Zero-sum game: Ruto and Raila now go for each other’s jugular

It might have seemed like a passing matter, but an extended exchange at the deputy presidential debate on Tuesday night brought home how the campaign for State House has degenerated into vicious contest with both camps threatening to go after each other, if elected.

The presidential campaign is becoming a zero-sum game where the camps led by Deputy President William Ruto and former Prime Minister Raila Odinga are threatening to investigate or jail their rivals once elected.

And in this lies a dangerous trend that makes the quest for the presidency a do-or-die contest.

At the nationally-televised debate, Mr Rigathi Gachagua, the Kenya Kwanza candidate’s running mate, expounded on his constant refrain, pointing the finger at outgoing President Uhuru Kenyatta as the linchpin of high level corruption, and the alliance’s pledge to launch a commission of inquiry into ‘state capture’ if elected.

2,500-acre Mata Farm

Challenged numerous times on whether that meant the Ruto administration would target Mr Kenyatta, Mr Gachagua evaded giving a direct answer, but insisted that Kenya Kwanza’s priority in the corruption war would be investigating state capture and punishing the culprits. He also continued to insist that President Kenyatta was the one directly responsible for, and is a beneficiary of, state capture.

Mr Odinga’s presidential campaign later responded with a bombshell of its own, demanding an inquiry into the DP’s land deals, especially on how he acquired the 2,500-acre Mata Farm in Taita Taveta County.

“The commission of inquiry shall be mandated, inter alia, to recommend whether the title documents issued in favour of Dr Ruto should be cancelled and whether ownership of the property should revert to the state to be held in trust and for the benefit of the people of Taita Taveta County,” Azimio la Umoja secretary-general Junet Mohamed wrote in a letter to Lands Cabinet Secretary Farida Karoney, which he copied to the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission.

Challenged President Kenyatta

In a swift response, DP Ruto challenged President Kenyatta to produce evidence of his family’s extensive land holdings at the Coast. He said he was ready to show how he acquired the Taita Taveta land and demanded the President does the same for land his family owns in the region.

With just 17 days to an election that could go either way, both sides are going for the jugular, with Mr Odinga and President Kenyatta on one side, out to stop the second-in-command’s State House quest.

Mr Kenyatta and Mr Odinga have accused the DP of exploiting for political capital the rising cost of maize meal, petrol and other essentials.

The latter has projected his campaigns as a pro-hustler movement, saying, he alone had the plan to reduce the cost of basic commodities.

Corruption allegations

The Ruto campaign, which faces allegations of corruption, is responding by accusing President Kenyatta of being the real culprit, insisting on a state capture inquiry and even suggesting the removal of a sitting president’s immunity from prosecution.

“We must build institutions that have the capacity to investigate corruption, theft of public resources, state capture and conflict of interest from any state official. There are countries that take their presidents to court because of corruption and we must take our country to that level,” the DP said in an interview with South African Broadcasting Corporation.

But it is in the proposed state capture inquiry, which Mr Gachagua has defined as institutionalised corruption, that the DP has gone directly for President Kenyatta.

While the Kenya Kwanza Alliance says it will not go after President Kenyatta directly, it has insisted that the inquiry will look into everything done during his tenure.

At the Tuesday running mate debate, Mr Gachagua also fished out a gazette notice exempting taxation following the merger of NIC Bank and Kenyatta-family owned CBA Bank.

Quasi-judicial public inquiry

Under the ‘Ending State Capture’ sub-topic, Kenya Kwanza, in their manifesto, promises to establish, “within 30 days, a quasi-judicial public inquiry to establish the extent of cronyism and state capture in the nation and make recommendations”.

DP Ruto says his administration will not allow a few individuals to continue benefiting from the government at the expense of millions of Kenyans.

He said: “We are going to deal with state capture, we are going to deal with conflict of interest and we are going to deal with corruption because we want fairness. We do not want a few people to enrich themselves.”

And while explaining the nomination of Ms Martha Karua as Mr Odinga’s running mate, President Kenyatta praised her as a tough anti-corruption crusader who would make sure those behind the vice are sent to jail.

At the debate, Mr Gachagua responded that President Kenyatta was unable to deal with corruption because key perpetrators and beneficiaries included members of his family.

Justice minister

Ms Karua, notably, has, in addition to deputy president, also been designated as Justice minister in an Odinga government, which will make her directly responsible for the justice, law and order sector, if her Azimio la Umoja One Kenya Coalition wins.

The Ruto camp sees this to mean that she would interfere with independent institutions such as the Judiciary and the investigation and prosecution agencies.

Political dalliance

DP Ruto, an outsider in his own government, has blamed the high cost of living on the political dalliance between Mr Odinga and Mr Kenyatta.

“In our Big Four agenda, one of the pillars was agriculture and food security and we had a commitment for a fertiliser subsidy for farmers, which was later removed. That’s why you saw fertiliser prices tripling from Sh2,000 to Sh6,000. Production costs went up and that’s why the final product, which is unga, became expensive,” the Kenya Kwanza leader said in a campaign rally in Machakos.

Maize flour

The government’s order to bring down the cost of maize flour to Sh100 per two-kilogramme packet has come as a masterstroke, dealing the DP and his team a blow, forcing them to change their campaign message.

On Wednesday, the President said the government had inked a deal with millers to bring down the cost of flour from Sh210 to Sh100 for four weeks in anticipation that the matter will be handled by the next administration.

Dr Ruto now claims that the move to lower the cost of maize flour is a political tool aimed at influencing the August 9 polls in favour of Mr Odinga.

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