Ruto makes two steps to win Gen Z but the harder part awaits him

President William Ruto won the hearts of many Kenyans by firing his Cabinet and accepting the resignation of the police chief. He may, however, soon find himself confronted with two new, must-win battles that could determine the trajectory of his tenure in office. 

Ruto’s ability to balance the youth’s demands with his political survival strategy without raising the country’s tribal temperature and his acumen to prevent his administration from launching into a doom loop that could consume the remaining three years of his first term, will be watched closely.

In the coming weeks and months, the president’s political smarts will be put to test, as he tries to meet unremitting demands of the youth and to avoid antagonising Mt Kenya elites in the reconstitution of the upcoming Cabinet, whose composition will most likely have an outsize bearing on his plans for a second term.

Ruto seems to have embarked on a long journey to strengthen his rule and weather the storm sparked by a partyless cohort of young men and women that wants the old order which tolerated corruption, tribalism and nepotism, shredded. 

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His decision to fire all Cabinet Secretaries save Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi was only the easy part in his efforts to rebuild his image and reshape his administration. It was a roll of the dice.

The hard part will be how he reconstitutes a new team that could please both Mt Kenya and the youth, whose activism has almost upended the country’s ethnic-based politics.

Some analysts already believe any possible inclusion of opposition figures in the incoming Cabinet could inevitably weaken the youth, shrink the share of Mount Kenya and possibly trigger disgruntlement among Kikuyus, Merus and Embus, a bloc expediently referred to as GEMA.

The president has said he would aim for a Cabinet that will help him in "accelerating and expediting the necessary, urgent and irreversible implementation of radical programs to deal with the burden of debt, raising domestic resources, expanding job opportunities, eliminate wastage and unnecessary duplication of a multiplicity of government agencies and slay the dragon of corruption.”

The reality is, Ruto will have to contend with the country’s informal, decades-old power-sharing formula that always favoured the Mt Kenya region. In the sacked Cabinet, the region had an almost 50 percent share.

The recent deadly protests that killed dozens and injured hundreds appear to have left Ruto with few choices but to resort to one option of appointing a broad-based government that could include members from the opposition.

Ruto’s anticipated move will surely disturb the country’s ossified political system in which each presidential victor used to shut his adversaries out of Cabinet-level positions.

The youth protests seems to have offered Ruto an opportunity to retool his administration and jettison incompetent cabinet secretaries, some of whom were accused of corruption, murder and other ethical issues.

Dr Nasong’o Muliro, a foreign policy and security specialist and University lecturer, said Ruto had responded to the youth's demands “in his own style and way.”

“Some of the protesters’ grievances seem to have opened an avenue for the president to liberate himself from pre-election political MOUs and initiate reforms without appearing as a betrayer,” Muliro said.

Ruto’s declaration that he intends to form a broad-based government was seen by many as an indication that the sacked Cabinet failed to handle the country’s myriad problems and shield itself from outside attacks, such as the youth agitation. 

The biggest casualty would, however, be Mt Kenya and the youth, whose reform message could be lost in the country's tribal politics and horse-trading.

President Ruto and Azimio leader Raila Odinga could also be collateral damage, according to Saitabao Kanchory, Raila’s former chief agent during the 2022 elections.

“Ruto has basically invited Raila to a sinking ship,” Kanchory told The Standard.

He said Mt Kenya will try to ride on the wave of the youth to “sweep Ruto and Raila out of power in 2027 or sooner.”

But Dr Muliro disagreed, saying the recent unrest was “an elite struggle, especially between the government and Mt Kenya.”

“Mt Kenya have found a movement - Gen Z. It will keep them faceless as they focus mainly on the person of Ruto,” Muliro said.

Kibaki era

Ruto’s decision to bring opposition members on board recalls former President Mwai Kibaki’s power-sharing agreement with Raila following the 2007-8 election violence.

Just weeks ago, few have expected Ruto to acquiesce to any form of power-sharing with Raila, given the vehement opposition by Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua to any overtures that could jeopardise his status as the principal assistant to the president. 

