During a live televised interview on Tuesday, October 29, on NTV, Rarieda MP Otiende Omollo and former Kakamega Senator Boni Khalwale engaged in a heated exchange after Khalwale made strereotypical claims against the ODM party.
Khalwale had claimed that ODM party advocated for violence in the country and institutions tasked with curbing the vice, were not acting.
"There are many cases of violence from this community, from this political party. If we don't speak to it, then we have no intention of stopping violence.
"Institutions charged with the responsibility are sleeping on their job. They have not arrested Junet and Simba Arati and Junet spoke for three and a half minutes inciting people," he alleged.
Irked by the former senator's remarks, Otiende jumped in to correct his unsubstantiated allegations against the party.
He stated that the former senator was wrong in stereotyping ODM party as one that had members from the same community.
"You know very well that you contested for Kakamega, the man who beat you is not Luo and he beat you on ODM. So you know those who voted for him in Kakamega are not Luo's. Hence, it is not only Luo's who are in ODM and vice versa.
"The violence you talk about in Kakamega and all, must have been caused by your own people, the Luhyas and they chose to vote for Oparanya," he continued.
Further, he stated that it was unfortunate that Khalwale was uttering such statements, noting that the Luo community had suffered a lot under successive regimes as compared to other communities.
"Let us not start to be inciteful very carelessly. In this country, we have heard very dicey ethnic relations and we should not raise them any higher than they need to be. We should raise them in Kibra, we should not raise them Mau, we shoul not raise them in Kisumu or Nairobi.
"I think what we should do is speak what we have all spoken about. That people are entitled to political differences and express themselves robustly but ensure it does not amount to tribal incitement," he concluded.
Below is the video courtesy of NTV;
