Deputy President William Ruto has listed key demands that the Presidential Debate Secretariat should meet ahead of the debate with his key opponent Raila Odinga of the Azimio la Umoja One Kenya Alliance coalition.
The announcement by Ruto’s camp comes after Presidential Debate Secretariat named moderators of the debate slotted for Tuesday, July 26.
“His appearance is pegged on the condition that the moderators will allocate equal time to issues that are affecting Kenyans. We have made a formal request to the presidential debate secretariat to make public the time allocations to issues facing Kenyans,” Hussein Mohamed, the Director of Communication in Kenya Kwanza said.
Ruto’s camp said they are dissatisfied with the running mate presidential debate held at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa stating it focused on sideshows and ignored issues facing the common Mwananchi.
“It is sad that after one and a half hours of a debate being watched by a million of Kenyans nobody even heard a proposal of what they are going to do about healthcare or manufacturing or all the other important issues,” Mohamed said.
“Hon Gachagua not only dominated the debate and content of the debate he also decimated the opponent and debunked the lies by exposing the hollow agendas if they have any of the other parties in as far as the economy is concerned,” Hussein added.
The statement from Ruto’s camp comes after the Presidential Debate Secretariat announced on Thursday, July 21 that Citizen TV’s Yvonne Okwara and Eric Latiff of Spice FM and KTN News will moderate the presidential debate between Ruto and Odinga.
“The moderators have been selected based on rigorous criteria that abide by among other things the principles of impartiality, fairness and objectivity, a strong understanding of the Kenyan political landscape and the major issues with this election,” the secretariat revealed.
The debate between Raila and Ruto will be second after the first one which will feature candidates who have polled less than 5 per cent in the three recent opinion polls.
Those who polled less than 5 per cent including George Wajackoya or Roots Party and David Mwaure of Agano will be moderated by Smirti Vidyarthi of NTV and Ken Mijungu of KTN News.
The Secretariat also reported that panel discussions for both debates will be moderated by Joe Ageyo of NTV.
