Aden Duale wants to be the first Muslim and Kenyan Somali deputy president – and probably president — despite lingering questions over his family’s links to terrorism. As Jubilee’s most rabid defender inside and outside parliament, the Leader of Majority in the National Assembly believes the job is almost half-done.He never stops reminding friends and rivals that there’s only one post that he will gun for at the transition in 2022: the running-mate of William Ruto, the URP leader and Uhuru’s deputy. Duale has been doing everything possible to continue currying favour with UhuRuto, while at the same time growing his clout in Garissa and among the Muslim constituency inthe north.Duale has also been in a rush to amass wealth to mount a serious campaign for the post he so much covets, and to which he fears he could be beaten by Abdikadir Mohammed, the former Mandera Central MP who is currently presidential advisor on constitutional affairs.When the list of corrupt politicians, public servants andparastatal chiefs was released early this month, many parastatal heads were shocked that Duale was not shamed, despite being one of the four powerful URP tenderpreneurs, known as the Sky Team haunting stateofficers for contracts. One CEO who had bet on the politician to protect him after awarding a company associated with him a tender was stupefied when the legislator took to the floor and made the most sanctimonious contribution against those on the list of shame. The disgraced officer threatened to “spill the beans” but Duale assured him that the EACC investigations will come to naught.“Duale acts like a man on a spell. He believes Jubilee will reign for at least 20 years and that Uhuru will back Ruto to succeed him. He wants to be Ruto’s running-mate and is in a constant fundraising mode to build a war-chest for the coming elections. He believes closeness to power and wealth will make him the indisputable leader of North Eastern Kenya. He wants to turn the Somali bloc into his fiefdom in the mould ofRaila’s Nyanza, Ruto’s Rift Valley and Uhuru’s Mt Kenya backyards. The problem is he is talking unity when he is building his stock on clannism,” an MP fromGarissa told our reporter.A senior officer in the deputy president’s office who could not be named for fear of reprisals told the Kenyaneditor that Uhuru and Ruto rate Duale highly and believe he is being targeted for his loyalty. He said the presidency regards him and Nairobi Senator Mike Sonko as bulwarks against intransigent legislators in parliament and civil society. For the Jubilee leaders, political support is more important than national stability and safety.But corruption is not Duale’s only weak point. He is also linked to terrorism and ethnic profiling of Kenyans.As we reported in October last year, the influential Duale family in Garissa stands accused of supporting terrorism, land-grabbing and nepotism.In a story complete with the intrigues of attempted murder, Duale is accused of grabbing a piece of land belonging to Garissa Primary School where he built a four-storey building called Lillac Centre.Those familiar with the story say that sometime in the 1990s, a group of Islamic scholars requested the boardof Garissa Primary School for a piece of land to put up a mosque. The request was granted but a big portion of the land was not immediately put to use. In 2009, Duale asked the mosque’s management to sell him a part of the land.The mosque’s management committee was split on theissue but a majority of the members opposed the idea, noting that the land still belonged to the school.One of those who opposed the request was the committee’s chairman, Yussuf Jama, the brother of Garissa County Governor Nathif Jama.While negotiations were ongoing, Yussuf was shot andinjured outside the mosque by a lone gunman on his way home from evening prayers. He resigned his position soon after.Who replaced him? Dubow Bare Duale, a brother of theMajority Leader. Soon after, the land matter was resolved and Duale allowed to lease the land.The school has appealed to the National Land Commission to revoke the lease and asked the Ethics the Anti-Corruption Commission to institute proceedings against Duale. But the complaints have not been acted on for Duale has threatened the officerswith censure motions if they dare open files against him. On April 7, EACC investigators told our writer that they had received the complaints but the commission’sCEO Halakhe Dida Waqo and his deputy Michael Mubea had intervened twice to stop the investigations. Waqo and Mubea did not respond to our enquiries.The second questionable deal involves Duale’s acquisition of a piece of land in Nairobi’s Eastleigh, where he has set up the Nomad Hotel.The land belonged to the Ministry of Livestock where Duale served as an assistant minister and it remains unclear how it changed hands.Another dark secret Duale has successfully hidden from Kenyans is that his family could be involved in supporting terrorist activities in North Eastern region and beyond. In fact some in Jubilee tellingly refer to him as the terror donor within the government, a moniker that is pregnant with innuendo.In April 2013, armed gunmen attacked Kwa Chege Kiosk and killed 10 people. Kwa Chege was an informaleatery, popular with the up-country people and employees of development organisations.Soon after this incident, security officers in the town questioned