Prof George Wajackoyah of the Roots Party has stated that he will not participate in next week’s presidential debate unless he shares a platform with the other three candidates.
Wajackoyah accused the debate organizers of discrimination, even as he criticized the formula used to arrive at the current format, in which the first debate features candidates who received less than 5% in three recent opinion polls and the second features candidates who received more than 5% in the same poll.
During a TV interview, the Roots Party’s flag bearer stated that he will not be a party to it if he is not given the opportunity to debate all of the other candidates.
“If you go to Canada, UK, US, China, Singapore, all presidential candidates are put together for people to see their body language, how they answer questions, how they look at each other, how they check the temperatures and temper, But these guys come in and say this is how it should be, No, I will boycott it,” he said.
Wajackoyah, who was placed on tier two alongside Agano Party’s David Waihiga Mwaure, stated that the organizers have no justification, neither in the Constitution nor in any law, for holding the debate as it is currently scheduled.
He described the current debate format as skewed, but he remains confident that Kenyans will vote for him whether he appears or not. He objects to being made to feel inferior to candidates in Tier One, a position he claims he has communicated to the organizers.
“I will not participate unless there is Raila Odinga, William Samoei Ruto, Mwaure, and I on the same platform speaking before Kenyans, for Kenyans to make an informed choice,” he added.
Wajackoyah claims he earned the right to be treated equally with Ruto and Raila after being cleared to run for President by the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission.
“You cannot just come out with a suit from Havard, or Oxford or University of Nairobi, and because you are a journalist, and you know too much Kizungu, you come and tell a presidential candidate this is how we have arranged it, and these are the rules, hell no,” he said.
