Prime Minister Raila Odinga said former ally Agriculture Minister William Ruto and Education Minister Sam Ongeri should step aside for three months to allow further investigations into scandals in subsidised maize and education programmes.
“I am taking this action because two recent investigations … have laid credible foundations for the two ministers to be investigated,” the prime minister said in a statement.
Donors and Kenyans have long called for leaders in the unity government to take a tougher line with influential individuals blamed for a raft of major graft cases that have tainted several important sectors of east Africa’s biggest economy.
Late on Saturday, President Mwai Kibaki suspended eight officials, also for three months, after they were “mentioned adversely” in reports on the work of the subsidised maize scheme and Kenya’s free primary education programme.
Donors will welcome the action against senior figures, who include officials from the National Cereals and Produce Board and the permanent secretaries in the ministries of agriculture, education, special programmes and prime minister’s office.
But many Kenyans said the moves had highlighted rifts between the president and Odinga, the opposition leader who became prime minister after talks to end post-election violence at the start of 2008 that killed at least 1,300 people.
Demonstrating the uneasy relationship between the pair, Kibaki’s office said later on Sunday that the president had not been consulted on the suspension of the two ministers — and that Odinga did not have the authority to take such a step.
Ruto said he was going nowhere.
“I have read very carefully my letter of appointment … and the appointing authority is very clear,” Ruto told local KTN Television. “I have not received any communication from the appointing authority as minister of agriculture and therefore I will continue to discharge my responsibilities.”
Tensions have risen since Kibaki allies were implicated in the education scandal, then senior Odinga allies were implicated in the bigger maize procurement case.
