Research Firm Threatens To Sue Council Of Governors Over ‘Fraudulent Poll’ Slur

All Africa Advisors (AAA), a UK-based research firm that recently ranked governors in terms of performance is up in arms against the Council of Governors (CoG) for rubbishing the poll.

In a statement today, the pollster through Nchogu, Omwanza & Nyasimi law firm, AAA demanded an apology from the CoG and its chair Wycliffe Oparanya, after which “the quantum of damages payable to the firm will be discussed”.

The CoG had attempted to discredit the poll, but now will have to rethink its statement as AAA threatens to sue them

In a statement yesterday, the CoG through Oparanya termed the poll as “fraudulent” and a political strategy to malign the leadership in the Counties.

“The Council is of the considered view that the Company has no locus to purport to have conducted a survey in the Country with Kenya’s interest at heart,” read the statement in part signed by Oparanya.

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The count bosses also dismissed reports that they had received a self-assessment tool where each County Government was required to provide evidence to support their scores on questionnaires.

“The company alleges to have administered a self-assessment tool to all counties where each County Government was required to provide evidence to support their scores on the questionnaires. We would like to clarify that to date, the Council of Governors which is the coordinating body of all the 47 County Governments have not received the alleged questionnaire and in effect none of the County Governments have,” added CoG.

However, AAA claims to be in possession of material evidence of the questionnaires filled by the counties.

“We sent a letter to the Council of Governors (COG) dated 21st April 2019 informing them of the upcoming review of impact of Devolution survey. AAA has email correspondence with County Governments on the survey and G4S signed receipts of the survey questionnaires from all counties. AAA engaged over 30 researchers who collected photographic and documentary evidence towards the survey which proves the level of diligence in undertaking this Survey,” said the company in the statement.

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In the poll compiled between June and August this year, Machakos Governor Dr Alfred Mutua was ranked as the best performing county boss, followed by Oparanya who is also the governor for Kakamega.

Nairobi Governor Mike Sonko was ranked third followed by Kivutha Kibwana of Makueni while Ali Hassan Joho of Mombasa closed the list of best five.

Amason Kingi (Kilifi), Fahim Twaha (Lamu), Sospeter Ojaamong (Busia), Cyprian Awiti (Homa Bay) and Ferdinand Waititu (Kiambu) were ranked as the five worst performing governors.

The CoG had also threatened to sue the pollster, saying that county governments are “not comparable”, a move that is thought to have been pushed by governors ranked as the worst performers.

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