Embakasi East MP Babu Owino has indicated he is willing to support Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna for two presidential terms before pursuing his own ambition of becoming President, marking a shift from his earlier proposal that Sifuna should serve only one term.
He spoke on Thursday while engaging with members of the Linda Mwananchi Women League at his office on the role of women in shaping our country’s future.
“Now that we have started this journey, I want us to build a friendship, whether politics is involved or not. We do not know where this friendship will take us,” Babu said.
He said if Sifuna won the presidency in 2027, he could remain in office until 2037 before Babu pursued his own ambitions.
“If Sifuna becomes President in 2027, let him serve two terms and finish in 2037. That will be 10 years. If we are still friends, our relationship will remain intact,” he said.
Babu added that he would also want to serve two terms as President after Sifuna, describing a political journey that could span another 20 years.
The remarks mark a shift from Babu’s earlier proposal for a one-term arrangement ahead of his planned presidential bid in 2032.
In August, the MP said he intended to contest the Nairobi governorship in 2027, serve one term and then run for President in 2032.
He also proposed that political leaders consider serving one term in elective positions before supporting a common presidential candidate.
Under the timeline he outlined, however, Babu would have to wait until after Sifuna’s proposed two terms before pursuing the presidency.
Babu said the two leaders had different immediate political ambitions and therefore had no reason to compete against each other in 2027.
“Sifuna does not want to be Nairobi Governor and Babu does not want to be President of Kenya at this stage. So there is no conflict of interest. We can work together as brothers and lift each other up,” he said.
He asked supporters to stand by both leaders, saying they should help each other advance their political ambitions rather than allow competition to divide them.
Babu also recalled that he had left the Orange Democratic Movement before Sifuna and said the senator later joined him outside the party. He described the two as brothers who had built their relationship through their political experiences.
The MP said he intended to remain alongside Sifuna despite the challenges they could face as they pursued their ambitions.
Beyond their personal political plans, Babu urged opposition leaders to unite ahead of the 2027 general election and learn from the 2022 presidential contest, which the late former Prime Minister Raila Odinga lost to President William Ruto.
He said the opposition needed to retain the support base built by Raila while attracting additional voters from other political formations.
“Votes are about multiplication and addition, not division and subtraction,” Babu said.
He argued that opposition leaders should examine what went wrong in 2022 and address any weaknesses before the next election, warning against assuming that victory was guaranteed.
Babu said the opposition needed to have difficult conversations about its strategy, preserve its existing support and expand its reach to other communities.
He also attributed leadership to God and said opposition unity would be critical to the movement’s efforts to challenge Ruto in 2027.
The MP’s remarks come as Linda Mwananchi positions Sifuna as its preferred presidential candidate, while Babu seeks the Nairobi governorship. Babu publicly declared his 100 per cent support for Sifuna’s presidential bid during the unveiling of The Equitable Party on October 4.
Sifuna has also said he intends to contest the presidency in 2027, declaring that he wants to challenge Ruto at the ballot.
