PREVIEW
Former foreign minister Raphael Tuju was the target of ruling party activists for leading campaign against the 2022 election results
The ruling by a Nairobi court on 25 March that former Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Raphael Tuju’s house could not be searched by police, was a major win for him at the end of weeks of trauma. On 23 March, a day after Tuju was reported to have disappeared, he was arrested with Director of Criminal Investigations Mohamed Amin telling a press conference that Tuju was at home and had created a ‘carefully staged disappearance rather than a genuine case of abduction’.
Tuju was later released and reported to have been admitted to hospital. He has not been charged, and the court ruling will give him a temporary reprieve from police investigation.
The former Secretary General of the Jubilee party formed by President William Ruto and his predecessor Uhuru Kenyatta, Tuju has been a marked man ever since Ruto’s disputed election win in August 2022. As Cabinet Secretary without Portfolio in Kenyatta’s second term, Tuju was accused of pushing a series of investigations and criminal proceedings against Ruto’s allies (AC Vol 61 No 6, The fight for Jubilee).
Wafula Chebukati, the late chairman of the National Elections and Boundaries Commission, alleged that Tuju was part of a delegation which arrived uninvited at the national tallying centre at Bomas at 3am the day that the results proclaiming Ruto as the winner were announced. One of Kenyatta’s closest allies, Tuju offered ‘a reward’ in exchange for Chebukati calling a run-off between Ruto and Raila Odinga, Kenyatta’s favoured candidate, or declaring Odinga the winner (AC Vol 64 No 3, Electoral Commission goes on trial again).
Since then, Tuju has been pursued on multiple fronts, facing attempts to seize and auction off his property portfolio over an unpaid bank loan.
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