Dr Ruto has made good progress in tackling the pitfalls of two-thirds gender rule
President William Ruto
By: Joseph Mutua Ndonga
Worth Noting:
- Dr William Ruto, who served the two governments in top positions including being the Deputy President, is now at the helm of power and he is grappling with the same challenge.
- Though for him he has done much better, not all Kenyans would agree with him. He has already suffered set back after a High Court judge halted the vetting of principal secretaries until the case filed by Law Society of Kenya [LSK] is heard and determined.
- The LSK cited two main grounds. The list of nominees failed to reflect the face of Kenya and regional balance.
Out of 22 people nominated by President William Ruto to serve in his cabinet, seven of them were women. Though the number dropped by four as he had promised during the campaigns that 50 percent of the seats would go to women, he has made good a progress.
For starters, the clause of the two-third gender rule came into being following the promulgation of the 2010 constitution. Article 81 [b] provided that not more two-thirds of members of elective bodies shall be of same gender. The same rule applied to the appointive positions.
But as it turned out, the implementation would become the biggest challenge facing his predecessors. Having made similar pledges, the governments of Presidents Mwai Kibaki and Uhuru Kenyatta would make very little progress.
In response to numerous cases filed in courts, they would put up a brave face and hire renowned lawyers to represent the state. They would lose some of the cases and this would put them in a big test.
For some of the court orders, they will not honor them and, of course, this would create a bad blood between the Executive and Judiciary.
At one point, the escalation of the matter would end up at the apex court, the Supreme Court of Kenya. In an advisory opinion, the court would agree that the two-thirds gender rule principle contained grey areas that needed to be ironed out. And in view of this, the judges would rule that the implementation should be done progressively.
Dr William Ruto, who served the two governments in top positions including being the Deputy President, is now at the helm of power and he is grappling with the same challenge.
Though for him he has done much better, not all Kenyans would agree with him. He has already suffered set back after a High Court judge halted the vetting of principal secretaries until the case filed by Law Society of Kenya [LSK] is heard and determined.
The LSK cited two main grounds. The list of nominees failed to reflect the face of Kenya and regional balance.
A friend of mine told me. President William Ruto has been reiterating his commitment to run a government that believes in rule of law and the constitution. Could it turn LSK is out to test him? Well, let us wait for the outcome.
He further argued. Just look at the list of the nominees. They hail from 43 counties and Dr Ruto nominated eleven to serve as PSs.
As it has been the trend with the previous regimes, the President always considered the areas where he got majority of votes. The law here would be his side because it does not specify on the number of PS nominees to be selected from each community and the region.
I’m happy to note that the departmental committees of parliament suspended the vetting of nominees immediately after receiving a court order halting the exercise. This showed our parliament respected the rule of law, constitution and the script of the president.
As we all know, the government is formed by the arms namely parliament, Executive and Judiciary. So, contrary to impression created, the President could not have been blamed if the court order had been ignored. This is because it had been slapped on Parliament.
After he got the legal briefings, the Speaker of the National Assembly made the right decision. He not only suspended the vetting and asked parliament legal team to file an application seeking to counter and rebuttal the prayers sought by LSK. If he failed to do this, parliament could have carried the cross.
Joseph Mutua Ndonga is a writer and political commentator based in Nairobi
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