Inside fear mongering war between Ruto and Gachagua in Mt Kenya

The battle between President William Ruto and his Deputy, Rigathi Gachagua in Mt Kenya appears set to be determined on who among them sells greater fear to the other, pundits opine.

The Ruto biggest portion of fear so far to his deputy is the threat of impeachment--with Tana River Senator Danston Mungatana having already filed a censure motion against him-- and eventually replacement as his running mate in 2027.

The DP has also created a cloud of dare-do-that-and-I-will-damn-ensure there is no second term for Dr Ruto to pursue with blessings from Mt Kenya voters.

The framing of the fear mongering that they are trading in has also dragged in the names of opposition chief Raila Odinga and former President Uhuru Kenyatta, both weaponised as leverage.

While the President appears to be brandishing Mr Odinga to Gachagua's face with the message that government is not dying to have Mt Kenya support, the DP is hitting back by invoking the name of Mr Kenyatta as partner to make his boss one term State House tenant should need arise.

Both friends turned shadow boxers against each other, are using their loyalists to trade in acts and utterances of enhancing fear to make either budge.

Embakasi North MP James Gakuya on Sunday told us that "we even target to wrestle Nairobi from the current wing come next election...the capital city must get back to its rightful owners", a threat that Nairobi governor Mr Jonson Sakaja who belongs to the President's wing has since dismissed as "tribal diatribe".

"The biggest technique the two have resorted to is threatening each other with scenarios of grounding each other. It is a game of intimidating each other and both appear to be accomplished in that endeavour," says political scientist, Gasper Odhiambo.

Mr Odhiambo submits that both Ruto and his deputy appear locked in some sort of a stalemate, each now desperately seeking the sucker punch ahead of 2027.

According to Jubilee Party Secretary General Mr Jeremiah Kioni, the president is using the threat of impeaching Gachagua as a weapon of survival in Mt Kenya and the country at large.

But on his end, Mr Gachagua is holding his ground by reminding the president that should that impeachment happen, Mt Kenya voters will take it as a declaration of political war punishable by withdrawing their support from Dr Ruto.

While on Sunday tour of Kiambu County, Gachagua fired his missiles directly to the President by reminding him that "we promised you our votes and we honoured it. You promised me that you will never have me humiliated. Meet your end of bargain or face the wrath of Mt Kenya people".

Mr Gachagua appears intent to use the Mt Kenya voters as his shield against impeachment, threatening to launch a fullscale opposition movement against his boss in the region.

To cushion himself against that possibility, the president and his men appear to be creating a ground scenario to scare Mt Kenya with possibility of isolation, some going to rabid extremes of suggesting cohesion turmoil in the Rift Valley.

"Packaged in the impeachment threat is also the peddling of fear that he (president) has the ability to isolate Mt Kenya from development projects. He wants to make it look like it is up to Mr Gachagua to become a sycophant so as to be spared impeachment and Mt Kenya get development," Mr Kioni said.

He added that, that is the thinking behind some wings of Mt Kenya fronting Interior CS Kithure Kindiki as their spokesman.

Former Gatanga MP Nduati Ngugi, who is a confidant of Mr Kenyatta, on Sunday told us that immediately Mr Gachagua was through with his September 20, 2024, TV interview where he laid bare persecutions he claimed were being accorded him by his boss, he (Ngugi) got a call from a state house mandarin.

"The call was from someone very senior at state house. His call was somehow hysterical and full of fear peddling," he said.

Mr Ngugi said the caller's exact words were: "Thanks to your Rigathi Gachagua emotional blackmail, Mt Kenya continues to be driven further from governance benefits...soon you people will be treated like opposition".

He added that the caller delivered the message thus: "Riggy G is negotiating Mt Kenya out of Government.  It's a deep issue. Mt Kenya must stay in Government by force by fire. If they leave it will take them more than 40 years to get back into it. There will be no roads, water...electricity...you will taste raw marginalisation".

Mr Ngugi said his deduction from the call was that the president's men want to tame the Deputy President but have no idea how "only coming through by personalized rants of the likes of majority leader, Kimani Ichung'wah".

