Ruto plays chess in proxy war to tame Gachagua in Mount Kenya

President William Ruto pays a courtesy call to Former President Uhuru Kenyatta at his Gatundu Home on December 09, 2024.  [File, Standard]

President William Ruto plans to take the fight to former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua’s home turf as he seeks to tame the impeached DP’s growing influence in the region.

Insiders told The Saturday Standard that Dr Ruto intends to wage a proxy war against his former DP, with former President Uhuru Kenyatta’s allies leading the assault.

The nomination of former President Uhuru Kenyatta’s allies, including former Kiambu governor William Kabogo, Mutahi Kagwe and former Nakuru governor Lee Kinyanjui into Cabinet ensures Gachagua is check-mated from every corner.

Kabogo, nominated to take the Information and Digital Economy ministry, is set to lead the assault from his Kiambu backyard, with Kinyanjui (Trade and Investments) ring-fencing Nakuru. Kagwe, the Agriculture CS noominee, is Ruto’s point man in Nyeri, with former Laikipia Governor Ndiritu Muriithi, appointed the Kenya Revenue Authority’s board chairperson, expected to take care of his home region.

Former Murang’a Senator Kembi Gitura’s appointment as the Kenyatta University Teaching, Referral and Research Hospital, ensures that the populous county is represented in the fresh changes.

“Gachagua thought he would be fighting Ruto. He will be fighting Uhuru,” said a source who sought anonymity. 

The regrouping of Uhuru’s allies will likely culminate in the formation of a political party to tame Gachagua’s influence and will partner with Ruto’s vehicle ahead of the next polls.

Former Trade CS Moses Kuria hinted at such a move when he called for the revival of Uhuru’s Jubilee, a once behemoth now battered by wrangles.

“The Mt Kenya region, like all other regions, deserves a strong political voice. It is our imaginable right. For all the good and bad lessons we have learnt, it was a mistake to leave the Jubilee Party,” Kuria said recently.

“However, it is not too late. We will now embark on bringing all the political parties with a footing in the region together under the Jubilee Party. We did it in 2016 when we dissolved parties to form Jubilee. We will do it again,” he added.

The Saturday Standard has learnt that the new appointees, expected to muddy the waters for Gachagua, are merely paving the way for a surprise candidate for Ruto’s running mate position.

One of them, who insisted on staying anonymous, linked Uhuru’s brother Muhoho Kenyatta to the position, stating that the President would slight Deputy President Kithure Kindiki, widely viewed as a transitional DP.

“His surprise candidate will be Muhoho Kenyatta. It was not strategic to unveil him at this moment. The President appointed politicians to sort the political issue of Gachagua. The likes of Kabogo can confront Gachagua head on and once he is neutralised then Ruto will unveil his hidden card,” said the highly-placed source.

There had been reports that Muhoho was to be picked as a Cabinet Secretary in Thursday evening’s mini shuffle, which happened 10 days after Uhuru hosted Ruto at his Ichaweri home.

But some insiders dismissed such talk, saying that Muhoho was never in the picture and he would not be directly   involved in the political wars.

A source aware of the matter said Muhoho was too critical in running the family’s business empire to join politics.

“Uhuru was the family’s politician, not Muhoho,” said the source.

The former President’s entry into Ruto’s ‘broad-based’ government promises to complicate Gachagua’s claim to the region and contradicts the former DP’s claims that there had been a truce between himself and Uhuru.

In TV interviews ahead of his impeachment in October, Gachagua said that he had met and patched things up with Uhuru, a man he had disparaged before and after the 2022 polls. He had said his troubles were a result of his association with the former Head of State.

But sources now say that the two did not meet, claims that The Saturday Standard could not immediately verify. One account suggests that Gachagua was duped into believing that he would be meeting Uhuru, but the meet-up did not materialise.

“During his impeachment, Gachagua was desperate to meet Uhuru and reached out to intermediaries who promised to arrange a meeting. Gachagua was kept waiting for hours,” said a source who sought anonymity. They said that the former Head of State was not interested in meeting Gachagua, his former personal assistant.

Gachagua has been reaping sympathy from his impeachment and he has termed Ruto a traitor for ousting him.

“We were in Ruto’s debt and we paid him in full. We wanted to pay him in instalments and once we paid the first instalment he disparaged us and so we are done with him,” Gachagua said recently.

“Appointment of Kabogo, Muriithi and Lee Kinyanjui as CSs comes after the Ichaweri visit. This is political gasping with zero milestone. Mulima is very restive and already rattled. Such gimmicks won’t work,” Githunguri MP Gathoni Wamuchomba, a Gachagua ally, posted on her X handle.

“We keep saying ‘No, thank you’. When your cooking pot rumbles instead of boiling, then you know it has backfired; you can’t redeem it. The best thing is to restart but don’t recycle. The punctured system can’t hold it anymore,” added Wamuchomba.

Charles Ng’ang’a, who teaches at the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, believes that Ruto’s alliance with Uhuru is futile.