An interesting development ahead of Deputy President William Ruto’s second appearance at the Hague is in the offing as two Mps are reported to have fought last night over Ruto’s decision to drop Raila as his main defense exhibit. The fight, according to the aide, has been boiling with widening rifts between the two factions of Mps -URP and TNA - who accompanied the Deputy President. According to an eyewitness (an aide to another Mp whom we cannot mention because of the sensitivity of this issue) , the TNA side who accompanied Ruto felt that by the Deputy President abandoning his Pre-trial chamber line of defense, where he projected Raila as the main cause of the violence, and showing video clips where ODM called for peace and restraint; the new line of defense will expose Uhuru and the then PNU political machine as the aggressors. “They (Mps) begun disagreeing the moment Ruto’s lawyer Karim Khan played those video clips where he called for peace while still a high ranking ODM party member. . .the other guys wanted him to use Raila but I think his legal team advised him not to, so he ended up changing his line of defense,” says the source. By the time Ruto left for Nairobi, so divided was the URP and TNA mps who remained at the Hague that one team, mostly of TNA allied Mps, left for Amsterdam as the others remained in the Hague city where the ICC is based. Then meetings and calls to Nairobi began, with each sending conflicting information to their bosses. “Each group went its way, accusing the other of dishonesty. . .then these two met yesternight where a joint meeting had been called to reduce the tempers but as the meeting progressed, huyu wa Rift Valley akaanza kuwakemea hawa wengine (this Rift Valley Mp begun castigating the TNA allied ones), that is Mheshimiwa shot up and grabbed him, things just got out of hand,” says the aide. It took the intervention of Kajiado North Mp Hon Ole Sakuda and Hon Sudi to cool the tempers down, the source reveals. The two Mps have since been recalled and will most likely arrive in Nairobi later today. When Ruto appeared at the ICC for the start of his trial, conspicuously missing in his opening statements was Raila Odinga, a man both Ruto and Uhuru have consistently alluded to since the ICC cases began as the source of their tribulations. For some reason, the “blame Raila” mantra served the presidential campaigns, but the ICC cases are legal questions which political posturing may not answer, a realization Ruto’s defense team apparently briefed their client thoroughly, leading to the change of tact in his defense. However, the Uhuru side are keen to use Raila, sadly, no evidence points to Odinga’s participation. The father of modern democracy “ni mweupe kama pamba”, a zinger he often uses to tease his often corrupt competitors who cannot march his integrity standards. Uhuru’s defense team, so diametrically opposed to Ruto’s new strategy, plans to portray the ODM side as the aggressors; but that would complicate things for Ruto, now serving in Uhuru’s government. Again, it is widely believed that most of Ruto’s witnesses were coached by the NSIS, or the PNU side of the Grand Coalition government. Hence, the case against Ruto is relatively weaker. In fact, the fear in the TNA side is that should the government withdraw all Ruto’s witnesses, Uhuru’s witnesses may stay as they form the bulk of real victims of the post- poll violence, and many, save for those already bought, bribed or intimidated to withdraw, are still cooperating with mama Fatou Bensouda. But attention now shifts to the public show the same Mps will display even as they fight behind the cameras.
Posted on: Mon, 16 Sep 2013 06:36:23 +0000
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