William Ruto has assured his opponents that they should have nothing to fear under his government, but warned that every Kenyan will henceforth account for what they do or say.
After confirmation as president-elect by court early today, Ruto says he would extend a hand of peace to his political opponents, but warned that during his tenure, any Kenyan who breaks the law in any way will be brought to book.
He claimed that the institutions, like the courts of law have been used for political reasons instead of fighting criminals, adding that everyone will have to account for what they say or do.
On the ongoing defections from other parties and coalitions to his Kenya Kwanza Alliance, Ruto said in a democracy like Kenya, everyone should have a right to belong where they want.
Since he was named president-elect, dozens of leaders, including MPs have been received by Ruto into the coalition, but this has drawn the wrath of his opponents and critics and an act of bribery. Others, at one time, Odinga accused him of attempting to kill off opposition in Kenya adding that this was bad for democracy.
Speaking to the media this afternoon after the court verdict Ruto took a swipe at his opponents, saying they were forcing people by coercion, intimidation and threats to join the Azimio la Umoja coalition, and that they people were now free. He stressed that he will encourage the thriving of opposition as a way of strengthening democracy.
On his relationship with outgoing President Uhuru Kenyatta who showed support to Odinga, Ruto said he had not talked to him for long. He added that he will soon reach out to Odinga to discuss important national matters.
“I’ll be making a call to Raila Odinga so that we can contextualize how we’re going to work together for the people of Kenya; those of us who’ll working from the Executive and the Azimio team who will be working from the opposition.”
He also vowed that he will never avenge his opponents, adding that they President Kenyatta, and former Prime Minister Odinga can now go into retirement peacefully as the government will accord them all the dignity they deserve as leaders.
The runner-up in the Kenya presidential elections Raila Odinga, and his legal team led by Siaya Governor James Orengo, have said they will accept the decision of the Supreme Court though they strongly disagree with it.
In a statement soon after the court sitting at Milimani in Nairobi confirmed William Ruto President-elect, the Orange Democratic Movement leader said though, they do not agree with the court.
“We have always stood for the rule of law and the constitution. In this regard, we respect the opinion of the court although we vehemently disagree with their decision today,” he said in a statement.
The now five-time contender 77, alleged in his petition that the election was characterized by many irregularities and illegalities, including lack of transparency especially on the part of the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission, Wafula Chebukati.
However, while court cited some discrepancies in the process, it said there was nothing substantial enough to have influenced the results. Odinga was satisfied that his lawyers provided enough critical evidence, and that it was unfortunate that the court saw otherwise, vowing to continue with the struggle for democracy.
“The judgement is by no means the end of our movement. In fact, it inspires us to redouble our efforts to transform this country into a prosperous democracy,” he added, saying his camp would be communicating its plans “in the near future.”
Lawyer James Orengo says the court was biased and it chose not to weigh the submissions of the two sides against one another, but chose to find ways of defeating the petitioners.
However, Orengo said that for the sake of democracy they will accept the outcome through the disagree with it, terming the judgment an ideological decision. He says that this is one of the mistakes the court has make but will be corrected with time.
The petitioners initially had more than dozen issues raised for court to determine, but these were consolidated into nine.
They included illegal or unauthorised access to the electronic voting system, interfered with the transmission of forms between the polling stations at the national tally centre, among others.
Odinga and others also said the commission intentionally postponed voting for governors in some areas like Kakamega and Mombasa, which according to him discouraged the voters from going to the polls.
However, the court ruled that the evidence provided in this issues was not enough. Orengo said unless the IEBC is made more open, it will always be hard for the petitioners to push for their cases.
Philip Murgor, another lawyer for the petitioners, said it cannot be true that they lost on all cases and yet they ‘had overwhelming evidence.
Kenya Law Society, which was one of the three ‘friends of the court’ on his part was confident that the process has added onto the building of democracy in Kenya, especially regarding building confidence in the institutions. LSK Chairman Erick Theuri said that according to him, the Kenyan people have won.