Only 1% of Kenyans Trust Ruto – Survey

Two years since becoming President, William Ruto is confronting numerous challenges, ranging from high cost of living to spiraling unemployment, denting the public’s perception about his government. On Monday, December 16, a survey by InfoTrak Research and Consulting showed that only one percent of Kenyans trust Ruto and the entire Executive. 

The Nationwide Perception Study December 2024 shows that another 28 percent have moderate trust, 29 percent have little trust while the larger majority (37 %) has no trust at all in the President, the Deputy President, and the Cabinet.

The survey that was conducted through an opinion poll also showed that a paltry four percent did not know how they felt about the Executive.

Reasons for lack of trust

Some of the reasons for the lack of trust in these governing institutions include the leaders’ failure to keep their promises, some of which they believe are unrealistic.

“The waning public trust in our institutions is a result of, one; over-promising and two; failure to fulfill those promises. I think the current leaders came into office with many promises. Some of them were realistic, some unrealistic,” said a respondent.

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Asked what would restore their trust in the executive and other governing institutions, 50 percent of the respondents stated that strengthening anti-corruption measures would, while 22 percent indicated the appointment of qualified people to lead the institutions, and improving public service delivery.

Further, 34 percent of survey respondents cited the strengthening of institutions’ independence and 45 percent indicated improvement of transparency in elections as the top reforms to restore public trust in governance and democratic institutions.

According to the poll, Kenyans trust the media more than any other governance or democratic institution in the country. 15% of those polled trust the media fully.

Religious leaders who have been at loggerheads with the state are fully trusted by 7% and Civil Society Organizations at 4%.

The Judiciary, Police, The Senate, Opposition leaders and the Office of the Auditor General have a trust level of 2 percent. 

InfoTrak conducted survey in all 47 counties

The outcome was similar for other arms of the government. The Judiciary, for example, had two percent of people expressing a lot of trust in it. 34 percent expressed moderate trust; 27 percent expressed little trust while 30 percent had no trust in the Judiciary at all.

InfoTrak conducted the survey between November 16 and November  30, 2024. The survey involved a three-pronged approach; desk research, quantitative interviews, and qualitative key informant interviews and focus group discussions were adopted.

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The survey covered all 47 counties with the Rift Valley region taking the highest sample and the NorthEastern region taking the least sample.  The survey targeted persons who were 18 years old and above.

The quantitative survey had a target survey sample size of 2400 respondents and had a 97 percent response rate. The data was processed and analyzed using SPSS 26 statistical software due to its high accuracy and reliability.

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