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    Kenya Inaugurates William Ruto as President

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    After a bitter and close election, William Ruto took the reins of power on Tuesday. One of his team’s first moves: Limiting the access of local television outlets to the ceremony.NAIROBI, Kenya — William Ruto was sworn in as Kenya’s fifth president on Tuesday in a ceremony attended by dozens of global leaders and diplomats — a peaceful handover of power following a bitter election campaign that underscored the entrenched if troubled place of democracy in East Africa’s largest economy.The Moi International Sports Center was filled to its capacity of 60,000 people by 5 a.m., with attendees dancing and waving the Kenyan flag. Immediately after the new president was inaugurated, the crowd broke into chants of “Ruto, Ruto” as fireworks popped near the dais and confetti was scattered across the stadium.Security was tight around the premises, with security forces trying to stop hundreds more people who thronged the gates of the stadium. At least a dozen people were injured as they jostled to enter through one of the gates, a driver with the St. John ambulance service said. In a potentially ominous sign for freedom of the press, Mr. Ruto’s team limited the access of local television stations to the inauguration, handing exclusive broadcast rights for the ceremony to a local affiliate of a South African pay-TV company. (Journalists from local newspapers and radio stations could cover the proceedings in person.)During the campaign, Mr. Ruto had repeatedly accused Kenya’s media outlets of bias against him, and some analysts said that his decision to limit their access to the ceremony was a sign of his resentment.People climbing fences to get into the stadium for Mr. Ruto’s inauguration.Brian Inganga/Associated PressMutuma Mathiu, editor in chief of the Nation Media Group, which owns print and television news outlets, said in an interview that the media had a “national duty” to cover the transfer of power, and defended his organization against charges of bias.However, he said, “I don’t think we want to start a mud fight at a wedding and in the process soil the bride’s gown.”Mr. Ruto triumphed in the Aug. 9 vote with a thin margin over his rival, Raila Odinga, who rejected the result and challenged it in the Supreme Court. But the court upheld Mr. Ruto’s victory in a unanimous decision last week.Mr. Ruto, 55, who has been the country’s vice president for the last 10 years, was born to a religious family in a small village in Kenya’s Rift Valley, where he helped plant maize and went to school barefoot. He showed his initial interest in politics in the 1990s, becoming a stalwart ally of Kenya’s longtime ruler, Daniel arap Moi, winning a position in Parliament and later serving as a cabinet minister for agriculture and higher education.His extraordinary rise almost came to an end a decade ago, when the International Criminal Court charged him with crimes against humanity, accusing him of helping to orchestrate the violence that followed the 2007 elections. But the court dropped the case against him in 2016, citing “witness interference and political meddling.”Despite his dizzying wealth, with a business empire that includes luxury hotels, ranches and a huge poultry processing plant, Mr. Ruto pitched his campaign this year to Kenya’s “hustlers,” the multitude of young and ambitious strivers trying to make ends meet. During the campaign, Mr. Ruto clashed with his boss, President Uhuru Kenyatta, who had endorsed Mr. Ruto’s rival, Mr. Odinga, a former prime minister and opposition figure.Mr. Kenyatta did not congratulate Mr. Ruto until Monday evening, when he finally welcomed him to the presidential office. Mr. Kenyatta attended the inauguration, but Mr. Odinga said in a tweet that he would not.Kenya’s outgoing president, Uhuru Kenyatta, inspected a guard of honor before Mr. Ruto’s inauguration ceremony.Tony Karumba/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMr. Ruto takes the helm of a nation facing economic, political and social challenges. Kenya’s economy is saddled with onerous debt, much of it borrowed to finance large infrastructure projects. Inflation is climbing, the currency continues to depreciate against the dollar and food and fuel prices are skyrocketing because of the war in Ukraine. Four back-to-back seasons of below-average rainfalls have left over four million Kenyans hungry and thirsty.Kenya is in a region layered with strife — in Ethiopia, Somalia, South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo — and Mr. Ruto, observers say, could play a role in promoting peace and stability in the region.But at home, he faces a divided nation after a nail-biter of an election.“The incoming administration has a full inbox,” said Dr. Karuti Kanyinga, a scholar at the Institute for Development Studies at the University of Nairobi. “There’s a lot to worry about.”One of those worries will be how Mr. Ruto’s government will treat the media. He was part of an administration that over the past decade took steps to muzzle the press by threatening journalists with arrest, shutting down broadcasters, starving media outlets of advertising revenue and warning journalists that they didn’t have full freedoms as protected by the Constitution.Mr. Ruto addressing the media at his official residence in Nairobi after the ruling last week. Mr. Ruto was part of an administration that took steps to muzzle the press in Kenya over the past decade.Brian Inganga/Associated PressThose worries were revived this weekend when Mr. Ruto’s team announced that it was giving exclusive broadcast rights to cover the inauguration to MultiChoice Kenya — an affiliate of the South African pay-TV company MultiChoice. Kenyan media will have to rely on the broadcast from the South African outlet.Dennis Itumbi, Mr. Ruto’s spokesman, justified the move by saying Multichoice Kenya was not just any private contractor but was partly owned by Kenya’s national broadcaster. Wanjohi Githae, a member of Mr. Ruto’s communications team, said in a text message that while local media could bring their broadcasting vans, there was no parking space for them “anywhere near the stadium.”On Tuesday morning, Mr. Mathiu of Nation Media said that after negotiations with Mr. Ruto’s team, they were allowed to have their vans around the stadium but that the main feed would still come from MultiChoice. The contract with the firm has not been made public but Mr. Mathiu said he expected the feed would be free to relay.Media analysts said they hoped the move did not augur an era in which the press will be further stifled.“The optics don’t look favorable given how this measure was rolled out,” said David Makali, a veteran journalist and communications strategist. “But I am ready to give the new government the benefit of doubt and hope this isn’t a deliberate move to suppress the press.” More

