Kenya Kwanza Alliance presidential candidate Dr. William Ruto has criticized Azimio la Umoja-One Kenya Coalition presidential candidate Raila Odinga for lacking knowledge on the positive impact the business on second clothes (mitumba) has on ordinary Kenyans.
Odinga in his beautifully worded but unrealistic manifesto launched on Monday night proposed a ban on mitumba clothes to allow local textile industries to grow.
The ODM leader emphasized that if elected president, he will ban the importation of second hand clothes to favor the local textile industries to grow and local traders to sell new clothes manufactured in Kenya.
Ruto told off Odinga against branding the clothing enterprises as dealing in dead people’s clothes as he blamed it on the ODM leader’s preference for trickle down economic concept.
“Trickle down is dangerous. They branded business people’s merchandise counterfeit & destroyed them. Now clothing enterprises are dealers in dead people’s wares to be banned.
“Bottom-up, using TVET will assist these enterprises to grow from sewing, cottage to textile and leather industry,” DP Ruto wrote on Tweeter.
Experts have described Odinga’s manifesto as an exciting but an unrealistic document. It has no single statement on how they will source Sh 400 billion to fund the projects annually.
WHY KENYANS WEAR MITUMBA & WHY IT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH PREFERENCE
Some of the mitumba worn in the country are from clothes manufactured in Athi River EPZ. We manufacture new clothes, sell them in the US and import them as used clothes.
THREAD 🧵— ephraimnjegafan (@ephraimnjegafan) June 8, 2022
And Odinga sounds odd with his manifesto, his campaigns have been full of calls to amend the law and expand the executive. His campaigns are not based on matters economy like Dr.Ruto’s Kenya Kwanza Alliance which is known for bottom up economic model and ‘pesa mfukoni’ slogans.
DP Ruto is chairing economic forums in every county and enjoying people’s endorsement of his concept of bottom up economics.
The bottom up economic model aims at creating jobs with more benefits will than the current trickle-down economic which is breeding cartels who are now turning guns on ordinary Kenyans involved in mitumba business.
“Bottom-up is focused on deliberately creating jobs, liberating enterprises from shylock-credit exploitation and unfair regulations,” DP wrote in Tweeter.
