After witnessing Deputy President William Ruto’s extraordinary spiel at the funeral service for his slain security aide Kipyegon Kenei, only one in total denial of reality would fail to admit that his fractured ties with President Uhuru Kenyatta are beyond salvage.
Dr Ruto spoke from the heart. He was bitter, angry, pained and close to tears as he more or less accused the president of being behind his recent tribulations.
The DP has previously found it convenient to shelter behind the accusatory fingers pointed at opposition leader Raila Odinga and functionaries such as Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i and his principal secretary, Dr Karanja Kibicho, as well as Director of Criminal Investigations George Kinoti.
This time he was going for broke by throwing the gauntlet down at President Kenyatta’s feet. Although he referred generally to “the system”, what Dr Ruto was essentially saying is that President Kenyatta’s system was the one responsible for the fake military procurement deal he says was a scheme to cast his office in disrepute; as well as the subsequent killing of Sgt Kenei. He also alluded to these forces plotting on his life.
As if to leave no room for doubt, Dr Ruto clearly stated that the office of Deputy President has no functions touching on the military.
Then came the clincher: ‘There is only one Commander-in-Chief’. He did not have to clarify that the C-in-C is the President, presumably the one who should be held accountable for the military procurement scam.
These are weighty accusations coming from the Deputy President, who has adopted the template of opposition leaders accustomed to hurling accusations at the government and claiming their lives are in danger.
In a normal administration, a deputy who disagreed with his boss to that extent would do the decent thing. Resignation is not always surrender. There is no shame in quitting on principle and freeing oneself to independently pursue legitimate aspirations.
But this is Kenya, where relinquishing ‘the flag’ and attendant perks is often akin to political suicide.
Dr Ruto will not resign, and he knows that whatever hurdles and frustrations the ‘system’ throws his way, it cannot dismiss him. He was elected as part of a ticket with President Kenyatta and knows that the two of them are tied at the hip.
Meanwhile, it is important to examine what lies behind Dr Ruto’s disaffection. He has been under pressure since a political ally, former Cabinet Secretary Rashid Echesa, was arrested leaving his Harambee House Annexe with some foreigners he’d just had sign a fake arms supply deal worth some Sh40 billion.
Matters took a turn for the worse when the security officer, Sgt Kenei, who had granted access to Echesa and accomplices, was found dead from a gunshot wound.
Further escalation came when Mr Kinoti called the media, purportedly to give an update on investigations into the policeman’s death.
It was an extraordinary briefing, for it was apparent the sole purpose was for the DCI to point fingers at the DP on the murder of the police sergeant.
Mr Kinoti was at pains to not only debunk the suicide theory first reached by the investigators, but to demonstrate that it was calculated murder linked Dr Ruto’s office and the Echessa arms scam.
On a matter of such far-reaching political implications, it was obvious to anybody who closely followed the press briefing that the evidence proffered was extremely tenuous.
It was the kind of performance that only adds weight to Dr Ruto’s constant complaints that many DCI probes target him for political purposes.
Dr Ruto does himself no favours by openly establishing himself as an opposition within; accommodating a network of political allies and keyboard warriors dedicated to attacking President Kenyatta at every opportunity.
The DP’s playing the innocent victim is not helped by his camp habitually offering political cover to the basketful of deplorables indicted for corruption, murder and other high crimes. But that is par for the course in Kenyan politics, given the number of tainted characters also gravitating around Mr Kenyatta and Mr Odinga.
Those for now might be minor details. The Kenyatta ‘system’ is accusing the DP of very serious crimes, and the latter is hurling back similar accusations. Fuel has been added to the fire in an already polarised situation, posing serious risk of a conflagration that could consume the entire country.
Something has to give. It cannot be business as usual on the road to the next General Election and the proposed Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) referendum when the country, leave alone the government, is tearing apart.
A divorce on grounds of irreconcilable differences might be the best option.
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