Kabete Member of Parliament Ferdinand Waititu who is accused by Kiambu Governor William Kabogo he does not possess any valid university degree or any degree from a recognized University.
BY THOMAS KARIUKI
Kiambu Governor William Kabogo has taken his supremacy wars to court this time claiming that Mr Ferdinand Waititu who has vowed to remove him from the governor’s seat lied about his academic credentials.
The governor through lawyer Issa Mansur told a Nairobi court on Friday March 11 2016 that Waititu does not possess any valid university degree or any degree from a recognized University.
He said that there is no evidence that now Kabete MP Waititu went through a process of learning, tutoring, and examination and met all the requirements of the University to earn the degree that he purports to possess.
Kiambu Governor also warns that there is a real danger that Waititu’s election as member of the National Assembly for Kabete Constituency was a fraud on the good people of Kiambu County.
Mr Waititu who over the recent past has been able to woo most, if not all Kiambu residents and is assumed to enjoy the backing of Statehouse to capture the Kiambu seat has launched a campaign to remove ‘redundant’ Kabogo with the backing of most Members of Parliament from the central regionwhere President Uhuru Kenyatta also comes from.
Kabogo wants his petition be certified urgent, raising a substantial question of law and one that raises matters of great public importance. He also urged the court to refer the petition to the Chief Justice to empanel a bench comprising of an uneven number of judges to hear and determine the matter.
The governor also claims that he was a student and therefore an alumni of Punjab University in India and is surprised by the claims made by Waititu that he was purportedly in the same University and earned a degree having been admitted in unclear and opaque circumstances.
Lawyer Mansur contends that Section 25(1) (a) of the Elections Act provides that a person must satisfy any educational, moral and ethical requirements prescribed by the Constitution and the Act.
He said that Waititu does not possess any degree from a recognised University and there is no evidence that the Respondent went through a process of learning, tutoring, and examination and met all the requirements of the University to have earned the degree that he purports to possess.
Mr Waititu was born in 1962 to his parents Waititu Ndogi and Monica Njeri Wainaina all of Ngarariga village in Kiambu.
He schooled at Mbagathi Primary School from 1975 and sat his Certificate of Primary Examinations and later joined Dagoreti High in 1981.
Waititu was in 1985 admitted at a University in India to undertake a 3 years degree course where he graduated on June 19 1988 and was awarded a degree diploma by Panjab University, Chandigarh.
Kabogo claims that Waititu does not have any qualification past primary school education.
The governor also says that it is extremely unlikely for a child born in Ngarariga – Limuru in 1962 to be commuting to Mbagathi Primary School from Ngarariga –Limuru to attend school at Mbagathi Primary school in Nairobi.
He also claims that while Waititu was courting his current wife, he introduced himself as Ferdinand Ndung’u Waititu as demonstrated in an affidavit of December 2 2008 that she knows her husband as known by only one name Ferdinand Ndung’u Waititu.
The governor says that Clifford Ndung’u Waititu as the latter is referred to in his certificates has always been a separate person from the Respondent with a specific and different identity from the time of birth, education, career, and at the time of graduating with a Bachelors of Commerce degree from Panjab University in June 1988.
It is undeniable and an unassailable fact that Clifford Ndung’u Waititu has never applied to contest nor has he ever contested for any elective position whether as a Councillor, Member of Parliament or as a Governor in the Republic of Kenya.
Kabogo prays among other declarations that Waititu be declared ineligible to contest for any elective office under the Elections Act, 2011.
The petition was certified urgent and will be heard on April 5 2016.