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      With Tears and Steel, Kenya’s ‘Hustler’ President Vanquishes His Foes

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      William Ruto built a career on beating the odds. In his greatest triumph, he is expected to be inaugurated as Kenya’s fifth president on Tuesday.NAIROBI, Kenya — William Ruto wept when he won, falling to his knees in prayer after Kenya’s Supreme Court confirmed his presidential win last week, the climax of a bruising courtroom battle over the results of a hard-fought election.Aides patted the sobbing Mr. Ruto, as his wife, a Christian preacher, and his running mate knelt by his side, thankful that a bid to overturn his win from the Aug. 9 vote had been thwarted.On Tuesday Mr. Ruto, who has been Kenya’s vice president since 2013, will be inaugurated as the country’s fifth president.The outburst contrasted with the image of a leader better known for his steel than for his tears. Since he began his political ascent three decades ago, enlisting as an enforcer for an autocratic president, Mr. Ruto has developed a reputation as a wily operator with a talent for reinvention and an instinct for ruthless pragmatism.He survived arduous shadow battles with his boss, President Uhuru Kenyatta. He won elections that he was widely predicted to lose. And he emerged as a free man from the International Criminal Court at The Hague, where Mr. Ruto had been charged with crimes against humanity, after witnesses changed their stories and the trial collapsed in 2016.“Ruto seems to thrive in going against the odds,” Macharia Munene, a political scientist at the United States International University in Nairobi, said. “Once he has garnered attention, he finds a way of separating himself, then comes out on top as a leader.”Supporters of Mr. Ruto celebrating in Nairobi on Monday.Ben Curtis/Associated PressThose qualities served Mr. Ruto especially well this past month. Not only did he vanquish his electoral rival, Raila Odinga, who had been favored to win by pollsters, but he also triumphed over Mr. Kenyatta, a former ally once so close to Mr. Ruto that they dressed in matching suits and ties.Mr. Kenyatta is now his embittered foe. After last week’s court decision, the departing president, who backed Mr. Odinga’s losing ticket, delivered a grievance-laced speech in which he refused to utter Mr. Ruto’s name, much less congratulate him on his win. It was the latest twist in a saga of loyalty and betrayal that has dominated Kenyan politics for over a decade.“I haven’t talked to him in months,” a chuckling Mr. Ruto told laughing supporters at his residence after the Supreme Court confirmed he would be replacing his former boss. “But shortly I will be putting a call to him so that we can have a conversation on the process of transition.”Already, Mr. Ruto has made soaring promises in eloquent speeches that his presidency will unlock the potential of Kenya, an East African economic powerhouse and regional anchor. But to Kenyans who look to his mixed record in office, blemished by violence and financial scandals, a Ruto presidency is a worrisome prospect.“He has so many unresolved controversies, which affects how much people are willing to trust and believe in him,” said George Kegoro, head of the Open Society Initiative for Eastern Africa, a democracy-promotion organization. “That’s a problem.”Few doubt his political skills. On the campaign trail, Mr. Ruto loved to tell of his humble origins: his barefoot childhood in the Rift Valley; his first pair of shoes at age 15; the early adult years when he sold chickens by the roadside to scrape by. That underdog narrative lay at the heart of his populist pitch to the “hustler nation” — young Kenyans striving to succeed on modest means, as he once did.It was also code for a kind of class warfare. Unlike other Kenyan leaders, educated at elite Western schools or ushered into politics by gilded bloodlines, Mr. Ruto grew up in a remote village where he raised cows and sang in the choir. In a freewheeling, alcohol-soaked political culture, he is a teetotaler who rises early, prizes punctuality and is unabashed about his Christian faith, attributing his successes to “the hand of God.”Employees in an electronics store watching the live broadcast of the Supreme Court of Kenya’s judgment on the general elections in Nairobi on Monday.Yasuyoshi Chiba/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesTo many ordinary Kenyans, that image resonated powerfully at a time of pandemic-induced hardship, said Mr. Munene, the analyst. “Everyone was suffering, yet the elite seemed to be doing fine,” he said.Many wealthy Kenyans, however, saw something different: “A thief and a murderer who is patently unsuitable to be president of this republic,” said Jerotich Seii, a one-time aid worker and Odinga voter, now a prominent Ruto supporter. “It’s a class thing.”Despite the slogan, Mr. Ruto was not the average “hustler.” He cut his teeth in politics in the early 1990s as a campaigner for Kenya’s longtime autocratic president, Daniel Arap Moi, a fellow ethnic Kalenjin. As minister for agriculture, then higher education, between 2008 and 2010, Mr. Ruto was seen an effective, hands-on leader, but no reformer: He sided with conservatives to oppose a new constitution that was approved in 2010.Along the way, he became very wealthy, growing a business empire that includes luxury hotels, a 15,000-acre ranch, a commercial farm and a huge poultry processing plant. He was implicated in corruption scandals, including accusations that he tried to grab land from a Nairobi school for a hotel parking lot — a case that is still before the courts.Mr. Ruto has always denied any wrongdoing — “I have been audited left, right, upside-down and inside-out” he said at a presidential debate in July — and many voters are willing to look past his wealth.