Are voters in Taita-Taveta unwilling to embrace scholars in politics?

 While a number of scholars from Taita-Taveta County have made a name in government and private sector, the same cannot be said in politics, at least going by the handful of examples in the recent years.

In 2007 Professor Morris Mbondenyi, then 38, made history by being among the few law dons from the Coast region to venture into politics.

Mbondenyi was taking a stab at the Mwatate parliamentary seat on a Jubilee ticket to unseat the then ODM MP Andrew Mwadime.

Prof Mbondenyi, at one time the deputy director at Kenya school of Law, was banking on his being a distinguished lawyer to articulate legal matters in and out of the National Assembly.

However, he lost to Andrew Mwadime.

In 2022 Mbondenyi made a second attempt at the Mwatate seat but lost to political greenhorn with little education, Peter Shake.

His main rival in 2017 Andrew Mwadime left the parliamentary seat to vie as governor and won with close to 50,000 votes.

It remains unclear if the eminent law professor has future plans of engaging in elective politics in the county in the near future, despite the fact that he has been holding a plum job at the deputy president office.

Another renown professor from Taita-Taveta, Agnes Mwang’ombe tried to capture the governor seat but lost, with a paltry 1,142 votes.

This begs the question:Are Taita-Taveta voters unwilling to embrace scholars as their political leaders or are the scholars unfamiliar with the locals' preferences?

As one voter put it, they were suspicious aboutthe motives of these highly learned people to go into politics.

To them a professor is such a prominent scholar to stoop too low to vie for the post of a member of parliament.

While some of these academics could be driven by the desire to lead and serve their people, the common voters appear suspicious and cautious to accept this.

(et