Kenya: Ignore False Video Claiming Kenyan President Ruto Visited Sacked Deputy to Seek Forgiveness

IN SHORT: A viral video claims that William Ruto met his former deputy Rigathi Gachagua and asked for forgiveness. But it uses an old image, and the accompanying audio is from a speech by Ruto in 2022, well before Gachagua’s impeachment.

A video on TikTok is captioned: “Ruto meets Gachagua as he asks for forgiveness and promises to work together.” The video shows a close-up picture of Ruto, Gachagua and Gachagua’s wife, Dorcas Gachagua, seemingly taken during a national ceremony at a stadium.

Along with this photo is audio of Ruto, saying: “To the great people of the Republic of Kenya, I know we have tried our best. We may not have done as much as you would have expected of us. We have not been as united as we should have been. We have failed in some areas. We ask, and specifically myself, I ask for your forgiveness.”

The video has over 23,000 views, 450 likes, and has been shared over 50 times.

The context

The position of deputy president in Kenya, formerly known as vice president under the old constitution, has historically been a challenging one, with most occupants of the seat eventually falling out with their boss.

Ruto himself, as deputy president, fell out with president Uhuru Kenyatta. During his 2022 campaigns, Ruto pledged to never allow his deputy to be humiliated.

After winning the 2022 elections, Ruto and Gachagua were closely aligned and initially worked well together. But cracks began to show almost two years later, when Gachagua allies began publicly criticising Ruto.

By then, Ruto had made peace with his 2022 political opponent, Raila Odinga, and had appointed senior opposition members from Odinga’s party to his cabinet. In October 2024, parliament passed a motion to impeach Gachagua, and interior minister Kithure Kindiki was subsequently sworn in as the new deputy.

The video began circulating a few days before Kindiki was sworn in. But is the claim true? We checked.

No recent meeting between Ruto and Gachagua

A reverse image search of the image in the video led to this article on a news website. The image was taken during the Mashujaa Day celebrations on 20 October 2023, more than a year before Gachagua’s impeachment.

A search of Ruto’s name and some of the words said in the audio, such as “I ask for your forgiveness,” led us to the source of the audio.

The audio is from Ruto’s speech during the 2022 national prayer breakfast. At the time, he was Kenyatta’s deputy president. In the speech, Ruto said he had forgiven those who had wronged him, but also asked for forgiveness from those he might have wronged.

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Ruto also asked Kenyatta for forgiveness, saying that he might have fallen short of the president’s expectations. The audio has been edited mainly from minute 2:18 to minute 3:33.

Given the public interest in this story, if such a reconciliation had taken place, it would have been widely reported. But a search for a patch-up between Ruto and Gachagua has yielded no credible results. The two have not been seen interacting closely since the impeachment.

The video’s claim that Ruto publicly met Gachagua and asked for forgiveness is false. The video was created using old audio and an old photo from unrelated events to create a false story.

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