Isaac Ruto scoffs at Uhuru order over governors

Bomet Governor Isaac Ruto has turned the heat on President Uhuru Kenyatta for releasing a dossier to the National Assembly implicating some governors in corruption.

While responding to a petition seeking to compel governors named on the President’s list to step aside, Mr Ruto said that governors are not appointees of the president to be asked to step aside through an executive order.

“We are not like Cabinet secretaries or principal secretaries who hold office at the will and pleasure of the President. Those are the people the President can dismiss at any time, whether by an executive order or word of mouth, but not governors,” said Ruto.

He swore that President Kenyatta exceeded his mandate by asking governors to step aside, adding that the executive order was improper, illegal and unconstitutional and should be declared null and void.

According to the Bomet governor, the president’s decision to release the list was a calculated move to fool the public as happened during the Anglo Leasing scandal when ministers were forced to resign only to resume work in high-ranking offices.

“His address to Parliament requiring public officers to step aside was a cosmetic public relations exercise by a beleaguered President overwhelmed by public pressure. He has even failed to tell the Kenyan public the terms and conditions of stepping aside,” swore Ruto.

Mr Ruto added that although governors are supporting the war against corruption, they will not step aside unless they are charged, found guilty and jailed for a term exceeding one year.

PETITION MSIGUIDED

He accused President Kenyatta of breaching the Constitution by purporting to direct the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission, the Director of Public Prosecutions and the Judiciary on how to prosecute individuals.

“Stepping aside on flimsy grounds of unauthenticated allegations is tantamount to a rebuttal of the presumption of innocence until proven guilty as it amounts to a presumption of guilty until proven innocent,” said Ruto.

He further swore that the petition by activists Okiya Omtatah and Wycliffe Nyakina was misguided since the President’s report might later prove to be defamatory.

Mr Omtatah and Mr Nyakina are seeking court orders to force governors and members of Parliament named on the anti-graft commission’s List of Shame to vacate office until cleared.

The activists argued that the Council of Governors is not an elite club for purposes of protecting their members from the reach of the law and that irrespective of whether appointed or elected, they took the oath to defend the Constitution.

Justice Isaac Lenaola scheduled the hearing on October 14.