The Democratic Party’s (DP) National Executive Committee, on Thursday, picked former Principal Secretary (PS) for Transport Irungu Nyakera to reorganize and revamp the party.
The 37-year-old Stanford-educated technocrat was appointed as the deputy leader by thirty-two delegates.
On October 26, 2018, the delegates had passed a resolution to energize the party by injecting new blood into its leadership in readiness for the 2022 presidential elections.
“DP is reorganizing and re-positioning itself in order to field a presidential candidate in 2022,” the party chairman Esau Kioni declared in a statement.
Furthermore, he stated that the party had a presence in 36 counties, making it one of the national parties in the country.
According to Nyakera, by 2022, 73 percent of Kenyan voters will be under 35 years of age.
Therefore, it was his view that the party needed to start speaking to the youth early including making room for them inside the party. He also stated that he didn’t mind understudying the old guard to learn from them.
He was selected to deputize the aging former cabinet minister, Joseph Munyao, who is expected to retire from politics soon.
Nyakera entry into active politics is the latest move since leaving the civil service in mid-2018 after President Uhuru Kenyatta announced a mini-reshuffle in his cabinet.
Uhuru tapped him from Equity Investment Bank where he was serving as the Managing Director (MD) and at the time, became the youngest serving PS.
Previously, he worked for City Investment Bank in New York and NIC Capital, as head of Infrastructure for South UK’s DFID Southern Africa office. Nyakera holds a BSc degree in management science engineering and finance.
Former president Mwai Kibaki founded the Democratic Party (DP) in 1991 after section 2A of the constitution was repealed.
