Kenyan President William Ruto says he appointed the head of the Kenya Defence Forces because he was the best, despite being among people who tried “to overturn my victory” in the last year’s general elections.
“I appointed General [Francis] Ogolla, he is among the people who went to Bomas to try and overturn my victory… But when I looked at his CV, he was the best person to be general,” he said.
“When I spoke to him, what exercised my mind, yes he may have made a mistake… When I talked to him, he told me ‘I have no defence…what I did was wrong’,” Mr Ruto explained, saying he made the decision consciously and against the advice of many people.
The president was speaking during a televised interview on Sunday night.
He was responding to concerns that there was ethnic bias in appointments to government positions – which he denied.
During a petition against the presidential poll outcome, former chairman of Kenya’s electoral body Wafula Chebukati alleged that Gen Ogolla was part of a delegation from the National Security Advisory Council (NSAC) that sought to influence the election results to favour opposition leader Raila Odinga.
In a sworn statement to the Supreme Court, he said that Gen Ogolla and others in the NSAC had been sent to the tallying centre in the capital Nairobi.
NSAC denied the allegations but acknowledged holding a meeting with the electoral body chairman.
The Supreme Court, which upheld Mr Ruto’s victory, did not make any definitive finding about the Mr Chebukati’s allegations.