William Ruto emphasized his poor background in his election campaign. He promises to turn the Kenyan economy into a new position and include all those struggling to make ends meet in the official economy.
The counting of votes in Kenya’s presidential election lasted six days and ended in a chaotic atmosphere on Monday.
Some of the members of the central election board refused to accept the election result, and the festive atmosphere of the counting place turned into a ruckus. However, after a delay of a few hours, the chairman of the election commission announced the result, which the national and international media had already predicted.
Kenyans voted the 55-year-old vice-president of the previous government as their fifth president William Ruton. A veteran politician who ran for the fifth time in the presidential election Raila Odinga, 77, lost the election by a margin of just over 1.5 percentage points.
Kenya has a long tradition of election-related violence, and even now the situation is explosive.
Raila Odinga announced today, Tuesday, that he does not accept the election result. Odinga promised to challenge it by all legal means. At worst, his supporters will challenge it on the streets of Kenya.
A roadside chicken seller
William Ruto, who has been declared the new president of Kenya, is a devout believer and comes from a poor background in western Kenya. He got his first shoes at the age of 15 and started his working career selling live chickens on the side of the road.
In his election campaign, Ruto emphasized his own humble background. And that the counter-candidate Raila Odinga represents the families, “dynasties” that have ruled Kenyan politics for decades.
Raila Odinga’s father was the vice president of Kenya’s first president Jomo Kenyatta’s in government in the 1960s. And now Kenyatta’s son, the outgoing president Uhuru Kenyatta supported Odinga in the elections.
William Ruto wanted to show that you can work your way up to the presidency from the side of the street – and he succeeded.
Every successful person is valuable
Ruto’s campaign slogan was Every Hustler matters. With the word hustler, he refers to the people who persevere in Kenya’s informal economy, who earn their living in small pieces from street stalls and small workshops. Most of them do not have official business licenses, and therefore they also do not accumulate tax revenues for the state coffers.
It is difficult to come up with a Finnish translation for the word “hustler”, but the Finnish ambassador to Kenya could work Pirkka Tapiolan the proposal “best performer”.
Kenyans who are struggling to make ends meet are always forced to come up with something new if the old way of making a living no longer works. We always manage somehow.
The same can be said about William Ruto’s political career.
Election violence and corruption charges
The 2007 elections were followed by unprecedented violence in Kenya. 1,200 people died and hundreds of thousands had to leave their homes. The International Criminal Court (ICC) investigated the events and indicted six politicians involved in the election campaign.
One of them was William Ruto. He was suspected of planning and organizing the violence that followed the elections. Ruto was charged with crimes against humanity on three grounds: murder, forced displacement of people and persecution.
Ruto allied himself with another accused, Uhuru Kenyatta, and in the 2013 elections, Kenyatta became the country’s president and Ruto became his vice president. In 2016, the Kenyan government withdrew from cooperation with the ICC, key witnesses recanted their testimony and the criminal court dropped Ruto’s charges.
William Ruto has also survived numerous corruption charges. It has been claimed that he e.g. who built his hotel on a piece of land seized from the state and defrauded the state oil company in land deals. But Ruto has only received a sentence in 2013, when the court found him guilty of stealing land from a small farmer in connection with the 2007 unrest.
These elections were the latest proof of success. The roadside chicken seller faced off against the powerful families of Kenyan politics but came out victorious.
The enormous challenges of the new president
Africa has seen several military coups in the last couple of years and there are many countries on the continent where citizens are not allowed to freely choose their leaders. That is why last week’s elections in Kenya were also important beyond the country’s borders.
Kenya has been at a standstill for a week because of the elections. Schools have been closed, streets quiet and most people have stayed at home.
The victory of the plague was celebrated loudly in some places on Monday night, and life will hopefully slowly return to normal.
With everyday life, the new president will face normal, huge challenges.
The global food crisis and rising fuel prices are also disciplining Kenya. More and more people fall to the limits of subsistence. The northern and eastern parts of the country are suffering from the worst drought in decades, millions of people are already suffering from malnutrition.
Previous governments, in which Ruto himself was involved, have built ports, highways and railways with loan money. More than half of the government’s tax revenue flows into loan interest and repayments.
How will William Ruto cope with these challenges? And where will he find the funds for the countless reforms promised by his electoral program: to support the poor, young people, farmers, small entrepreneurs and businesses, health care, education, infrastructure and pensions?
Speed to the economy from the side of the street
The first tool in Ruto’s toolbox is to bring street-side earners under the law and taxation. He believes that Kenya’s new vitality can be found in the smallest entrepreneurs and companies.
When all attempts are made legal, when successful people are not harassed by the police or unreasonable bureaucratic demands, a new well-being is born. From the bottom up, bottom up economy, as Ruto expresses it.
Another method that is effective in principle but difficult to implement was included in both Ruto’s and Odinga’s election promises: stop corruption.
Due to corruption, even a third of Kenya’s budget funds disappear into the wrong pockets of some. Kenya’s leading politicians also admit it.
The toolbox of a hustler, a doer, usually doesn’t include strict adherence to rules. But corruption cannot be controlled without strict laws, transparency and accountability.
That’s a challenge for the new president.
You can discuss the topic on 17.8. until 11 p.m.
Also read the correspondent’s previous stories about Kenya:
‘s Afrikan correspondent Pasi Toivonen also shares content from his everyday life and work on Instagram @toivonenpasi.