Two Cabinet Secretaries (CSs) yesterday launched scathing attacks on former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua over his remarks that President William Ruto was an aristocratic leader who does not listen to anyone but himself.

 The two, Rebecca Miano (Tourism and Wildlife) and Alice Wahome (Lands, Housing, and Urban Development) described Gachagua’s remarks, as backward saying the team constituted by the Head of State has no time for politics but development.

  “Referring to qualified and experienced male and female professionals as “flower girls” is very lowly and crude. Flower girls are honourable young beautiful girls who carry flowers and play a noble and significant role especially in weddings signifying beautiful beginnings. Using the term flower girls in a derogatory manner is total disrespect to all the girls and womenfolk in the world. It is simply outrageous and absurd. It is a demonstration of outdated male chauvinism,’ said Miano.

 Miano said that failure by most of the ministers to comment does not show any form of them working under any pressure but it was a sign that they are fully engaged with their dockets.

 Speaking separately in Nairobi, Wahome said Gachagua was simply bitter and hence there was no need for anyone to take him seriously.

 “ All the Cabinet secretaries you see around are very powerful in their various dockets. Our power is not through the word of Mouth which Gachagua likes but by our dockets. I am launching the markets you see me launching because I am fully incharge of my docket. We don’t have time for someone who failed to work when he was given a job,” said Wahome.

 Wahome further challenged Gachagua to present any evidence of corruption within the Affordable Housing Programme to the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC).

 She dismissed claims from Gachagua that the programme is a business venture from which some government officials and companies selling building materials allegedly profit.

“The procurement is public. So for somebody at the level of my deputy president, a former deputy president, to tell Kenyans that there is somewhere my ministry is sitting behind the scenes and making some illegal contracts, I would want him to tell the ESCC where that is and who happens to be there so that then they can help me to deal with that as a corruption issue,”she said.

 Wahome explained that the project has created numerous job opportunities for Kenyans, that the procurement process has been transparent, and that the project received government approval.