‘Alilkuwa anatupanga’ – Former Laikipia MP Waruguru speaks on Farouk Kibet

Former Laikipia County Woman Representative Cate Waruguru has waded into an ongoing conversation after President William Ruto’s aide and right-hand man Farouk Kibet dramatically controlled speakers during the president’s tour of Mandera County on Tuesday, February 4, 2025.
Speaking during the Milele Breakfast Show on Wednesday, February 5, 2025, Waruguru revealed that Kibet’s influence started way before Ruto ascended to the office on the hill and that he was one of the proponents of the Deputy Presidency of Rigathi Gachagua.
“Alikuwa anatupanga,” Waruguru said, “During the intrigues that preceded the picking of Gachagua as the Deputy President, his biggest supporters were President Ruto, Farouk Kibet, Ndindi Nyoro, Didmus Barasa and Oscar Sudi.”
During Ruto’s tour of Mandera County, Kibet was seen appearing to cut short the speech of Mandera Governor Adan Khalif who floored both ODM, Jubilee and UDA candidates in the 2022 elections.
Mandera politics
Four out of six constituencies in Mandera County were won by the United Democratic Movement (UDM) a party which was founded by KANU rebels including Ruto in 1999.
Ruto’s visit in Mandera was seen as a move to gather support in the region which predominantly voted in favour of the former Prime Minister Raila Odinga in the last election.

UDM party leader and Mandera senator Ali Roba on February 1, 2025, questioned the heightened UDA party politics in Mandera ahead of Ruto’s visit, noting that the president will come and go.
“If the group of political rejects and opportunists at today’s UDA office opening rally in Mandera truly cared about the party, where were they for the past two and a half years when UDA had no offices in Mandera,” Roba said.
“The President will visit and leave in a few days. What next? A rushed and poorly planned initiative is bound to be short-lived. If they genuinely had the party’s best interests at heart, they should have focused on organizing a united and dignified welcome for the President instead of sowing division by pitting sister parties against each other. Leadership is about building, not tearing down.”
Post-election pact
While UDM initially sided with Odinga’s side in the 2022 general election, it later entered into a post-election pact with the Kenya-Kwanza administration.

The head of state appears to be courting the three North-Eastern counties of Wajir, Mandera and Garissa which voted largely for the former Prime Minister Raila Odinga in the 2022 general election.
This is after falling out with his former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua who is currently ring-fencing the vote-rich Mount Kenya region ahead of the 2027 general elections.
The tour comes just days after Ruto completed a week-long tour of the Western region which overwhelmingly voted for Odinga in the 2022 elections, save for Bungoma County which stuck with the UDA party leader.