“They are all crooks, we know that,” said Ms. Seii. “I’m going for the crook with a plan.”Mr. Ruto’s career has been shaped, to a large degree, by the International Criminal Court.In 2010 prosecutors accused Mr. Ruto and Mr. Kenyatta of leading the political violence that followed the disputed election of 2007 — the great trauma of recent Kenyan history, with over 1,200 people killed, and 600,000 others displaced, as the country threatened to tip into civil war.An opposition supporter being arrested in Kibera, a slum that is an opposition stronghold in Nairobi, in late 2007. Stephen Morrison/European Pressphoto AgencyThe I.C.C. indictment depicted Mr. Ruto as the godfather of mayhem in the Rift Valley, accusing him of distributing weapons, issuing kill-lists and telling supporters which houses to burn. But that case floundered badly at trial, ultimately managing only to unite Mr. Ruto and Mr. Kenyatta, and transforming Kenyan politics.The two leaders ran on a joint ticket in the 2013 election, with Mr. Kenyatta as president, portraying the court as a tool of Western oppression and rallying other African leaders to their cause.On the ground in Kenya, witnesses disappeared or changed their stories amid accusations of bribery and intimidation, and by 2016 the trials of both men had entirely collapsed.Mr. Ruto and Mr. Kenyatta became an apparently unstoppable force. Before they were re-elected in 2017, they finished each other’s sentences in interviews and joshed in a jokey campaign video, drawing comparisons with the Obama-Biden partnership in the United States.But a year later, it all fell apart. In 2018, Mr. Kenyatta signed a pact that switched his loyalties to Mr. Odinga, triggering a shadow war inside Kenya’s government.Uhuru Kenyatta, in a red shirt, as a presidential candidate, next to his running mate, Mr. Ruto, in a yellow shirt, at a rally in Nairobi in 2013. Now, they are bitter foes.Pete Muller for The New York TimesMr. Ruto started to build a political base in Mount Kenya, Mr. Kenyatta’s political backyard.Mr. Kenyatta used the state apparatus to thwart his deputy’s ambitions.Last year, a senior Kenyan government official made public a list of Mr. Ruto’s assets. Security agencies began to obstruct his movements. His supporters came under unusual scrutiny by the tax authorities, said a senior Western official who spoke anonymously to discuss sensitive issues.As the election drew near, the main news media outlets tilted their coverage in favor of Mr. Kenyatta’s ally, Mr. Odinga.And on Aug. 15, just before Mr. Ruto was declared the winner, a delegation of senior police, military and presidency officials tried to subvert his victory quietly, the head of the electoral commission, Wafula Chebukati, told the Supreme Court last week. The real test for Mr. Ruto may come when things aren’t going his way. He insists there’s nothing to worry about.“We are competitors, not enemies,” he assured his rivals after his victory was confirmed last week. “I pledge to make Kenya a country for everyone.”A poster of Mr. Ruto in Eldoret, Kenya, last month.Ed Ram/Getty ImagesAbdi Latif Dahir More

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      Kenya’s Supreme Court Upholds Presidential Election Results

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      In a sweeping rejection of claims that the Aug. 9 vote had been rigged, the court confirmed Vice President William Ruto as the country’s fifth president.NAIROBI, Kenya — The Supreme Court of Kenya on Monday upheld the election of William Ruto as president, ending a courtroom battle over disputed results from the Aug. 9 election and confirming Mr. Ruto as the fifth president of a country often seen as an indicator of democratic strength in Africa.In a lengthy judgment that rejected the claims by Mr. Ruto’s rival, Raila Odinga, that the vote had been rigged, Chief Justice Martha Koome swept aside claims of ballot stuffing, computer hacking and falsified results that she variously described as “sensationalism,” “hot air” and “a wild-goose chase that yielded nothing of value.”The unanimous verdict means that Mr. Ruto, the charismatic and populist vice president who pitched his campaign at Kenya’s “hustlers,” or young strivers, could be inaugurated as early as Sept. 13.Supporters of Mr. Ruto erupted in celebration as the verdict was announced, flooding the streets in towns across the Rift Valley, his main stronghold. Addressing supporters at his mansion in Karen, outside Nairobi, a jubilant and smiling Mr. Ruto lauded the court, extended a conciliatory hand to his rivals and promised to unite the country.“We are not enemies,” he said. “Let us unite to make Kenya a nation that everyone will be proud to call home.The court’s decision was yet another stinging defeat for Mr. Odinga, 77, a political veteran making his fifth bid for the presidency, having lost the first four. The election was hard fought: The court confirmed that Mr. Ruto had won 50.5 percent of the vote to Mr. Odinga’s 48.9 percent, a difference of about 233,000 votes. In a statement, Mr. Odinga said that while he respected the court’s verdict, he “vehemently” disagreed with it. “We find it incredible that the judges found against us on all nine grounds” and on “occasion resulted to unduly exaggerated language to refute our claim,” he said. At hearings last week, Mr. Odinga’s lawyers argued that Wafula Chebukati, the chairman of Kenya’s election commission, had swung the vote in favor of Mr. Ruto by conspiring with foreign agents who hacked into the commission’s computer system.President-elect William Ruto of Kenya speaks in Nairobi after the Supreme Court upheld his victory on Monday.Monicah Mwangi/ReutersBut Chief Justice Koome, flanked by six other judges, systematically demolished those claims in a judgment that took nearly 90 minutes to read out.The court found “no credible evidence” that the electoral computer system had been interfered with or hacked, or that the technology employed by the commission failed to meet standards of integrity.Chief Justice Koome dismissed claims by four of the country’s seven election commissions which dramatically disowned the election result minutes before it was announced. “Are we to nullify an election on the basis of a last-minute boardroom rupture?” she said. “This we cannot do.”And she offered scathing criticism of the most lurid rigging accusations, which she said were based on forgeries and hearsay, and warned lawyers against introducing sworn statements that were demonstrably based on “falsehoods.”Following the court proceeding by television in Kamagut village, about 200 miles north of Nairobi, where Mr. Ruto grow up, Esther Cherobon joined in the scenes of exultation. “I am very excited that someone who knows me by name, who never wore a shoe to school, has become president,” she said in a phone interview.It was “a miracle” that Mr. Ruto, whose