As the Handshake deal between President Uhuru Kenyatta and ODM leader Raila Odinga marks its fourth anniversary, it faces heaps of criticisms and accusations from a section of Kenyans.
Deputy President William Ruto and his camp have fired a series of salvos at the Handshake deal in a bid to paint it as the worst thing that has ever happened to Kenya.
The endorsement of the ODM leader for the Presidency by Uhuru became the telling moment for the DP.
In his tour of the US and UK, the DP noted that the shaking of hands at the footsteps of the Harambee House on March 9, 2018, was all about the 2022 succession politics, and not about the country's unity.
An interview with Voice of America was one of the many instances the DP explained why the Handshake, according to him, was a decoy to block his bid to be president.
“As Uhuru has said, he informed me before he engaged Raila. There was no problem...but the things we agreed upon as being part of handshake mutated into something else,” he said in an interview with VOA.
According to Uhuru and Raila, the handshake brought hope amid tension, economic strife and political division that had characterized Kenyan politics.
But to the DP, the Handshake had ulterior motives.
“We did not discuss that the handshake would kill the opposition, we didn’t agree that this was an exercise that would involve changing the constitution," said Ruto.
Last month, Uhuru said Ruto was misleading Kenyans on his Handshake deal with Raila.
He said the DP was aware of his efforts to seek a political truce and revealed that he took a hardline stance over the protracted stalemate that followed the contentious 2017 election.
“It was all about peace. He (Ruto) was, of course, opposed to it (handshake) because he knows he has government security but what about the common man down there, that is the person I was mindful about because the country was literally stalled, we all wanted peace,” Uhuru said.
In the midst of the push and pull surrounding the true state of affairs regarding the Handshake, Kenyans perhaps have the best assessment of what the Handshake became to them.
Whichever way it goes, the Handshake would be credited or faulted for the outcome of the August 9, general elections.
Edited by B.Marita
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