Gachagua has repeatedly rejected any attempt to hold talks with Raila, saying the government was like a shareholding company.

Ruto’s presidency has since its arrival in 2022 gone through a rough patch, with the opposition refusing to recognise its legitimacy amid a rising cost of living and ballooning debt crisis.  

Soon after taking office, Ruto, the second president from the Kalenjin tribe, ran into headwinds of the Kikuyu-dominated deep state that has obliquely influenced the country's politics since independence. 

During the campaigns, Ruto adroitly outsmarted the deep state, a group of Kikuyu politicians and their allies from other regions. After a period in which members of the deep state muted their acerbic criticisms against Ruto or went underground, they have in recent months come out swinging.

Elusive quiet period 

Ruto’s government should ideally have been on a roll and enjoyed a quiet time to focus on its bottom-up agenda on which it campaigned, especially after tamping down the Raila-led opposition and after giving the country’s largest ethnic bloc, Mt Kenya, a 50 per cent share of the government.

In his early days, Ruto was so popular among the masses that they welcomed him as the change they desperately waited for with bated breath for a long time.

After 10 years of Uhuru Kenyatta’s rule marked by human rights abuses, swelling debt and rising cost of livelihood, Ruto’s advent was a huge relief to many. 

During Ruto’s inauguration on Sept 13, 2022, tens of thousands of elated Kenyans ululated, chanted and cheered.

The mere mention of the name the new president elicited a deafening din from the people that filled Kasarani Stadium, the swearing-in venue.

When the Supreme Court president, Martha Koome, introduced then-president-elect, Ruto, the crowd erupted in applause and whistling and both Ruto and his wife, First Lady Rachel, flashed toothy grins.

Ruto and Gachagua – colloquially known as Riggy G – beamed from ear to ear as they greeted each other and the spectators.

Hope for happier days – free from economic hardships and of floating dead bodies at Yala River – was in the air. Kenyans prayed for better days ahead.

To stress his message of the upcoming change, Ruto told a keen nation and angst-ridden former officials that his victory was a "historic, revolutionary feat - perhaps as great as the daring exploits of our legendary freedom fighters."

“To the people of Kenya, this is a momentous occasion for our country,” President Ruto said, disclosing to the public that the country's uniformed services "effectively resisted a concerted attempt to foment unrest and subvert the will of the people.”

But, after nearly two years of economic hardships and new taxes, Ruto’s popularity has taken a nosedive. 

Then, weeks ago and without prior warning, youth-led protests demanding a root and branch reform in the country have turned everything topsy-turvy, shaking Ruto government to the core and forcing it to think of its survival rather than implementing its campaign manifesto.

The youth’s agitations were unlike anything Kenyans have ever seen: Disruptive and unwavering.  The youth demanded the sacking of the whole Cabinet and the appointment of a new one whose members are knowledgeable about the affairs of their offices.

The intermittent protests, which swept dozens of cities across the country, were different from Raila's pushback that was mainly confined to street protests that hardly threatened the country’s stability, security or the president’s grip on power.  

Contrastingly, the angry youth, who first started their agitation online before pouring onto the streets, have brazenly said they would occupy the State House, the seat of the national government, to evict the head of state.  

Any anti-Ruto in Mt Kenya would hit a snag because of the split in the region’s political elites, said Muliro, the foreign policy and security specialist and University lecturer. 

The “hard, raw reality” of ethnicity in which Mt Kenya is just one bloc in a country of 40 other ethnicities will finally “push sections of Mt Kenya politicians to soften their stance and seek to join the bandwagon,” he said.

"The Ruto-Raila alliance will weaken, split and eventually absorb the youth movement," he said. "If Raila gets to AU, the Ruto-Raila unity will hold," Muliro said.

A Ruto-Raila government was always expected to have a better chance of survival, as the two men once successfully worked together before breaking off during the Kibaki administration.

Ruto’s comeback

Since his days as a member of the Youth for Kanu in 1992, Ruto has been a wily and lucky politician who often one-upped his adversaries.

