The current Kenya Kwanza administration is already showing signs that the relationship between the President and his deputy will not be any different.
It has been all rosy for President William Ruto and his deputy Rigathi Gachagua but 19 months down the line, cracks are emerging.
Riggy G, as he is popularly known, has been Ruto’s biggest cheerleader, always accompanying him in public events and heaping praises to the head of state.
As word went round that the two had fallen out, the second in command retreated to his Mt Kenya backyard and revived the push for the controversial one-man one-vote one-shilling revenue-sharing formula.
The formula is seen to favour smaller counties with highly concentrated populations like Nairobi, Kiambu and Mt Kenya.
Gachagua re-emerged last Sunday in Nyeri for a church service after a week of not being seen in public, choosing not to respond to claims that his absence was due to differences in the government.
And while addressing Kirinyaga residents on Tuesday, the DP reached out retired President Uhuru Kenyatta, saying he is willing to work with him.
"Uhuru Kenyatta is our son, he should come so that we unite, is that okay? Do you have a problem with him? The election period is over. We should unite as one region and love each other. If we fail to unite, love each other and agree, we shall find ourselves in difficult situations," Gachagua said.
The former president fell out with Ruto after he endorsed Azimio leader Raila Odinga for the top seat in the run up to 2022 elections.
Notably, the DP has also extended an apology to Mama Ngina Kenyatta, the mother of Uhuru for the rift that occurred in 2022.
During the church service, Gachagua’s lieutenants from Mt Kenya pledged that the region will not allow their son to be mistreated, warning of tough political repercussions.
“We will not allow Gachagua to be mistreated,” Nyeri Governor Mutahi Kahiga said.
Luanda MP Dickson Maungu told the Star Gachagua believes he delivered Mt Kenya to Ruto, enabling him to win the election and thus an equal partner in the government.
“It is for that reason that the DP acts like he controls Mt Kenya,” he said.
Maungu added that Ruto on the other hand believes he had penetrated Mt Kenya by the time he named Gachagua as his deputy.
“What the President has done, being a good student of political science, he has clipped his wings,” he said.
Gachagua, he said, is now trying to find a friend in his enemy, Uhuru Kenyatta. “He had been very arrogant and rude towards Uhuru, a person who was president for 10 years,” the Luanda MP said.
“If you ask me, Gachagua did not help Ruto to win Mt Kenya. Ruto had made a name by himself. If you can remember, Gachagua was brought on board as the deputy in the very last days of the campaigns.”
Political analyst Joseph Mutua said that as per the Constitution, the DP is the principal assistant to the President.
“One thing is however clear. The job of the holder of this office is not defined. This creates room for the President to exercise his prerogative on this matter. He is at liberty to assign him a job that he deems fit or not,” he said.
“To me, this is one of reason why the DP's job is seen as a curse.”
He explained that the President can set the holder for failure by giving assignments and not supporting him.
Mutua added that Gachagua is also fighting political forces which are out to stop him from being Ruto's running mate in 2027, hence dim his dream of succeeding President Ruto in 2032.
“Some of these forces hail from his backyard of Mt Kenya. From onset, they never believed in him. You would call this another curse for him,” he said.
In the run-up to the 2022 election, Uhuru ditched his deputy and supported a long-time political rival for the top seat.
When he was elected President in March 2013, his political friend was Ruto, his deputy.
The two showcased bromance, wearing similar colours of ties and shirts and sharing bookrest during media briefings.
But as the 2022 election approached, Ruto was perhaps his worst political enemy, going by the way he endorsed Raila.
Even before the endorsement, Uhuru significantly clipped Ruto’s roles in his administration with Executive Order No.1 of 2019 which drove the nail into the coffin.
Uhuru appointed then Interior Cabinet Secretary Fred Matiang’i to be chairman of the National Development Implementation and Communication Committee, supervising all national government projects.
Matiang’i became so powerful that he openly engaged in politics contrary to the law and openly issued threats to Ruto, his boss.
Maungu said that before the 2010 Constitution, the VP was an appointee of the President.
“This meant that anytime the President felt they VP was undermining him or showing signs of taking over, he would cut them off,” he said.
Maungu said further that following the promulgation of the new Constitution, the President and the DP come together in a partners.
“It is more of a coalition. You remember Uhuru and Ruto had to bring TNA and URP together. Ruto felt like he was an equal shareholder. He felt he delivered votes that earned the victory while Uhuru knew he was the commander in chief,” he said.
Jaramogi Oginga Odinga, who was Kenya’s first VP, resigned in 1966 when his ideologies and those of the ruling party Kenya African National Union clashed.
As VP he did not agree with founding father Mzee Jomo Kenyatta's government. While Jaramogi had called for closer ties with China, the Soviet Union and other countries of the Warsaw Pact, Kenyatta was in favour of approaching the United States and the Western bloc.
As differences grew, Kenyatta subjected Jaramogi to humiliation, harassment, intimidation, threats before he resigned.
The friction between the two continued after he resigned, and in 1969 Jaramogi was arrested after the two verbally abused each other publicly at a chaotic function in Kisumu where at least 11 people were killed.
Kenyatta was to open New Nyanza General Hospital (Russia Hospital), in October 1969 which was seen as Odinga's project due to his Russian connection.
Joseph Murumbi was appointed by Kenyatta to succeed Jaramogi but he later resigned after 120 days, citing personal reasons.
In the sunset years of Mzee’s presidency, his deputy Daniel arap Moi, was constantly humiliated and mistreated by Kenyatta’s men.
Moi was seen as a toothless VP who was regarded as an outsider in Kenyatta’s exclusively Kikuyu inner circle.
In his book, The Making of An African Statesman, Andrew Morton, said the all-powerful police commandant in charge of then Rift Valley province, James Mungai, loved to humiliate Moi.
Morton cites an incident in 1975, when Moi returned from an Organisation for African Union meeting in Kampala, only for Mungai to accuse him of bringing guns to overthrow Mzee.
Mungai is said to have conducted a vigorous search for the weapons, ordering his men to examine Moi’s offices.
The search was said to be so rigorous that involved asking Moi to strip.
Morton said the disrespect and humiliation was too much that Mungai, on two occasions, slapped Moi on the face in front of Kenyatta at State House in Nakuru.
Josephat Karanja, the fifth VP resigned to avoid an ongoing vote of no-confidence in Parliament.
He was accused by then Embakasi MP David Mwenje of wanting to overthrow Moi.
After the 1988 general election, Moi appointed George Saitoti as Kenya's sixth VP. Saitoti became the longest sitting VP serving for 13 years between May 1989 and January 1998 and again between April 1999 and August 2002.
After the 1997 general election, Moi failed to name a VP for 14 months, which was a huge embarrassment to Saitoti.
Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi was the last and shortest serving VP under Moi in late 2002.
He was appointed in an unsuccessful attempt to bring the then Western province votes into the camp of KANU, which had been the party of government since independence
He ran for the VP's seat in 2002 general elections under Uhuru as the flag bearer.
He went on to lose his Sabatia seat to Moses Akaranga, leaving him in the political cold for five years.