campaign made much of his humble background and early years selling chicken on the roadside, had won, she added.Equally remarkable is Mr. Ruto’s rise to the top following accusations that he once committed crimes against humanity. A decade ago, Mr. Ruto was facing trial at the International Criminal Court in The Hague, which indicted him on charges of orchestrating communal violence after the 2007 election that resulted in over 1,200 deaths.The trial collapsed in 2016 after the Kenyan government withdrew its cooperation and key witnesses recanted their testimony. But the court did not formally acquit Mr. Ruto, then the country’s vice-president. The judgment on Monday was delivered to a courtroom packed with lawyers less than a month after a fiercely fought electoral battle that was closely followed across Africa and the world.Kenya’s stability matters to the region and beyond. The economic powerhouse of East Africa, it has emerged as a key Western ally in the fight against terrorism, a burgeoning technology hub and a stable democracy in a region shaped by autocrats and conflicts.Some schools in the capital closed, and the police closed roads leading to the court, but worries of a backlash from Mr. Odinga’s supporters did not immediately materialize. In Kisumu, a major Odinga stronghold in western Kenya, traffic flowed and businesses reopened soon after the verdict was announced.Supporters of Raila Odinga in Nairobi last month. The court battle that unfolded in the past week had threatened to erode Kenya’s democratic foundations.Yasuyoshi Chiba/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWhile some residents said they were shocked by the judges’ decision, they voted to abide by it. “Life has to go on,” Maurice Ogange, a motorcycle taxi driver, said by phone.That reaction stoked hopes that Kenya’s closely watched election, although messy and hotly disputed like the country’s previous three votes, could yet prove to be an example to the region.In contrast to recent elections, the vote was largely peaceful, although the chaotic scenes as the results were declared on Aug. 16, and the often sensational rigging accusations made in court last week, risked undermining voter confidence in the democratic system.When it became clear the result was going against Mr. Odinga, the top election official for his coalition denounced the vote-counting center as a “crime scene,” then rampaged through it with other supporters, clashing with security officials.It was not lost on anyone that the four rebel electoral commissioners were appointed last year by Kenya’s current president, Uhuru Kenyatta — Mr. Ruto’s political nemesis and Mr. Odinga’s ally.But the Supreme Court justices’ evenhanded treatment of the sensitive case over the past two weeks appeared to underscore the growing strength of Kenya’s senior judiciary. The judges narrowed a slew of accusations down to nine key questions, including whether Mr. Ruto had attained over 50 percent of the vote, avoiding a runoff. Since Friday they spent three sleepless nights to reach a unanimous decision, the deputy chief justice, Philomena Mwilu, said in brief remarks on Monday.“Now, you allow us to go home and sleep,” she said before the hearing adjourned.Other key institutions, however, emerged from the election damaged or discredited.While the verdict largely vindicated the election commissioner, Mr. Chebukati, he was not totally without fault in the eyes of the court. It suggested he overstepped his mandate in delivering the final result without backing from his own commissioners.The court also heard disturbing testimony that senior police, defense and security officials had tried to pressure Mr. Chebukati into denying victory to Mr. Ruto just hours before the result was announced, suggesting a dangerous rift in key state institutions.Despite the defeat, Mr. Odinga’s legacy as a champion of democracy remains undiminished. For decades he was the outsider in Kenya’s politics, a dogged opposition leader who served years in prison under the authoritarian leader Daniel arap Moi, who in 1982 accused him of fomenting an attempted coup.This time, however, Mr. Odinga was running as an establishment candidate thanks to a political pact that he sealed with Mr. Kenyatta in 2018. But that deal, known as the “handshake,” dismally failed to deliver the votes Mr. Odinga needed to win.Mr. Ruto’s candidacy was also riven with contradictions. A wealthy businessman, he cast himself as an underdog, playing up his humble past, and largely ignored that he has been in power as vice president under Mr. Kenyatta since 2013.But his appeal to what he called the “hustlers,” the millions of young Kenyans who, like his younger self, were striving to make ends meet, struck a chord with many.Even so, many young Kenyans were turned off by both candidates. Turnout fell to 65 percent of the country’s 22.1 million registered voters, down from 80 percent in 2017.Presidential ballot boxes taken to the court after the justices ordered ballots from some 15 polling stations to be recounted.Daniel Irungu/EPA, via Shutterstock More

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      Kenya Awaits Supreme Court Ruling on Presidential Election

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      The Supreme Court is expected to rule by Monday on whether the recent election of William Ruto as president, now mired in a welter of conflicting accusations, should stand.NAIROBI, Kenya — With its hefty price tag and sophisticated anti-rigging measures, Kenya’s recent presidential election was supposed to be among the best that money could buy — an elaborate system that experts said was more transparent than those in many Western countries, posting online tens of thousands of results in a matter of hours.But since a victor was declared on Aug. 15, giving William Ruto a narrow margin over Raila Odinga, Kenya’s election still hangs in the balance. The outcome has been mired in a storm of rigging allegations, baroque conspiracy theories and vicious personal attacks directed at the same electoral commission chairman who only recently was being praised for a polling process seen by many as a model for Africa, and beyond.At the center of the dispute is Mr. Odinga, who at 77 is making his fifth bid for the presidency. As with most of his previous four attempts, he says he was cheated of a rightful victory.He has taken his accusations straight to Kenya’s Supreme Court, where seven judges have spent much of the past week trying to sift fact from fiction. A decision is expected by Monday evening.The