Former Deputy Speaker Farah Maalim, one of the original founders of the ODM party has hinted that he will be challenging ODM leader Raila Odinga for the 2017 ODM presidential ticket.
And because Maalim is not a politician who bluffs, he may just challenge Odinga. The good thing is; he has said he will challenge Odinga within ODM and remain in ODM, regardless of the outcome.
Educated at Maseno School, Hon. Maalim, the former Ladgera MP, was at some point the only opposition MP in the larger Northern Kenya region during Moi days. He started his politics as a youth winger under Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, and was one of less than five young politicians who would be Jaramogi’s protégés, alongside James Orengo and Paul Muite.
He has remained pro-Luo and pro-Odinga,  casting his lot with the western bloc both in the 7th parliament and 10th parliament. In the 10th parliament, Odinga nominated him as Deputy Speaker.
Maalim ably deputised former speaker Kenneth Marende, and is remembered for shooting down several PNU manouvres in parliament, to which they never forgave him, and rigged in senator Yusuf Hajji, former defence minister, in the 2013 elections.
One of his rulings so irked then Deputy Prime Mnister Uhuru Kenyatta that he banged a table in parliament while addressing the press. After that, PNU wing swore never to discuss any weighty issue if Marende, whom they’d compromised, wasn’t presiding.
Maalim is known to be among the few ODM leaders whose loyalty to Odinga is never in doubt.
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