•The two met before a rally in Bomet in what is seen as part of his elaborate strategy to ring-fence his Rift Valley bastion ahead of next year's election.
•This ushers a new partnership to consolidate the region.
Image: FELIX KIPKEMOI
Former Bomet Governor Isaac Rutto on Friday met DP William Ruto face-to-face for the first time since 2018.
The two met before a rally in Bomet in what is seen as part of his elaborate strategy to ring-fence his Rift Valley bastion ahead of next year's election.
This ushers a new partnership to consolidate the region.
Ruto is in Bomet to commission several projects, hand over a bus to the National Super League side Silibwet FC and later preside over a fundraiser for boda boda Saccos in Sotik, among other events.
The DP, who has fallen out with President Uhuru Kenyatta, is keen to diminish pockets of rebellion in his backyard as he prepares for a presidential run next year.
During the Friday rally, Ruto reiterated his message that Kenya should not be divided on tribal lines.
"There are people who were not happy Jubilee was uniting people and they hatched a plan to split the party so that Kenya is split. Even if they split the party, Kenya's unity will not be divided," he said.
Ruto said meetings held at Jubilee's headquarters are only aimed at splitting the party.
"To the point that the party cannot field a candidate for any by-election. Is that not a shame?"
On Sunday, Rutto said he is ready to support the DP for the country’s top post “if we agree on principle”.
“I am not in an alliance with anybody. After all, nobody has asked me to back him or her for presidency. If William seeks my support, we shall discuss, and if he supports the tenets CCM stands for – like devolving resources – then I will back him. There’s nothing personal,” he told the Sunday Nation.
The DP has been facing a threat that could have chipped away a section of his main support base after Rutto last year led his Chama Cha Mashinani party in signing a cooperation agreement with Jubilee Party.
When he signed the agreement, there was talk of major Cabinet changes that would have seen Rutto's entry into Uhuru's government in what would be a strategy to tame the DP in the Rift Valley.
His change of heart to join the DP camp could puncture the Building Bridges Initiative campaigns in the Rift Valley given that the CCM party leader was a key point man of the process in the region.
Kanu chairman Gideon Moi, the son of the country's second President who also hails from the Rift Valley, is working closely with Uhuru after the Independence party signed a coalition agreement with Jubilee.
Rutto and Gideon had been seen as a political force that would have complicated the DP's efforts to put the region under lock and key ahead of next year's polls.
Rutto's move to join the DP's camp is seen as part of his plan to recapture the Bomet governor's seat, which he lost to the late Joyce Laboso who was backed by Ruto in 2017.
Rutto and the DP have had frosty relations since 2013 and in the lead-up to the 2017 polls. They last met face to face in 2018 at a public function at Siongiroi in Chepalungu, Bomet county. They have not been seeing eye to eye, a situation that could complicate Rutto's gubernatorial ambitions after staying in the political cold for five years.
The former governor is set for another political duel in his bid to oust incumbent Hillary Barchok. A week ago, Rutto was greeted with unfriendly chants at Kuresoi in Nakuru where he had made a stopover.
Angry youths demanded he join the wheelbarrow movement spearheaded by Ruto if he wanted to salvage his political future.
“We love you but if you want to save your political career, work with the DP,” residents could be heard telling him from a video that went viral on social media.
Rutto then left in a huff.
It is this hostility that is believed to have made the once abrasive politician to agree to work with the DP.
It, however, remains to be seen if their reunion will be sustained until 2022 given that the DP is under a fierce political onslaught from the President who has declared an end to the Kikuyu-Kalenjin hegemony.
Last month, Rutto attended a Kanu party meeting in Bomet where he announced he will support Baringo Senator Gideon Moi should he declare his interest in the presidency.
He later said he was quoted out of context after some CCM party officials, led by secretary general Zedekiah Kiprob Buzeki, took him head-on. Buzeki had accused Rutto of making decisions touching on the party without consulting them.
In the run-up to the 2017 election, Rutto joined hands with the Nasa brigade before later ditching the camp and declaring support for Jubilee ahead of the repeat presidential election in October that year.