task is considerable. Mr. Odinga turned up outside the courthouse with a van filled with boxes of legal fillings, which he helped to carry inside. But while Mr. Odinga enjoyed a fair measure of public sympathy in his previous election battles — by most estimates, victory was stolen from him at least once — this time his accusations are more contentious.His legal team appear to have taken a kitchen sink approach, making a wide range of charges that, analysts say, range from the plausible to the outlandish. They will be scrutinized by a Supreme Court with a reputation for independence: It forced a rerun of the 2017 election and earlier this year overturned constitutional changes championed by Mr. Odinga and President Uhuru Kenyatta.Raila Odinga speaks to supporters as he arrives to hold a news conference at the Kenyatta International Convention Centre in Nairobi last month, after filing a petition to the country’s top court, challenging his defeat in the presidential election.Yasuyoshi Chiba/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesWith Kenya bitterly divided, the judges’ verdict on the election will be consequential, analysts say — not only for determining the result of the Aug. 9 vote, but also for the legitimacy of the ballot in a country widely seen as beacon of democracy on a continent where authoritarianism is rising.“These seven men and women are walking a tightrope,” Denis Galava, a former managing editor at the Daily Nation newspaper, said of the Supreme Court justices.After a series of bitterly, often violently, contested elections, many Kenyans hoped this one would yield a clean result followed by a smooth transfer of power. Violence was nearly absent during the vote and its aftermath. International and local groups that deployed thousands of election observers across Kenya said the vote went well.But in the hours before Mr. Ruto was declared winner on Aug. 15, with 50.5 percent of votes against 48.9 percent for Mr. Odinga, the process plunged into rowdy discord.At the national tallying center, Mr. Odinga’s top electoral representative proclaimed it a “crime scene” then stormed the dais with other supporters, flinging chairs and clashing with security officials who eventually drove the group out with truncheons. Two electoral commissioners were injured in the melee.Around the same time, signs emerged that powerful figures inside the government also opposed a Ruto victory.Supporters of William Ruto celebrating in Eldoret, Kenya, last month.Brian Inganga/Associated PressMany Kenyans, including members of the political elite, had supposed that Mr. Odinga would coast to victory thanks to his political alliance with Mr. Kenyatta, who had reached his two-term limit. That assumption was overturned as the results poured in. Some officials allegedly turned to other means to influence the result.Top government officials loyal to Mr. Kenyatta turned up at the tallying center hours before the result was announced, pressuring the electoral commission to push the election into a second round, according to a court filing by the commission chairman, Wafula Chebukati. (If no candidate gets over 50 percent of votes, Kenya’s system requires a runoff).He said the group, including the inspector general of police, the deputy chief of the armed forces and the solicitor general, warned him that “the country is going to burn” if Ruto was declared the winner, leaving “the blood of dead Kenyans” on the commission’s hands. More

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      How Raila Odinga Lost His Stronghold, Then Kenya’s Presidency

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      In his fifth, and possibly last, bid for president, Raila Odinga failed to enthuse a crucial bloc of voters in his own backyard that would have catapulted him to the top job.KISUMU, Kenya — For decades, Kenya’s veteran opposition politician Raila Odinga has been the chief political power broker in the western counties around Lake Victoria, relying on his fellow Luo ethnic voters to back him in five successive elections for president.They stuck with the man they affectionately call “Baba,” or “father,” as he challenged entrenched corruption and fell short of the presidency four times — twice in contested votes too close to call.But the loyalty of his Luo stronghold came into question last week, as Mr. Odinga, 77, was pronounced the loser of his fifth, and possibly last, bid for the presidency. In an election with over 14 million voters, the tally — which he said he plans to challenge in court — showed him only about 233,000 votes short of his rival, William Ruto, the current vice president.But he almost certainly would have clinched the prize if over 600,000 registered voters in four Luo-dominated counties had not failed to turn out. Many residents said in interviews that he had lost their support because he and his party endorsed wealthy party cronies and his own relatives — rather than young aspirants — for seats in governorship, Parliament and county assembly, suggesting that he had succumbed to the corrupt machine politics he had long opposed.“Raila was once the man of the people,” said John Okello, 38, a community organizer who lives in the low-income Obunga area in Kisumu, a city of 1.1 million that hugs the lake. “But that’s no more.”John Okello, a community leader in Obunga in Kisumu County, said he once considered Mr. Odinga a man of the people, but “no more.” Brian Otieno for The New York TimesEthnicity has shaped Kenyan politics for decades, leading to rampant corruption and disenfranchisement and, sometimes around elections, full-blown violence. But for the first time this year, millions of voters crossed ethnic lines, shifting the political dynamics in a nail-bitter election that ended with four of the seven national election commissioners walking out and declaring they could not stand by the final tally, only minutes before the head of the election commission pronounced the results.The ethnic shift was particularly evident in Central Kenya, where voters from the Kikuyu community — Kenya’s largest ethnic group — did not heed the guidance of President Uhuru Kenyatta, a fellow Kikuyu, who had anointed Mr. Odinga as his successor. Instead, voters in Central Kenya overwhelmingly cast their ballots for Mr. Ruto, an ethnic Kalenjin.