By Staff Writer | Wajir Today | Sunday, 11 January 2026

Northern Kenya has erupted into a raw, emotional and unusually public moment of self-reckoning after former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua’s blunt remarks on poor leadership and service delivery ignited fierce debate across the region.

What began as a national conversation around grade 10 admissions to elite schools has quickly morphed into a wider and more uncomfortable question,  what, exactly, has devolution delivered for one of Kenya’s most marginalised regions?

Across Wajir, Garissa and Mandera, residents, professionals and intellectuals are now speaking openly, some in anger, others in pain, and a few in defiance  about leadership, accountability and the billions of shillings that have flowed north since 2013.

For Mohamed Abdisalan, a businessman and resident of Wajir County, the former Deputy President merely said what many have long whispered.

“He spoke the reality,” Mohamed said. “He told us that we do not have good leaders. He spoke about how devolution did not help us from this region. He questioned why we do not have proper institutions and he spoke the reality.”

Mohamed’s frustration is not abstract. He points to the yawning gap between annual county allocations and everyday life in the region.

According to him, devolution brought unprecedented financial resources, but little visible transformation.

Since the onset of county governments, North Eastern counties have received billions of shillings every year. Yet, Mohamed says, the outcomes are painfully thin.

“It pains us a lot that the government resources is not helping us,” he said. “The governor of Wajir, Mandera and Garissa are told to invest in your region and that is very correct. I ask politicians to come to the region and invest in the region.”

He argues that many leaders disconnect from their constituents almost immediately after election, choosing Nairobi over the communities that voted them in.

Residents, he says, are watching their leaders accumulate wealth far from home while basic services stagnate.

That anger is no longer confined to private conversations.

Leadership assessment

Residents of Wajir, Garissa and Mandera are now openly confirming the realities on the ground and demanding truthful leadership and accountability, a striking shift in a region where criticism of leaders has often been muted.

Among those welcoming the controversy is Professor Salah Abdi Sheikh, an intellectual who describes the exchange sparked by Gachagua as overdue and revealing.

“This is a very interesting exchange,” he said. “The impeached Deputy President isn’t being charitable to the North at all. He is attacking the people of the North with the usual tropes and some facts.”

Professor Salah does not defend Gachagua’s tone, but he is unsparing in his assessment of regional leadership.

“The fact that is indefensible is the leadership of the North are an embarrassment and have been for ages,” he said. “They have no development record to speak of.”

He says the failure goes beyond infrastructure to ideas themselves.

“They have no sustainable ideas. They are bila ideas in politics,” he said.

According to Professor Salah, devolution money was squandered on politics rather than progress.

“They misused the resources allocated to the North in tribal mobilization, token contracts, widespread looting and misplaced priorities,” he said.

The result, he argues, is moral paralysis.

“They have put themselves in a situation where anybody calling them as clueless and corrupt expects no comebacks.”

That blunt assessment is echoed by Mohamed Wehliye, an international banking and finance expert, who says the anger among Northerners has been building for years.

“I endorse this message 100%,” he said. “Many especially current and past Governors ought to be in jail.”

He insists that accountability should not be selective or tribal.

“If Riggy G can help in that process, every Northern will be behind him,” he said. “We’ve said this before and we will continue to do so”

Gachagua is right

Perhaps the most incendiary intervention came from lawyer Ahmed Nassir Abdullahi, who offered a layered but uncompromising endorsement of Gachagua’s critique.

“But he makes a valid point when he calls out leaders from Northern Kenya and tells the truth about them.”

Ahmed Nassir did not mince his words.

“Hon Rigathi Gachagua is right when he says Northern Kenya leaders are thieves who steal from their people and invest public funds in Nairobi,” he said.

He went further, questioning accountability for the region’s finances.

“Northern Kenyan leaders can’t account for about Kshs 1 trillion given to the region since devolution started in 2013,” he said.

He also accused leaders of failing to build institutions.

“Northern Kenya leaders have not built world class institutions , schools, hospitals  and have eaten CDF money,” he said.

According to him, the physical absence of leaders speaks volumes.

“Northern Kenyans leaders including MCAs are all domiciled in Nairobi and have homes, wives and children only in Nairobi and none in Northern Kenya,” he said.

Pointing to Garissa and Marsabit, he asked a question many residents are now asking openly.

“Where did Kshs 300 billion in devolution money go to?” he said. “Leaders steal money left, right and centre and nothing happens.”

Yet even as he accused Gachagua of political opportunism, Ahmed Nassir stood firm on the substance.

“Gachagua is playing politics, but when he talks about Northern Kenyan leaders and how they have let down their people he is being truthful and I’m with him ,” he said.

Generalization

But the debate has not gone unanswered.

Political leaders from the region have hit back hard, rejecting what they see as sweeping generalisations and historical amnesia.

Wajir Governor and Council of Governors Chair Ahmed Abdullahi has thrown down a direct challenge to the former Deputy President.

“I volunteer to take up Hon. Rigathi Gachagua’s challenge,” he said. Governor Ahmed called for evidence rather than rhetoric.

“Let’s compare what devolution money has done in Wajir for the eight years I have been a governor with any county of his choice in any region,” he said.

He invited independent scrutiny.

“Rigathi is free to pick any agency, governmental or non-governmental, that is able and willing to do this comparison,” he said.

On claims of equalisation, he urged context.

“As to whether devolution should have equalised Kenya in 13 years, that is a debate for another day,” he said.

He also rejected comparisons that credit devolution for national infrastructure elsewhere.

“You will agree with me that neither the tarmac road to his village nor the electricity connection of his Wamunyoro home to the National Grid is attributable to devolution,” he said.

Let them eat cake

Mandera Senator Ali Roba offered a broader historical defence, invoking one of the most famous metaphors of political detachment.

“History recalls a powerful metaphor from the French Revolution,” he said, referencing the phrase attributed to Marie Antoinette: “Why don’t they eat cake?”

“‘Let them eat cake’ was privilege blinded by abundance,” Senator Roba said who accused critics of erasing history.

“When leaders mock Northern Kenya for lacking skyscrapers, they erase Kenya’s truth,” he said.

According to him, national investment bypassed the region for decades.

“Almost all glittering national infrastructure, national schools, colleges and industries was built for other regions, while our region was left behind for over 50 years under colonial rule and 60 years post-independence,” he said.

Senator Roba argued that devolution inherited a vacuum.

“Devolution found devolved sectors virtually non-existent, forcing pioneer governors to resuscitate everything from scratch,” he said.

He listed interventions he says counties were forced to undertake.

“Using devolution funds, we built technical training colleges, teachers’ training college, medical training college, urban roads in Mandera town,” he said.

He said counties even stepped into national security.

“We paid for KPR and supported national security infrastructure,” he said, insisting it was necessity, not excess.

“It was not because we had money to spare, but because insecurity made it an inevitable necessity,” he said.  “Without these interventions, our counties would have been left ungovernable,” he said.

Senator Roba conceded imperfection but rejected ridicule.

“Northern leaders are not perfect, but no one has moral authority to ridicule us unless they can objectively compare devolution investments alone across regions,” he said.

His conclusion was defiant.

“Remove decades of national government investment elsewhere,” he said, “and there is very little to compare with what Northern Kenya built through devolution alone.”

For many Northerners, the question is no longer whether the criticism hurts, but whether the truth can finally lead to accountability.