The reported loss of KSh21Billion in the Arror and Kimwarer dams project has now turned into a political barbs affair between the Deputy President and ODM leader Raila Odinga.
On Thursday, during the State of the Judiciary Annual Report presentation attended by President Uhuru Kenyatta at the Supreme Court, DP William Ruto dismissed claims of corruption saying the figures were incorrect, claiming “the money in question is about KSh7B.”
Ruto’s allies backed their boss, Senate Majority leader Kipchumba Murkomen, saying the corruption allegations were unmerited and only a cause to undermine the formed Eldoret North MP’s 2022 presidential ambitions.
And on Friday, during his party’s National Governing Council meeting in Nairobi, Odinga hit out at Ruto saying KSh7 Billion was still a lot of money.
“Nobody is above the law, and if somebody is stealing, don’t go out and shout there and tell us that ooh Ksh7billion is nothing […] KSh7 billion is not pocket change, sio pesa ya kununua mandazi,” Odinga, who averred that Kenya’s corruption cartels had become like “a criminal enterprise.”
“We are witnessing a level corruption never seen before in our country, it is a web that has all the makings of a criminal enterprise, working from within the state itself.”
Ruto quickly responded to Odinga in a bare-knuckles rejoinder reminiscent of the statements that characterised the run up to the 2017 presidential elections when the DP referred to Odinga as “yule mganga” and “jamaa wa vitendawili.”
Speaking in Garrissa, Ruto said: “We will not allow people whose signature is keeping people in the slavery of poverty and fighting every development project with fake data and fake news and false information to try and scuttle the development agenda that we have for our country.
“As they weave together these narratives and create the falsehoods, let them not target William Ruto or individuals or personalities or mandazinomics. This is about 100,000 people in Arror and Kimwarer who will access drinking water and thousands of land transformed into agricultural land.”
This latest confrontation, coming just a few weeks after the apparent burying of the hatchet during President Kenyatta’s tour of Nyanza, may confirm pundits assertions that Ruto has never been comfortable with the handshake that founded a working relationship with the government.
Ruto and his close allies have been critical of the handshake, majority legislators and other leaders demanding that details of the handshake that bore the Building Bridges Initiative be made public.
Former ODM youth activist, Rashid Echesa, believed to have been Ruto’s appointee to the Cabinet was sacked earlier before the two leaders exchanged fire in what seems to be the first sign of Odinga’s influence in government against Ruto.
Echesa recently told off Odinga saying he was not his boss, daring the ODM leader to sack him if he had the authority. The president’s executive order that booted Echesa might have as well been a signal to Ruto’s ‘Team Tanga Tanga’ that Odinga has a big say in government.
Other players in Ruto’s camp have openly criticized Odinga saying he has rocked the Jubilee Party ship, coining the move as a contest pitting ‘dynasties’ against ‘hustlers.’
A section of leaders has interpreted the current purge on graft as targeting Ruto’s camp, especially with his popular perception that he is corrupt.
It will be interesting to see how this pans out in the coming days, whether it will open up the clear rift within government with President Kenyatta maintaining that criminal investigations be commenced on the two dams project to ascertain the truth.
Will Ruto, the self-proclaimed hustler, take this as the cue for him to move out of government or will he hang on?