“The presumption that many people have always made is that voters from one community will sway a certain way,” said Ken O. Opalo, a political scientist at Georgetown University, in Washington, who studies Kenya’s politics and traveled there during election season. “But there was both fatigue and dissatisfaction with Kenyatta’s performance, and William Ruto’s message resonated with many among the Kikuyu, which partly helped break the cycle of ethnic voting.”For Mr. Odinga, the failure to elicit excitement in his own region began before Election Day. During the primaries, his party, the Orange Democratic Movement, or O.D.M., installed party stalwarts as candidates, passing over up-and-comers.During the primary elections, when party members were voting, allegations of corruption, rigging and bullying marred the process, according to several party members, officials and candidates who vied for positions.Some of those who felt cheated decided to run as independent candidates, only to be pressured to withdraw. When they declined, they said they were ostracized, harassed and attacked.“We were accused of being anti-Baba or being the enemies of the party,” said Sospeter Obungu Owich, an ethnic Luo who said he ran as an independent candidate for a county assembly seat in Kisumu after party officials shunted him aside. He said he was attacked twice by “goons” while campaigning, and that two staff members were injured.Candidates like Sospeter Obungu Owich ran as independent candidates after they were pushed aside by Mr. Odinga’s party. Brian Otieno for The New York TimesPatrick Ayiecho Olweny, the chairman of Mr. Odinga’s party in Kisumu County, acknowledged the “harassment and the political violence” directed at Mr. Owich and others, and blamed it on “a generation of hostile youth” whom the party cannot control.He also admitted that the primary process had been fraught with political patronage and vote buying, but he blamed the party’s top brass in the capital, Nairobi, for mismanaging the whole process, saying, “It’s a total mess.”Nic Cheeseman, a professor of democracy at the University of Birmingham who has written extensively about politics in Kenya, said that for Mr. Odinga, “the claim to be a kind of pro-democratic opposition leader promoting change was undermined by not being able to organize his own party in a democratic way.”“Some of those disgruntled voters were less likely to come to the polls to vote for him as a presidential candidate,” said Mr. Cheeseman, who came to Nairobi to observe the election.By contrast, Mr. Ruto’s party, the United Democratic Alliance, managed its primaries better, with Mr. Ruto himself interceding to appease some disgruntled candidates, Mr. Cheeseman said.In the presidential election, turnout in the four Luo-dominated counties — Kisumu, Homa Bay, Siaya and Migori — was 72 percent — around 20 percent lower than the election in 2013. Turnout was also lower on the coast in Mombasa County, another major Odinga stronghold, where just 44 percent of voters turned out, compared to 66 percent in 2013.Mr. Ruto, 55, not only swept the Central Kenya vote — he even won at the president’s own polling station — but also managed to bring out almost 80 percent of voters in many counties in his stronghold in the Rift Valley. The four counties with the highest turnout in the August vote — Bomet, Kericho, West Pokot and Elgeyo Marakwet — all went to Mr. Ruto.Broken windows at a supermarket that was targeted during protests in Kisumu on the night Mr. Ruto was announced as president-elect. Protests have since subsided.Brian Otieno for The New York TimesBesides the bruising primary process and depressed turnout, Mr. Odinga’s campaign was also hobbled by a lack of clear messaging, experts say. Mr. Odinga had surprised his followers when in 2018 he made a pact with his long-term nemesis, President Kenyatta — an alliance famously known as “the handshake.” Critics labeled Mr. Odinga a “project” of the establishment, and he lost his claim to outsider status.In contrast, Mr. Ruto, a wealthy businessman and the country’s vice-president, cast himself as an ally of the country’s poorest, or what he called “hustler nation,” employing a wheelbarrow as his party’s symbol.Some of Mr. Odinga’s supporters lamented in interviews that after his alliance with President Kenyatta in 2018, Mr. Odinga did not return to his home base to engage young people on their concerns, including unemployment, or assist families that suffered from police brutality.After Mr. Odinga announced he would challenge the vote in court, initial protests in Kisumu quickly subsided and in the days since, many said in interviews that he should concede to Mr. Ruto and work with him.“Now that he’s lost the presidency, he should also get on the wheelbarrow movement and we move on together,” Alphonse Onyango, a 30-year-old security guard, said.The low-income Obunga area in Kisumu, part of Mr. Odinga’s stronghold.Brian Otieno for The New York Times More

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      Kenya Starts to Digest the Result of a Contested Election

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      Vice President William Ruto was declared the winner, beating Raila Odinga, but Mr. Odinga has rejected the results A sharply divided electorate and uncertainty over how the apparent loser will react have roiled a nation pivotal to East Africa’s stability.KISUMU, Kenya — After a tumultuous political day in Kenya, the country on Tuesday began to come to terms with the reality of a new president-elect, William Ruto, a sharply divided electorate and uncertainty over how the election’s apparent loser would react to defeat in a nation pivotal for the economy and stability of East Africa.Mr. Ruto, who is currently the vice president, moved quickly on Monday in a speech and news conference to cement his new status after being declared the winner of last Tuesday’s election with 50.49 percent of the vote. He called for unity and said that there was “no room for vengeance” after a hard-fought campaign. He was greeted on Tuesday with a string of flattering newspaper headlines in Kenya.In a choreographed sequence of announcements, he also offered an olive branch to supporters of his main opponent, Raila Odinga, a former prime minister and opposition leader who had been thwarted four previous times in his attempts to win the presidency.But two major factors served to keep the electorate on edge. The first was a worrying split in the electoral commission, four of whose seven members said on Monday that they could not accept the outcome given the opaque nature of the vote counting. Their statement was made even before Mr. Ruto was pronounced the winner and is likely to feature in any court challenge to the election result.The second is Mr. Odinga’s silence. He is scheduled to hold a news conference later on Tuesday, but one of his leading aides described the election headquarters on Monday as a “crime scene.”Previous elections in Kenya, a country whose democracy is closely watched across Africa and farther afield, have led to orchestrated violence.After a 2007 election, at least 1,200 people were killed and about 600,000 others were forced to flee their homes. This time, religious and civic leaders, as well as much of the political class and the security forces, have emphasized the importance of accepting results and resolving disputes through the courts.