is made up of Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka of Wiper Democratic Movement, Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta of Kanu and Internal Security minister George Saitoti of PNU will also announce the individual recruitment of members for their parties before coming together for joint nominations.
The Alliance’s national executive council meeting held two weeks ago allowed affiliate parties to strengthen their parties to comply with the requirements of the Political Parties Act.
Murungi said to register one will need the national identity card, voter’s card and will be required to pay ten shillings for the party’s membership card.
Kangundo MP Johnstone Muthama, who is the alliance’s meetings convenor said grassroots polls will start at the polling centre level on February 17 followed by ward elections the following day.
The party intends to register between 7.5 million to 10 million voters through the nationwide exercise.
The date for national elections is yet to be set.
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