Kitutu Chache North Member of Parliament (MP) and the United Democratic Party (UDA) party treasurer Japheth Nyakundi has responded to claims made by the party's former Secretary General Cleophas Malala that his family members were abducted.

This is after Malala claimed that his son and 19-year-old brother-in-law were allegedly tortured for hours by unknown people and left along Thika Road.

Rebutting Malala's statement, MP Nyakundi noted that the party was only seeking to reclaim the cars assigned to Malala which were being driven by the two family members at the time.

Nyakundi said that the party had to use the police to reclaim their cars since Malala had turned down requests to voluntarily hand in the vehicles.

"We had initially requested him to return so we used the police to get our cars back," he said.

He added that Malala's family members were not tortured or harrassed as earlier alleged, and they were simply told "to leave the vehicles".

MP Nyakundi had earlier written on his X account saying that Malala was only displaying theatrics to exaggerate the incident.

"My good friend @Cleophasmalala pole sana if this happened to your family, Cleo is a good drama teacher and the best in the country I can say very talented. As a party we are very sorry for the inconvenience but nobody is after your family the UDA was just taking back the cars," he wrote.

Attempts to get a response from the UDA SG Hassan Omar turned futile at the time of this publication.

Malala has been under political clamor following his removal from the SG role in the ruling party.

His appointment was revoked by UDA's National Executive Committee on August 2, 2024, and appointed Hassan Omar, who was the Vice Chairperson, to serve as the SG on an interim basis.

Malala has, however, maintained that he remains the rightfully elected SG, and his ouster is a political move to frustrate the party's leadership.