“We are waiting for Baba to speak,” said Wycliffe Oburu, a 23-year-old supporter of Mr. Odinga, using the name by which the veteran opposition leader is often called. “We cannot lose this election.”Riot police officers patrolling Nairobi on Tuesday following the announcement of the results of Kenya’s presidential election.Thomas Mukoya/ReutersOn Tuesday morning the electoral commission formally declared Mr. Ruto president-elect in a special edition of the government’s Kenya Gazette, in a move apparently intended to underscore the legality of the results announced a day earlier.Many supporters of Mr. Odinga view Mr. Ruto and his appeal to Kenya, a country Mr. Ruto calls a “hustler nation,” with extreme suspicion. And for voters in western Kenya, an ethnic stronghold for Mr. Odinga where many people say that they have been excluded from presidential power since independence, the announcement on Monday of Mr. Ruto’s win stung.In towns along the eastern edge of Kisumu County in western Kenya, the soot of burned tires, as well as stones and sticks, were strewn across the streets on Tuesday, evidence of protests the night before. Large rocks and boulders could also be seen along a major highway that runs from Kisumu, a city on the shore of Lake Victoria, to Busia, which is near the border with Uganda.Protesters on that highway clashed with the police overnight, according to witnesses and young men crowded at bus stops and shops on Tuesday in anticipation of Mr. Odinga’s speech. There were no other reports of clashes, though an election officer in Embakasi, an area east of the capital, Nairobi, was found dead after going missing, newspapers reported on Tuesday. It was not immediately clear whether his death was linked to the voting.Key to any challenge to the result will be any evidence that the voting or the count was significantly flawed. Mr. Odinga challenged the result of the 2017 election, which he lost to Uhuru Kenyatta, in the Supreme Court, which ruled that the election should be annulled and held anew. Three months later, Mr. Kenyatta won again, though Mr. Odinga had asked his supporters to boycott the vote. In a move that spoke to the shifting alliances that are a hallmark of Kenya’s politics, Mr. Kenyatta supported Mr. Odinga this time around.A statement on Tuesday by the respected Election Observation Group, which comprises civic and faith-based groups, could serve to make Mr. Odinga’s task more difficult. The group did its own analysis of the published results and concluded that they were broadly accurate.The detailed statement concluded that the results the group had seen were “consistent” with those given by the electoral commission.Abdi Latif Dahir More

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      Kenya Elects New President, but Disputes Erupt

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      Kenya is often held up as a beacon of democracy in Africa, but as the latest election showed, it is not always pretty. Disputes started even before a winner was named.NAIROBI, Kenya — On a continent where military coups and rubber stamp elections have proliferated in recent years, Kenya stands out.Despite its flaws and endemic corruption, the East African nation and economic powerhouse has steadily grown into a symbol of what is possible, its democracy underpinned by a strong Constitution and its hard-fought elections an example to other African nations seeking to carve a path away from autocracy. But Kenya has just hit a speed bump.On Monday, a winner was declared in its latest presidential election, ending an unpredictable battle that had millions of Kenyans glued to their televisions and smartphones as the results rolled in. William Ruto, the president-elect, beamed as he addressed a hall filled with roaring supporters, lauding the “very historic, democratic occasion.”Vice President William Ruto of Kenya was named the winner of the country’s presidential election. Before the announcement, four out of the country’s seven election commissioners refused to verify the results.Tony Karumba/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBut the losing candidate, Raila Odinga, rejected the result even before it was announced. A fracas erupted in the hall where Mr. Ruto had been speaking, and where the votes had been counted, sending chairs and fists flying. And four electoral commissioners stormed out, casting doubt on a result that is almost certain to end up in court.And so the election hangs in the balance, scrutinized not just at home but across a continent where Kenya’s rambunctious democracy is among those that are viewed as indicators of progress.“We do not have the luxury to look back, we do not have the luxury to point fingers,” Mr. Ruto said. “We must close ranks to work together.”It started out as a day of hope.Early in the morning, several thousand people began packing into the giant hall in a Nairobi suburb to hear the election results, following an arduous six-day count that had the country on tenterhooks.Mr. Ruto before the announcement of the results of Kenya’s presidential election on Monday.Monicah Mwangi/ReutersMr. Ruto and Mr. Odinga had been neck-and-neck throughout the count, sometimes separated by as few as 7,000 votes, according to unofficial news media tallies. Those razor-thin margins left many nervous: Although its democracy is robust, Kenya’s elections can be vicious, and its last three contests were marred by disputed results that led to protracted crises, court cases and street violence that in 2007 killed over 1,200 people.Chastened by those failures, the electoral commission had gone to extraordinary lengths to ensure a clean vote. Within 24 hours of polls closing last Tuesday evening, it had posted to its website images showing the results from nearly every polling station — over 46,000 of them.But as Wafula Chebukati, the chief electoral commissioner, prepared to announce the winner on Monday, one of Mr. Odinga’s top aides called an impromptu news conference outside.