Grapevine

As an outsider, Malala should have picked his fights wisely, speak less

Embattled UDA party Secretary General Cleophas Malala addressing faithful at ACK St Mathews Ituti church at Buture constituency on June 23, 2024. [Benjamin Sakwa, Standard]

He was meant to be the United Democratic Alliance's answer to Edwin Sifuna.

Fresh from a dog's beating in the hands of Kakamega Governor Fernandes Barasa in the 2022 polls, Cleophas Malala was picked to challenge Sifuna's claim of the limelight.

Having no elective seat meant he had more time to attend TV talk shows, his apparent brief when UDA appointed him its secretary general, and whitewash the Nairobi senator's gains.

As the curtains fell on his brief tenure on Friday despite a last-ditch effort to cling on, it must have dawned on Malala that he had failed. He lost his job like Sifuna gained his - through two coups, the first by a political greenhorn and a subsequent one at the crack of dawn.