Uhuru, Ruto ICC case was a conspiracy by the West, says Duale

The International Criminal Court (ICC) case against retired president Uhuru Kenyatta and President William Ruto was an 'international conspiracy', Defence Cabinet Secretary Aden Duale now says.

Duale, in an interview with Spice FM on Thursday, May 11, said that the cases were to be used to eliminate possible threats to Raila Odinga's presidential candidature. The CS was revealing snippets from his explosive autobiography, For The Record.

According to Duale, the conspiracy was between Kenya's international partners, western counties, and Odinga.

"Raila was assured by the West that he will be their presidential candidate. So to eliminate them [Uhuru and Ruto], they brought up the ICC cases. Ruto and Uhuru were the main threat which is why the other cases were dropped along the way," the Defence CS revealed.

"The ICC case was a factor of who will become the president which was sponsored by the United Kingdom. This is because in 2007 the Western powers and international players like Kofi Annan believed that Odinga had won the election and had promised to support him in 2013."

At that time, Odinga was Kenya's Prime Minister, which made it easy for him to control everything in government, Duale averred.

He further revealed that they had threatened former President Uhuru that the Western government will block all the imports from his own backyard, Central Kenya, should he run for the presidency.

In 2012, Uhuru and Ruto were charged with orchestrating several crimes against humanity in the 2007 and 2008 post-election violence.

Uhuru and Ruto's cases were dropped in 2014 and 2016 respectively after ICC prosecutors said that the cases were rushed without conducting proper investigations.