Charity Kaluki Ngilu vs Julius Malombe: Who Has Done a Better Job as Kitui Governor?

Some few months ago, I overheard an interesting debate at Kalundu market in Kitui – as to who, between Charity Kaluki Ngilu and Julius Malombe had done a better job as Kitui governor. Some of the pro-Ngilu people were strongly arguing that she had been more effective has Kitui governor, even as some of the pro-Malombe people were arguing that she (Kaluki Ngilu) had not been more effective than Dr Malombe.

Charity Kaluki Ngilu is currently (as at December 2020) the Governor of Kitui County. She won the seat during the 2017 general election, on a NARC party ticket. Before her was Julius Malomber, who was the first governor of Kitui – after winning the seat on a Wiper ticket during the 2013 general elections.

Before winning the Kitui governorship position, Ngilu had served for many terms as Kitui central MP. She had also served as a minister in many dockets, including the health docket, the water docket and the lands docket. The advantage that Ngilu had while coming into the Kitui governorship position was her great wealth of experience, and her genuine understanding of the people’s needs.

The advantage that Malombe had while coming into the Kitui governship position was his considerable education (I heard that he has a doctorate) and the fact that he was a political outsider, unsmeared by the political shenanigans that surround our governance. There are those who argue that at the time Malombe ran for Kitui governorship in 2013, people hadn’t yet understood just how influential the governorship position was. So he is said to be one of the pioneer governors who were lucky to run at a time when competition for the governorship positions wasn’t as heated as it is today. That was also a time when the prevailing view was the governor ought to be a managerial sort of person, you know, some sort of CEO – and not a politician (which seemed to be a perfect description of Malombe).

Malombe was successful in establishing the structures of devolution in Kitui. Being a pioneer governor is not as easy as it looks – one has to start from scratch. But his greatest undoing was perhaps in the fact that he was seen as an aloof manager, one who doesn’t mingle with the people a great deal. Thus whereas Malombe was able to do quite a huge number of positive things as Kitui governor, they didn’t get the attention they deserved, on account of his inability to engage in political shenanigans. On the other hand, Kaluki has been successful in taking the devolved services to the people, and establishing highly visible projects [like Kitui Textiles] and generally in keeping the devolution vehicle moving smoothly within Kitui county. One of her greatest assets is in the fact that she is truly a people’s lady, one who mingles easily with the people and one who has pointmen (and point-women) in all corners of Kitui county. This has led people to develop the feeling that she has been considerably effective in her role – if nothing else, at least because she is able to clearly explain what she wants to do for the people/what she has done for the people. In politics, being able to explain your agenda to the people is very important, and this is something that Charity Kaluki Ngilu does quite well consistently.