What Ruto told Tanzania MPs
National
By
David Njaaga
| May 05, 2026
President William Ruto has told Tanzania's Parliament that mistrust, not infrastructure or policy, is East Africa's biggest barrier to integration, and the region cannot afford another collapse.
Addressing lawmakers in Dodoma on Tuesday, May 5, Ruto became only the second Kenyan president to address Tanzania's Parliament, 23 years after Daniel arap Moi delivered a farewell address to the same house in November 2002.
Ruto said Kenya and Tanzania must move beyond incremental progress toward decisive integration.
"The time has come for our generation to move beyond incremental progress towards decisive integration. Our biggest barrier is not infrastructure or policy. It is the quiet mistrust that affects our relations. It has cost us time and prosperity, and we can no longer afford it," the Kenyan Head of State said.
He traced the East African Community (EAC) collapse of 1977 not to ideological differences between Kenya's market economy and Tanzania's Ujamaa socialism, but to a failure of governance, the inability to deliver opportunity where it was needed most.
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"Our enemies are not Kenyans nor Tanzanians. Our enemies are joblessness, poverty and lack of development," he said.
EAC
On the EAC's global standing, Ruto called for the bloc to position itself as a strong pillar within the African continental architecture, while pushing for reforms that make the community leaner, more focused and better aligned with the priorities of member states.
He also took aim at the structure of global governance, arguing that a United Nations Security Council (UNSC) that excludes Africa cannot effectively secure the continent, and that the international financial system, built for a different era, does not reflect Africa's current realities.
"A system that marginalises Africa cannot claim legitimacy. A global order that excludes a continent of 1.2 billion people is inherently incomplete," observed Ruto.
The address came on the final day of a two-day state visit running from May 4 to 5, aimed at strengthening diplomatic and economic relations between the two neighbouring countries.
The two leaders held bilateral talks covering trade, investment, infrastructure development and transport facilitation, and jointly addressed members of the press to outline the outcomes of their discussions.