Duale’s older brother Hassan Bare Duale.An officer involved in the investigations, but who requested not to be named for fear of his personal security, said:“There were too many coincidences, which we simply could not ignore. Our intelligence showed that whenever he (Hassan Bare Duale) travelled to a place, say Mombasa, an attack would occur soon after he left. People came to us and told us to connect the dots. We did but we did not come up with any solid proof to charge him. But it is quite telling that after we questioned him, the attacks abated, at least for a while.”According to security officers, Hassan, a former Administration Police officer, is shielded by his brother Aden’s political clout.As was reported recently by a section of the local press,a low-level but sustained campaign of intimidation andethnic cleansing against non-Somalis is under way in Garissa town and neighbouring villages—even before the deadly April 2 al-Shaabab attack in which at least 150 Garissa University students, mostly Christians, were murdered.Duale is the MP of Garissa Township where most of these attacks have occurred. However, until after the most recent attack that shook the world, he has never condemned this systematic targeting of a section of Kenyans in his constituency.In the past, Duale has accused CORD leader Raila Odinga of nepotism for appointing close family members to public positions of influence while he was Prime Minister.But those who know him well say he is guilty of the same: He is said to have influenced the nomination of his niece, Mariam Hassan, as a Member of County Assembly on his United Republican Party (URP) ticket.He is also said to have arm-twisted the National Land Commission and the Ministry of Lands and Housing to hire another of his nieces, Fatuma Borrow, as the LamuCounty Lands Secretary.She did not apply for the job in the first place, but her name was on the short list. She is said to have failed the interview, answering only three out of 10 questionsasked by the panelists.However, Uncle Aden Duale came to her rescue and she got the job that pays her more than Sh400,000 permonth.The Leader of Majority is said to be currently lobbying for another of his brothers, Noor Bare Duale, to be appointed the chairman of the Kenya Revenue Authority. Noor is a businessman with a lucrative tender to supply drugs to government hospitals in the North-Eastern region.Other accusations revolve around his alleged role in influencing tenders. Duale is accused of ensuring majorcontracts in his county by the national government are issued to him and his family members. He is one of thepowerful cabal of URP tender-preneurs holding parastatal chiefs to ransom for business opportunities.These include the construction of five polytechnics in Garissa at a cost of Sh150 million each, construction of Garissa Livestock market, which was funded by the World Bank under the Kenya Municipal Program at a cost of Sh125 million. However, the project stalled due to variation of costs by the contractor.Last year, another company associated with his family, Hagar Construction Company, was given a contract to fence the Garissa Provincial Hospital at a cost of Sh40 million. However, the project which was awarded under the former Ministry of Northern Kenya Development is yet to be completed after the companyvaried the cost of the contract.The Duale family has spread its interests beyond the Kenyan borders. Duale’s sister Arfon is a member of Jubaland Parliament in Somalia.Jubaland is the region in southern Somalia which was created by the Kenyan government as a buffer zone against Al Shabaab militants.Arfon is a close associate of Professor Mohammed Abdi Mohammed, popularly known as Professor Gandhi, the first president of Jubaland and now Somalia’s ambassador to Canada.She went to the United States around 2008 on a Somali passport as a refugee but came back when the Jubaland government was being put in place.The family is said to have lobbied Prof Gandhi and the current President of Jubaland Sheikh Ahmed Madobe to have Arfon appointed to the region’s Parliament for its own interests.The Leader of Majority hails from a wealthy merchant family that owns a plethora of businesses and properties in Garissa, Nairobi and beyond.But having achieved financial muscle, the family is nowkeen on consolidating its political clout, not only in Garissa County but also in the former North Eastern province.Duale’s position as Leader of Majority in Parliament has given him and the family an important platform to establish grassroots links throughout the North Eastern region for future political endeavors.“The ultimate aim of Aden Duale is not to stick with Jubilee but someday break out from it and form a strong political party for the Somali community and bargain for a higher post in subsequent governments. That is what his family members tell people in public,” said our source.The question nagging many people is why the President and his deputy are still indulging Duale at theheart of government despite being linked to terrorism, corruption and ethnic profiling of Kenyans. Could he behiding behind the bravado of being Jubilee’s foremost defender to pull wool over the eyes of his benefactors? And if so, why aren’t the intelligence forces outing him? So many questions, so few answers. But hey, this is digital Kenya. Karibu.
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