The formal publication of President William Ruto’s move to dismiss most of his Cabinet has stirred a fresh debate on the suitability of the twenty-two top policy advisers to hold office.
Reacting to a Gazette Notice backdated to 11 July when Ruto announced the unprecedented firing of twenty-one Cabinet Secretaries and his Attorney General, former Law Society of Kenya President Nelson Havi argued the dismissed officials can neither hold elective nor appointive office.
“The dismissal from office of the Cabinet Secretaries means that they [are] ineligible to hold any public office forever: appointive or elective,” Havi, Ruto’s UDA aspirant for the Westlands constituency seat in 2022, said sparking a heated debate.
“They are in the same category as impeached Governors or Judges found unsuitable to serve. That is the law,” he quipped in a comment late Wednesday, hours after Government Printer published the notification.
Foreign Affairs Principal Secretary Korir Song’Oei, who served as Ruto’s Principal Legal Advisor during his tenure as Deputy President, countered Havi’s view.
“The circumstances under which the “class” was “dismissed” are canvassed in the preamble to the Gazette Notice,” he said, alluding to President Ruto’s detailed Executive Order 6 of 2024 outlining events that informed the decision.
“None of the members of the class have been impugned so as to render them permanently infirm to serve,” Song’Oei reasoned.
Political cost
On whether President Ruto would consider any of the former Cabinet Secretaries for reappointment, Song’Oei suggested the Head of State would weigh the “political cost” of such a move, “a calculus I am certain the president is conscious of”.
Adding his voice to the debate, outspoken lawyer Miguna Miguna dismissed Song’Oei’s position as untenable.
The debate came amid the publication of opinion polls projecting public acceptance of a section of Ruto’s former Cabinet.
In a survey released on Thursday, Trends and Insights for Africa (TIFA) reported public support for Cabinet dissolution at 63% with 20% of 1,507 respondents expressing hesitancy.
Kindiki support
TIFA said 13% of respondents in the poll disapproved of President Ruto’s decision to dismiss his Cabinet Secretaries.
The pollster ranked the immediate former Interior Cabinet Secretary Prof Kithure Kindiki as the most popular for reappointment at 61%.
Eliud Owalo who manned the ICT ministry polled in second place at 48%.
In general, TIFA reported the highest approval for the dismissal of Cabinet among supporters of the governing Kenya Kwanza Coalition at 90%.
TIFA said 86% of respondents identifying as supporters of the opposition Azimio Coalition expressed support for the move.
The study also projected overwhelming public support transcending party affiliations for the Gen Z-led clamour for reforms at 81%.
Support for austerity measures ranked the highest among demands endorsed by the public with 25% of respondents in the TIFA study backing spending cuts.
Youth unemployment, cost of living and corruption ranked among other key priorities in the study at 21%, 18% and 14% respectively.
President Ruto announced the firing of his Cabinet after weeks of anti-Finance Bil protests by youths coalescing under the Gen Z Movement at the height of which demonstrators stormed Parliament on 25 June.
Ruto subsequently dropped the Bill which proposed additional taxation as the government sought to mobilise additional resources to cut on borrowing and manage public debt.
