State House: Why William Ruto presidency attracts fear

There were forces in deep state that would stop at nothing to derail President William Ruto's stab at the highest office in the land; it backfired on their faces and now Bill is set to be sworn in as Kenya's fifth president on Tuesday, September 13, 2022.

But why is a Ruto presidency attracting such paranoid fear bordering on the absurd? Well, by nature, he is an aggressive and ambitious man. The sheer tenacity with which he changed his fortunes both politically and financially is an apt lesson for political science students.

Immediately he entered the political foray proper after the 1997 elections, Ruto went out to chart his own destiny and by 2007 when he took on the late President Daniel arap Moi and the Kanu machinery and wrestled away the Kalenjin Nation from them, nothing could stand on his way.

In the current political dispensation, this has only served to evoke fear and insecurity in the political dynasties and elements in the Deep State. The worry was that if he became President he would run roughshod and make them irrelevant in the country's power structure.

There is also the perception that Ruto is ungrateful to those who helped him go up the ladder, which is a fundamental virtue in political dealings. One of the bitter Godfathers is former Lugari MP Cyrus Jirongo. Once a billionaire in real coin, Jirongo was calling the shots as chair of Youth for Kanu '92 (YK '92) when Ruto-fresh from university- was his spanner boy. But fortunes changed and now Jirongo is a broke butt in political Siberia while Ruto is President elect who explained he is where because of "kujipanga" yet it was Jirongo who thrust Ruto into the deep end of political scheming.

"I acknowledge I was his junior," said Ruto of Jirongo during the funeral of former Malava MP Soita Shitanda in June 2016. "But why is he so chronically bitter at me? I have told him quite often, it is all about 'kujipanga' (strategy)."

During the funeral of retired president Moi recently, Ruto admitted he is one of the graduates of his school of politics. Under Moi, he grew rapidly both in political and material terms. However, this did not stop him from rebelling against him when the right time availed itself. In taking over the Rift Valley, among his casualties were three of Moi's sons, Gideon, Raymond and Jonathan, who all failed in their parliamentary bids in 2007 when ODM of which Ruto was one of the Pentagon members swept much of the expansive region.

The thinking then is that there is no assurance that the man from Sugoi will protect the interests of those who have been with him in his journey to State House, including outgoing President Uhuru himself. But the narrative that is easy to sell is that the William Ruto is incorrigibly corrupt and "loot" everything if he becomes President.