In his brief time in office, he has overcome many challenges, like his former boss’s initial objection to his victory, the 2022 wave of robberies that rocked the capital, Nairobi, and Raila’s bloody agitation that lasted for almost a year.

Raila, who initially refused to accept Ruto’s presidency, has finally befriended Ruto, mainly out of necessity: As East Africa’s candidate for the African Union's top job, he should win the government’s support and largesse. 

The public, which quickly welcomed Ruto’s move to fire the Cabinet, now appears relieved, and Ruto is apparently clear of any imminent danger to his rule.

Stung by weeks of chaos, a majority of Kenyans are, too, yearning for an order that would allow them to go about their business and safely send their children to school, even though many of them support the youth’s call for good governance and the eradication of corruption in the country. 

Youth agitation

When the youth agitation coursed through the country and shook the foundation of his rule and chants of “Ruto Must Go” rent the air, Ruto has slowly but firmly moved to calm the public's jangled nerves, throwing a bone – as he always does -- to the youth and the larger public by sacking his entire Cabinet and most probably engineering the resignation of the police chief, Japhet Koome.

In a first, he has also engaged the youth on X space, where he tolerated their berating, invectives and gripes, an online encounter that’s likely to inform Ruto’s future words and deeds that are often marred by overpromises and roadside declarations.

Of course, some of his loyalists would resist the ongoing change and may accuse Ruto of being a wimp or of letting them down, but he, for now, seems resolute and is ploughing ahead.

The realistic Ruto appears to have concluded that he can’t keep his old self and that he needs to adapt to the changing time and yield to the youth's demands.

Ruto is well aware that he’s not presiding over a family business, nor was he in the 1980s or even in the early 2000s, when scant regard was paid to the concerns of the citizens or it was easy to get away with sleaze and corruption.

It seems that he has decided to swallow a bitter bill for his own political survival and legacy. 

However, Ruto's "let's share the burden and fix our country together," laudable as it is, will likely weaken his authority and could dim his chance for a second term.

Kanchory, Raila’s former chief agent during the 2022 elections, said that “Gen Z will drain the swamp with all these crocodiles in it.”

“A Ruto-Raila government would be a disaster,” he said. “It’ll be a pack of wolves devouring the carcass of Kenya.”

Politically, the sacking of the Cabinet and call for a shared responsibility can be viewed as a tour de force of statesmanship, but it was also a shot in the dark that exposed Ruto to the opposition leaders’ vagaries.

The ramifications

The incoming Cabinet will have far-reaching ramifications for Ruto, Raila and political alliances, as it will certainly rip up earlier political deals to give way to the new expediency.

There’s already disquiet within ODM and open rebellion in Azimio, with Martha Karua, the Narc Kenya party leader, vowing to bolt out of the coalition should Raila join the Ruto-proposed national dialogue.  

The ODM leader, who runs a tight ship, will most likely secure his party’s endorsement to engage with Ruto, but Azimio’s future is up in the air. ODM, a constituent part of Azimo, is expected to suffer no major upheavals.

Ruto, as the head of state, has a better advantage to keep his coalition, Kenya Kwanza, in a relatively stable state, though a lot could change if the already sour ties between him and his deputy degenerate.

Although Ruto counts some prominent Kikuyu politicians, like Kimani Ichung'wah, Moses Kuria and Ndindi Nyoro, among his loyalists, there is still much work to be done in Mt Kenya to peel more big names from the former president's camp.

The majority of the Kikuyu elites opposed to Ruto tend to either have a personal dislike for Ruto or owe their political standing or wealth to their proximity to the Kenyatta family's quarter-century rule.

"It's not a coincidence that DP Gachagua's bold criticism against the government has come after the May 17 Limuru III conference and eruption of the Gen Z protests," said Muliro, the university lecturer. 

Ruto could soon win over the respect of the millions of Kenyans who voted for Raila. He could also be tempted to downgrade the youth’s agitation and ignore their demands.

Already, within the circles of State House, there’s a belief that Mt Kenya members in the sacked Cabinet have done little to protect the government from their community's assaults.