Kenyan MPs start process of impeaching deputy president
Kenyan lawmakers on Tuesday initiated a motion to impeach the Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua in an unprecedented political move portending an acrimonious fallout within the ruling party.
The East African country’s politics has been in turmoil since July following deadly protests over a spiralling cost of living crisis and deeply unpopular tax hikes.
Gachagua is accused of undermining the government, being involved in corruption, insubordination, practising ethnically divisive politics among a slew of other charges, AFP reported.
Some 291 members of parliament appended their signatures to support the motion, well beyond the 117 minimum.
National Assembly speaker Moses Wetangula said the motion – filed by Mutuse Eckomas Mwengi, a legislator from the ruling coalition – met all the requisite constitutional threshold.
Gachagua, a businessman from the vote-rich Mt Kenya region, has denied the allegations as politically charged, warning his removal will stir discontent within his bastion.
But in recent weeks, he has complained of being sidelined by his boss amid accusations he supported anti-government protests by mostly Gen-Z Kenyans that began in mid-June.
The protests were sparked by proposed tax hikes in the 2024 finance bill, but snowballed into wider disillusionment at Ruto’s top-down style of governance. More than 60 people were killed in those protests.
For the impeachment motion to pass, it would require the support of at least two-thirds of members of the National Assembly. A debate and vote are due for next Tuesday before it heads to the Senate.
If approved, Gachagua will become the first deputy president to be impeached in Kenya’s history since the promulgation of the country’s revised 2010 constitution.
Peoplesmind