We Must Hit the Ground Running Immediately – Ruto, Kenya’s President-Elect
POLITICS DIGEST- Kenya’s president-elect William Ruto vowed Wednesday that his new administration would be transparent, saying there was no time to waste in meeting the “huge expectations” of Kenyans.
Ruto, who has served as deputy president for the last nine years, was on Monday declared the winner of the August 9 poll in a race against veteran politician Raila Odinga that went down to the wire.
“We will shortly be making steps to run a transparent, democratic but accountable government,” Ruto said after meeting with elected leaders from his Kenya Kwanza (Kenya First) alliance.
“The expectations of the people of Kenya are huge and therefore we do not have the luxury of wasting any time,” Ruto said.
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Kenya is one of the richest economies in Africa but is grappling with the fallout from the Covid pandemic and the war in Ukraine, with surging inflation and high youth unemployment.
“We are going to govern in a manner that no sector of Kenya is left behind,” Ruto added, saying no-one would be excluded, regardless of political or ethnic affiliations.
Measures to make his new administration more accountable would include enabling ministers to be questioned in parliament and ensuring that public servants cannot work for political parties.
Ruto appears to be moving ahead with his administration even though his defeated rival could make a Supreme Court challenge to the election results.
Odinga on Tuesday branded as a “travesty” the outcome of the largely peaceful poll which Ruto won by a margin of less than two percentage points.
The veteran opposition leader, who ran with the backing of his old foe President Uhuru Kenyatta, said the figures announced by the election commission were “null and void” and vowed to pursue “all constitutional and legal options”.
