Nyeri Town Member of Parliament Ngunjiri Wambugu now says that Deputy President William Ruto will not pick a running mate from the Mount Kenya region in his bid for the presidency.
In a Facebook post on Wednesday, Wambugu claimed Ruto’s allies from the vote-rich region don’t add value to his presidential campaigns, the reason why he may consider a running mate from other parts of the country.
“The DP’s Mt Kenya allies depend on him for the votes they will get; while he doesn’t need them to get votes from Mt Kenya. No one around him has the capacity to bring Ruto a new vote,” the MP said.
“The votes Ruto has in Mt Kenya he has gotten for himself. Why would he give the powerful DP position to someone who doesn’t add any votes to his 2022 bid?” he posed.
The legislator believed to be one of President Uhuru Kenyatta’s closest allies argues that the DP is using the ‘no-tribe’ mantra to hoodwink the President’s backyard into backing his presidential ambitions blindly.
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Ruto has repeatedly said, in his rallies, that his United Democratic Alliance (UDA) is a national party, dismissing others as tribal outfits.
“The DP is working very hard to become the Mt Kenya ‘Kingpin’. This way he will present himself as the person holding the interests and aspirations of the Mt Kenya people,” said Wambugu.
“…The DP’s propaganda-ists are aggressively pushing the ‘no-tribe’ agenda. Kenya’s politics is tribal. Even God recognises that people organise in communities to get power. Ruto’s objective in the ‘no-tribe’ mantra that drives the hustler nation is primarily to hoodwink Mt Kenya to accept to support him without looking at who ‘of their own’ is in his government. Si we are all Kenyans?”
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Wambugu, who supports ODM leader Raila Odinga’s presidential bid, opined that a Kalenjin/Kikuyu ticket won’t favour the DP’s bid to State House.
“For all his faults the DP is a brilliant political animal. He knows he can’t sell a Kalenjin / Kikuyu ticket in 2022, to the rest of Kenya. He will not,” he added.
Early this week, there were reports that the DP is considering picking Mathira MP Rigathi Gachagua as his deputy.
Gachagua is seen as an asset to Ruto’s ‘Hustler Movement’ due to his strong mobilisation skills.
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Over the weekend, the DP praised the lawmaker after a huge crowd turned up for his rally in Nyeri County.
“I have never seen a meeting this big in Nyeri. Some people had said we would not be allowed to come here but this MP of yours really knows his job well,” Ruto said.
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