Deputy President William Ruto put a strong case for his position on the Building Bridges Initiative report as it was launched at the Bomas of Kenya, Nairobi. – By Enock Mukoma.
Ruto was jeered as he expressed his reservations on the document, castigating the BBI team for trampling on the independence of key institutions in the BBI report.
While laying his ‘humble submissions’ in front of the overly pro-BBI audience, Ruto contested the establishment of the office of Ombudsman, which will be appointed by the Executive.
“On the matter of the judiciary allow me to say that there is a huge space to have an improvement on the proposal that has been made… Having an ombudsman appointed by the Executive into the Judiciary is a derogation from the independence of the institution.”
“We need to operationalize the Judiciary fund that is already in the Constitution so that the Judiciary can establish more courts, hire more judges and more staff so that more Kenyans can have access to justice,” Ruto said.
He went on to further oppose the idea of political players nominating commissioners to IEBC wondering how participating football teams could choose impartial referees.
“I have my reservations,” he said.
The DP then weighed in on Raila’s turf, using football narrative to illustrate the winner takes it all, which almost brought things to a standstill at the Bomas.
“How fair will a league be, where a referee is appointed by teams, and not all the teams but some teams?”
“…unless you tell me that it is okay for some teams to appoint the referee…and if that is what you are saying, I have my reservations.”
Ruto also expressed his fears over changes in the National Police Service and the National Police Commission.
“To recommend that we will have a police council, chaired by a CS is actually a derogation from the independence of the police.”
And despite the heckling, Ruto sojourned on, challenging the role of the Prime Minister and two deputies.
“The questions is: Have we sorted out the winner-takes-it-all question,” he asked adding that “We must have a candid discussion on millions of youth locked by poverty.”
On BBI’s recommendation of increasing budgetary allocations to the counties to 35 per cent of the national budget, Ruto said he had no problems with it as long as the Senate was made the upper house with more powers to oversee the usage of the funds.
His speech ended with those in attendance jeering loud ‘’Respect the president”
