“What emerges is not a portrait of a reformer but of a leader playing prosecutor without the constitutional tools, preempting institutions while ignoring the stench within his own backyard.“

President William Ruto’s thunder against parliamentary bribery collapses on contact with the law: a president does not arrest—institutions do. On Monday, August 18, 2025, Ruto alleged that some MPs pocketed about KSh10 million to influence the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing law, blasting House committees as “extortion rings” and a “den of graft.” The remarks, delivered at a meeting with legislators in Karen, ignited a full-blown clash between the Executive and the Legislature and pushed the question from rhetoric into process.

Parliament’s reaction was not contrition but defiance. Committee work was paralysed in protest as leaders demanded names and evidence. The chair of the Justice and Legal Affairs Committee, George Murugara, publicly refuted the President’s claim and dared him to table specifics. The effect was institutional paralysis and a public showdown rather than swift accountability.

Outside the theatre, Kenya’s anti-graft machinery did stir. The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) confirmed that it is investigating Parliament over bribery and extortion allegations tied to legislative influence. Broadcast outlets confirmed formal probes are underway, reframing the matter from presidential speeches to evidence, files, and prosecutorial thresholds.

But here is the central truth: the President has no constitutional power to investigate corruption or order arrests. Under Article 245 of the Constitution, the Inspector-General of Police commands the National Police Service and is insulated from “direction or control of any person” in relation to specific investigations. The EACC investigates corruption and economic crimes, the DCI investigates offences, and the DPP—independent under Article 157—decides whether to prosecute. The President can signal priorities, but when he preempts the work of these independent offices by publicly naming or hinting at guilt, he politicises what should be evidence-driven processes. In short, those supplying information are the ones to be investigated by EACC and DCI—not State House acting as whistleblower, prosecutor, and judge rolled into one.

That constitutional clarity makes the hypocrisy sharper. For months, Ruto has faced questions over his administration’s own “cash culture.” Clergy and civil society have openly challenged the Executive’s lavish donations in churches during a period of austerity and debt. Catholic and Anglican bishops took the rare step of rejecting political cash, warning of “tainted altars,” even as Ruto and his allies continued to pour millions into sanctuaries. The public sees the contradiction clearly: a President who rails against parliamentary bribes while himself presiding over unexplained rivers of money.

Ruto’s conspicuous church appearances have amplified the contradictions. On March 2, 2025, he delivered KSh20 million in Roysambu and pledged more, only weeks after announcing a ban on harambees by public officials. Critics noted the donations happened while hospitals lacked drugs and the Inua Jamii safety net collapsed under budget shortfalls. The optics are devastating: a Head of State splashing cash on pulpits while calling for arrests of MPs.

Add to this the Weston Hotel saga—legally separate from bribery but symbolically inseparable from perceptions of impunity. In June 2025, the aviation regulator dropped its legal fight over the land where Weston sits, effectively closing a dispute in which Ruto himself once admitted the property had been “acquired illegally” before he purchased it. To the public, this remains a monument of elite exceptionalism—another credibility crater when the President dons anti-corruption robes.

What emerges is not a portrait of a reformer but of a leader playing prosecutor without the constitutional tools, preempting institutions while ignoring the stench within his own backyard. Allegations of bribery in Parliament are serious and demand prosecution—but they must be investigated by the EACC and prosecuted by the DPP, not tried at political rallies. If Ruto wants credibility, he must resolve his own contradictions, submit to the same scrutiny he demands of MPs, and let institutions do their work. Until then, his words ring hollow: another act in Kenya’s endless circus of corruption, where everyone is guilty, and nobody is accountable.

— By Jeff Marima, Political Analyst, The Diaspora Times
Disclaimer: This analysis relies on contemporaneous reporting and constitutional law. Allegations remain allegations unless and until proven in court. The Executive’s donations and the Weston matter are cited as controversies bearing on perception, not as determinations of criminal liability.