Maragua MP Mary Wamaua who is an ardent loyalist of the DP told us that "they are threatening us to abandon the DP so as to make him feel abandoned and vulnerable".

Ms Wamaua said "the biggest scheme was to try and gang up Mt Kenya MCAs against the DP, a situation that flopped".

She said that "when the MCAs were recently invited to Murang'a to make a declaration against the DP, only 50 percent turned up, a further 25 percent refusing to endorse the declaration".

This, she said, is a clear indication that at worst, Mr Gachagua has more than 75 percent of Mt Kenya villages hence unshakeable.

On his part, Laikipia East MP Mwangi Kiunjuri for the president insists that "we have more than 80 percent of the national legislators on our side". 

To beat the trap of isolation, Mr Gachagua appears to be investing in ganging up voters against those opposed to him in Mt Kenya by branding them traitors and sellouts.

"We are not concerned about those traitors...we have the people on our side. They know who stands to benefit should we get divided. They want to infiltrate us, dominate us and rule us as per their wish. We will tell our people to resist," says Kiambu Senator Karungo Thang'wa.

He said "we dare them to convene an open public meeting in the heart of Mt Kenya region to declare war on Gachagua and that is when they will realise the fallacy they are riding in".

Already, Mr Gachagua has warned President's loyalists in Mt Kenya to change their minds before coming December failure to which they will encounter a political bloodbath in the 2027 General Election.

Mr Ichung'wah on Sunday hurled a scare to Mr Gachagua that "removing him from office is not a hard call".

He said "this man cannot continue to run amok and once he is put to account he resorts to using tribe, crybaby and scarecrow narratives to survive".

While the president's men are using broad-based government to scare DP Gachagua with impeachment numbers, he is hitting back by saying he too is crafting broad based friendship ahead of 2027.

He says he is courting the friendship of regional leaders like Kalonzo Musyoka, George Natembeya and Fred Matiang'i.

Murang'a Senator Joe Nyutu on Sunday told AVDelta News that "we are not going to buy any fear unleashed".

He said "it is only when Gachagua speaks of uniting those in his backyard that tribalism card is floated...but when others meet and declare that they will speak in one voice in defending their own, they are rated as nationalists".

Mr Nyutu said "that is the kind of deceit we do not want to hear about".

Mr Kiunjuri on Sunday insisted that "we are seeking new ways of achieving our development agenda outside Gachagua's ambit since he appears more fixated with politicking hence why we have elevated Kindiki to be our link to the president".

But former Laikipia County Woman Representative Cate Waruguru calls it bluff saying "the fear being sold is that Mr Kindiki can use the tactics of unleashing security agencies against dissenters like how the former regime used to do".

"Our antidote to that lie is simple. We cannot remove our trust from an elected Mr Gachagua to a presidential appointee in the name of Prof Kindiki and whose only mandate is to do Ruto bidding," Ms Waruguru said.

She said soon Mt Kenya will be full of ‘Ruto must go songs’ "since we have come to know he is the source of all these problems".

Former Kiambu Governor Ferdinand Waititu said "Prof Kindiki is being elevated to prominence since he is known to oppose one man one shilling one vote formula". 

He said the fear being peddled is for DP Gachagua to drop his demand that the formula applies rest he be replaced with Prof Kindiki.

"That formula is our greatest weapon in politics and we will not drop it. President Ruto publicly promised to enact it. He is using threats to renege on it. That is daydreaming," Mr Waititu said.

Former Bahati MP Kimani Ngunjiri claimed that governors serving their one term, are being threatened with impeachment should they side with DP Gachagua.

"They are being reminded that Meru Governor was a victim of political trade where area leaders and elders traded support for Ruto schemes against Gachagua with impeachment of Kawira Mwangaza," he alleged, a matter of great public interest now before court.

Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT) don Charles Mwangi says "it is obvious that the President and his Deputy are locked in a do or die fight in the Mountain from where Kenya Kwanza Alliance administration received 87 percent of votes and 47 percent of its authority".