Compiled by Jane Osore and Boniface Manyala

Hon. Dr. Sally Kosgei (ODM Team)

The Aldai Member of Parliament has risen through ranks to become the first and only woman to become the head of Civil Service and Secretary to the Cabinet. Kosgei graduated from Dar es Salaam University. She did her doctorate studies at Stanford University in the United States. She has also been in-charge if several missions abroad.
The former Head of the Civil Service and Secretary to the Cabinet packs impressive curriculum vitae. A career civil servant who rose to the top of her profession, she is credited with being the steward of the reforms initiated during her tenure spanning between 2001 and 2003 bridging both the presidencies of Daniel arap Moi and Mwai Kibaki.
Once the most powerful woman in Kenya, she has a reputation for thoroughness in her work. In addition, Kosgey is credited by some analysts for getting more women into top civil servant jobs in the country, as well as foreign mission postings around the world.
She counts Tanzania President Jakaya Kikwete and Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni as her former college-mates.
Today she represents the ODM party at the Annan-led mediation talks with the government alongside party members Hon. Musalia Mudavadi and Hon. William Ruto.

Hon Martha Karua (PNU Team)

Justice and Constitutional Affairs Minister, Ms. Martha Karua is revered and her attitude equated to that of Margaret Thatcher, former British Prime Minister. The fifty year old lawyer was admitted to the Bar in 1980. She has been a council member of the Law Society of Kenya and a council member of the Federation of Women Lawyers.

Ms. Karua was the first female jurist to be given the ‘Jurist of the Year’ award by the Kenya Section of the International Commission for Jurists in 1999. This was in recognition of her work. She was the first woman lawyer to be elected to Parliament and still holds that position. She has been a leading national politician. Karua is currently the Minister for Justice and Constitutional Affairs, after serving as Minister of Water Resources Management and Development.

She is seen as a leader with skills in reforming the rule of law. She has come to be seen as championing the interests of the common Kenyan at a time when corruption and tribalism are said to be rife within Kenya's ruling elite. In 1991 she was recognized by Human Rights Watch as a human rights monitor, followed the 1999 Jurist of the year.