Kajiado Governor, Joseph Ole Lenku has detailed that he walked into State House and requested to be fired from his Cabinet Secretary Position at the Ministry of Interior and Coordination.
As reported by the Kenya Yearbook Editorial Board, the Minister had earlier stated that he approached the former President, requesting to be fired after he deemed the pressure from the docket to be too much.
Ole Lenku, was serving as the CS between 2013 to 2014 when the country experienced a series of terrorism and banditry attacks.
The then CS came under heavy criticism from Kenyans as he was termed as clueless and lacking in experience to run the highly sensitive document.
During his tenure, Kenya experienced the Westgate Attack, where the Minister delivered a speech stating that terrorists were burning mattresses in the mall.
The speech painted him in a bad light, a factor which he explains he later turned around to his favour in the Governor position, campaigns.
However, the then-president, Uhuru Kenyatta, gave in to the public outcry and the CS’s request when he sacked him alongside the Inspector General at the time; David Kimaiyo.
Ole Lenku, was a hotelier before his previous appointment to the Ministerial docket; a factor that demonstrates his lack of experience or specialisation in security issues.
He also explained that he had not intended, in any way, to be a CS, and his appointment came as a surprise.
Lenku narrated that he had applied for a position as a Permanent Secretary and had been shortlisted for the position already.
“I was called to State House and I was hoping that the President would confirm my appointment as PS. But in an interesting turn of events, I was appointed CS for Interior. I think that drama is in the public (domain),” Lenku had said in a previous interview.
As a testament to the negative impact the pressure from the docket had on him, Lenku’s wife, Edna Lenku in 2023, came out to explain that the position had placed a negative spotlight on her family over constant media coverage.
