Mariga vows to fight on after FKF purge at stormy Meru SGM

The Mt Kenya Times

Football
10 November 2026

The Mt Kenya Times

The ousted vice president is refusing to go quietly, calling the Special General Meeting unlawful and appealing to Fifa and Caf to intervene.

By Martin Weche

MacDonald Mariga yesterday vowed to remain in office as Football Kenya Federation vice president two days after delegates at a Special General Meeting in Meru voted to remove him and six other National Executive Committee members, declaring the proceedings unconstitutional and calling for intervention by world football’s governing bodies.

The former Inter Milan midfielder and ex-Harambee Stars captain was among seven NEC members stripped of their positions on Sunday when 64 delegates voted by acclamation at the Three Steers Hotel in Meru. Also removed were former AFC Leopards chair Dan Shikanda, NEC representatives Gabriel Mghendi, Bernard Lagat, Collins Kalee and Robert Macharia, as well as women’s representative Kerubo Momanyi. Mariga, however, is not prepared to accept the outcome without a fight.

“The affected NEC members remain in office, and their constitutional mandates cannot be extinguished through an unlawful process,” Mariga said in a statement. “What transpired in Meru was a deliberate attempt to silence elected leaders who have consistently championed accountability, transparency and good governance within FKF.”

His defiance sets the stage for a prolonged legal and institutional battle that threatens to deepen the crisis engulfing Kenyan football at a critical moment. Mariga said he and the removed officials would pursue every available constitutional remedy to challenge what he described as a purge conducted in breach of the FKF constitution.

“We reject the purported dismissal of the seven NEC members and shall not recognise resolutions arising from proceedings conducted in breach of the FKF Constitution. We reserve the right to pursue all available constitutional remedies to challenge the purported resolutions,” he said.

Central to Mariga’s challenge is his assertion that the SGM lacked legitimacy from the outset. He claimed that 32 legitimate congress delegates were barred from entering the meeting venue, that individuals without proper mandates participated as delegates and that the quorum required under the FKF constitution was never properly established.

“The legitimacy of the proceedings is further undermined by the exclusion of 32 legitimate Congress delegates and credible evidence of impersonation and unauthorised representation,” Mariga said. “These irregularities raise serious questions about the authenticity of the attendance register, the legitimacy of the quorum and whether any constitutionally prescribed voting threshold was attained.”

The events of Sunday were extraordinary even by the turbulent standards of Kenyan football governance. Mariga arrived at the Three Steers Hotel in a police Land Cruiser accompanied by officers from the Rapid Deployment Unit amid reports that the venue had been surrounded by individuals seeking to prevent certain delegates from entering. What followed descended rapidly into chaos — a shouting match outside the hall, a teargas canister thrown by an unknown individual and delegates scattering for safety before the meeting eventually resumed nearly an hour later.

When proceedings reconvened, the purge was swift. Each official’s fate was determined in turn as those present voted overwhelmingly for their removal. Notably absent from the list of officials facing scrutiny was FKF president Hussein Mohammed, whose conduct had also been raised in correspondence circulated a week before the SGM — an omission that Mariga’s allies have pointed to as evidence that the process was selective and politically motivated.

Hussein, for his part, was unapologetic. In his closing remarks he framed the removals as necessary surgery on a federation he said had been held back by internal obstruction. “We must fix it and we must do it decisively and aggressively. It will not be business as usual. Now the mandate is clear. The majority of the delegates have spoken. We move and forge forward decisively and deliberately without any fear or favour. You will see significant changes in how we implement and execute our vision,” he said.

Mariga has now called on Fifa, the Confederation of African Football and Kenya’s Sports Registrar to scrutinise the Meru proceedings urgently, including delegate credentials, attendance records, quorum compliance and the voting process itself. The appeal to Fifa carries particular weight — the global body has previously intervened in Kenyan football governance and any finding of constitutional irregularity could have significant consequences for the federation’s standing internationally.

With both sides hardening their positions and legal challenges now a near certainty, Kenyan football faces weeks, possibly months, of institutional uncertainty. The game on the pitch will have to wait while the battle for control of the boardroom plays out — and on current evidence, neither side is anywhere close to backing down.