Candid conversations on state of the nation make striking conclusions on Ruto presidency

President William Ruto after the launch of 2025 Great Wildebeest Migration in the Maasai Mara, Narok, on July 24, 2025. [PCS]

Good morning, Mheshimiwa Kabando wa Kabando aka KK. Let me say I like your candour when you go on national TV, as you did this week, to debate the state of the nation.

While I’m not at liberty to repeat the pronouncements that you made on TV 47—not because of self-censorship, but because I can’t match your eloquence—I was touched by your deep conviction that no one could stop you from saying your piece.

Even when the show’s host threatened to take a break, possibly to quell the fires, you were unrelenting. There would be no break, you declared, before you said your piece.

And you let it be known that if the host persisted in censoring your views on air, then you’d would never return to the platform. You had to say piece before the recess, which you did, namely: That the worse tragedy to befall this country over the last 60 years is the rise of Prezzo Bill Ruto to office. 

I haven’t lived that long to make such an assessment, though I’m your age-mate, but the Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna, who has only lived for half of our nation’s life, came along and made a similar conclusion, when he appeared on Citizen TV. 

If we were to triangulate these views as samples, and throw in a few more voices from other generations, it is astounding that there is consensus that the Ruto presidency has been an unmitigated disaster. 

I am not concocting research samples; the views from another politician from another generation, Cyrus Jirongo, corroborates this. Jirongo said he is surprised that Kenyans are surprised at the incompetence of the Kenya Kwanza administration. He knew Prezzo Ruto from their YK ’92 days, so he knows him better than all of us put together. 

And Bonnie Mwangi, who belongs to another generation, made a similarly scathing assessment of the government as irredeemably corrupt and inept. I need not enlist Gen-Z in this survey because they have made similar conclusions through their street protests over the last one year.