Ruto: With Raila gone, I have no opposition, its a walk in the park

_{By Ben Shizukane and Andanje Wakhungu.}

President William Ruto has described the country’s opposition as clueless, stating that he will trounce them in the 2027 General Election.

He said the opposition brigade lacked a development agenda for the people of Kenya, bragging that he will send them home very early in the coming polls.

The President, who is the UDA party leader, pointed out that currently, the country has no strong opposition candidate like the late Raila Odinga, whom he faced in the 2022 general election.

He said: “I don’t have a tough competitor in the coming polls after the demise of opposition icon, the late Odinga. The current crop of opposition leaders lack strategy, and I will beat them on the ballot.”

The Head of State said the opposition was hanging on personal vendetta and politics of tribalism that are outdated in the country’s political dispensation. Ruto added that the current opposition outfit should be shunned by all Kenyans at all costs as they were out to throw the country into political anarchy as they champion their own personal interests.

Ruto said this yesterday while on a campaign trail in Malava Constituency, Kakamega County, for UDA parliamentary candidate David Ndakwa in the impending November 27 Malava parliamentary by-election.

Accompanying the Head of State on the campaign blitz were Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi, National Assembly Speaker Moses Wetang’ula, and Cooperatives Cabinet Secretary Wycliffe Oparanya. Others were Kakamega Governor Fernandes Barasa, his Bungoma counterpart Kenneth Lusaka, area Woman Representative Elsie Muhanda, Central Organisation of Trade Unions Secretary-General Francis Atwoli, and a host of legislators.

Ruto toured the constituency and Kakamega County in general with a basket of goodies that included the launch of upgrading works to bitumen standards of the Malava–Samitsi–Navakholo road and the opening of the Kenya Medical Training College (KMTC) Malava Campus.

Ruto also revealed that the government had set aside Sh2.2 billion to be used to connect 34,000 households in the county to the national power grid, with another Sh1 billion going to Kakamega Teaching and Referral Hospital to complete its construction.

Another Sh1.4 billion will go towards the completion of Bukhungu Stadium, a move that will give young people in the area infrastructure to hone their talents, he stated.

On their part, Mudavadi, Wetang’ula, and Oparanya called on locals to vote for the UDA candidate, Ndakwa, if they want to get more goodies from the national government.

As he enumerated the importance of siding with the government, Oparanya stated he had all along played opposition politics, which he said was non-beneficial and detrimental to the development of the nation. He said that he was there to stay in the broad-based government, which he said had good plans for the development of the nation.

Meanwhile, Mudavadi said that opposition candidates in the area seeking the seat in the coming by-election were in panic mode, stating that the state was bankrolling the UDA candidate.

“They have started crying wolf after realising that they will be defeated by Ndakwa. Wetang’ula, Oparanya, and I are not voters in Malava. It’s the local electorate that will decide their next Member of Parliament and should concentrate on wooing them to their side, as we are also doing,” opined Mudavadi.

The Malava Constituency by-election was occasioned by the death of area Member of Parliament Moses Malulu Injendi early this year.

Others seeking the seat besides Ndakwa are Democratic Action Party–Kenya candidate Seth Panyako, Kenya Moja’s Wilberforce Tuvei, and Democratic National Alliance’s Joab Manyasi.