“This was the most mismanaged election in Kenya’s history,” Saitabao Ole Kanchory told reporters in a flurry of invective that described the counting center as “a crime scene” and called on those in charge “to be arrested.”Moments later, pandemonium erupted inside the hall.Supporters of Mr. Odinga, including Mr. Ole Kanchory, stormed the dais, throwing chairs on the floor and clashing with security officials brandishing truncheons. Foreign diplomats and election observers fled to a backstage area — but a choir that had been belting out gospel songs for much of the day continued to sing.A Kenyan police officer firing tear gas at protesters who set tires on fire in Kisumu on Monday.Yasuyoshi Chiba/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesOnce the situation calmed, Mr. Chebukati emerged to deliver a short speech in which he noted that two of his commissioners had been injured in the melee — and others harassed, “arbitrarily arrested” or disappeared — before proceeding to announce the results.Mr. Ruto received 50.49 percent of votes, he said, against 48.85 percent for Mr. Odinga, a difference of just 233,211 votes but enough to avoid a runoff.In a speech that appeared intended to project authority and offer reassurance, Mr. Ruto thanked his supporters and vowed to work for the good of Kenya. He promised to set aside the bitterness of the campaign — and the chaotic scenes minutes earlier — to concentrate on the country’s flailing economy.“There is no room for vengeance,” Mr. Ruto said, flanked by his wife and by his running mate, Rigathi Gachagua. “Our country is at a stage where we need all hands on deck to move it forward. We do not have the luxury to look back.”Celebrations erupted in the streets of Eldoret, a stronghold for Mr. Ruto in the Rift Valley, where there was a deafening cacophony of horns, whistles and chants filling the downtown area.But in much of the country, his victory was overshadowed by a major development: Four of the seven electoral commissioners refused to verify the vote, defying Mr. Chebukati and decamping to a luxury hotel where they denounced “the opaque nature” of the final phase of the count.Those commissioners, it turned out, had been appointed by Mr. Odinga’s most prominent ally in the race, President Uhuru Kenyatta, who is barred by term limits from running again.Speaking to journalists a few hours later, Mr. Ruto dismissed their declaration as a “side show.” Under Kenyan law, he said, Mr. Chebukati alone is responsible for declaring the winner.“Legally, constitutionally, the four commissioners pose no threat at all to the legality of the declaration,” Mr. Ruto said.Supporters of Raila Odinga protesting in Kibera after Mr. Ruto was declared president-elect.Marco Longari/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesStill, the drama suggested that a day that should have signaled the end of the presidential contest might end up being just another chapter in the nail-biter race that has had Kenyans on the edge of their seats since the vote on Tuesday.The candidates were a study in contrasts.Mr. Odinga, 77, a leftist from one of Kenya’s most storied political dynasties, made his first bid for the presidency in 1997. He ran three more times, always losing, before trying again this year.Although he did once serve as prime minister, Mr. Odinga’s electoral defeats embodied the broader frustrations of his ethnic group, the Luo, which has never controlled the Kenyan presidency in all the years since the nation gained independence from Britain in 1963.Mr. Ruto, 55, the country’s vice president and a wealthy businessman, cast himself as champion of Kenya’s “hustler nation” — the disillusioned, mostly young strivers struggling to gain a foothold. He frequently told voters about his humble origins, including a barefoot childhood and an early career selling chickens on the side of a busy highway.That image contrasted with Mr. Ruto’s considerable wealth, which has grown during his political career to include a luxury hotel, thousands of acres of land and a large poultry processing plant.While the “hustler” pitch resonated powerfully with some Kenyans, others just shrugged. Just 40 percent of Kenyans under 35 registered to vote in this election, and the 65 percent turnout was sharply down from the 80 percent reported in the 2017 election.Mr. Ruto, center left, and his running mate, Rigathi Gachagua, center right, after the election results were announced.Tony Karumba/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThe low turnout appeared to be a rejection of what many saw as a bad choice between candidates from their country’s discredited political elite.In voting for Mr. Ruto, millions of Kenyans overlooked the charges he once faced at the International Criminal Court, which a decade ago accused him of whipping up the storm of violence after the 2007 election that nearly pushed Kenya into a civil war.The charges included murder, persecution and forcing people to leave their homes, but the case collapsed in 2016. The Kenyan government — Mr. Ruto was vice president — engaged in what the court said was “witness interference and political meddling.”Mr. Ruto was running not just against Mr. Odinga but, in effect, against his own boss, Mr. Kenyatta, whom he accused of betrayal for backing Mr. Odinga.Instead of delivering votes for his chosen successor, Mr. Kenyatta suffered a humiliating rebuke from voters in his heartland, the Mount Kenya region, where ethnic Kikuyus rejected his allies across the board. Even at the polling station where Mr. Kenyatta cast his vote on Tuesday, Mr. Ruto scored a sweeping majority, the results showed.Debilitating economic troubles provided a bleak backdrop to Tuesday’s vote. The tourism-reliant economy has been battered in recent years, first by the coronavirus pandemic, then by Russia’s assault on Ukraine, which caused food and fuel prices to rise even more amid a global downturn.“Maize flour, cooking oil, cooking gas — everything is going up,” Abzed Osman, an actor who also works in tourism, said as he stood in line to vote on Tuesday in the Nairobi district of Kibera, Africa’s largest shantytown.By Monday evening in Kisumu County, one of Mr. Odinga’s strongholds in western Kenya, hundreds of protesters who had been eagerly awaiting the results began demonstrating and burning tires, witnesses said.Hours later a spokesman for Mr. Odinga, Dennis Onsarigo, said the candidate planned to address the nation on Tuesday.The police fired tear gas as people protested the election results in Kisumu.Ed Ram/Getty ImagesDeclan Walsh More