How Buzeki, Allegedly Backed by Ruto, Cornered Mandago and Sparked a Showdown with Uhuru

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In the lead-up to the 2017 Kenyan General Election, Uasin Gishu County, the political backyard of then-Deputy President William Ruto, became the epicenter of one of the fiercest political battles in the country. At the heart of the storm was a high-stakes gubernatorial showdown between incumbent Governor Jackson Mandago and billionaire businessman Zedekiah Bundotich, popularly known as Buzeki.

What started as a local contest for the county's top seat quickly escalated into a broader political drama, fueled by widespread speculation that Ruto was quietly backing Buzeki to clip Mandago's political wings, leaving the incumbent cornered and prompting him to issue veiled threats against President Uhuru Kenyatta's re-election bid.

The Rise of the Challenger

Buzeki entered the Uasin Gishu gubernatorial race as a wealthy, self-made businessman with deep pockets and a promise to run the county with corporate efficiency. Although he lost the Jubilee Party primaries to Mandago, Buzeki rejected the outcome, alleging irregularities, and immediately declared his bid as an independent candidate.

Crucially, Buzeki did not run as an opposition figure. Instead, he branded himself as a staunch supporter of the Jubilee administration, plastering his campaign billboards and vehicles with portraits of President Uhuru Kenyatta and Deputy President William Ruto. This strategy allowed him to tap into the massive Jubilee wave in the Rift Valley while offering voters an alternative to the incumbent.

Whispered Backing from the Top

As Buzeki's well-funded campaign gained undeniable momentum, rumors began swirling across Eldoret and beyond that he was enjoying the silent blessing of Deputy President William Ruto. Political observers and Mandago’s allies suspected that Ruto was playing a calculated game, using Buzeki to tame an increasingly independent and vocal Mandago, who had occasionally clashed with the establishment over regional appointments and local politics.

Even when Ruto publicly urged Buzeki to step down in favor of Mandago to preserve Jubilee unity, many in Mandago's camp viewed the plea as mere political theater. When Buzeki boldly defied the Deputy President's public request and remained in the race, and was still warmly acknowledged by Ruto at state functions, suspicions deepened that the billionaire was a "project" designed to unseat the governor.

Mandago Cornered and Fighting Back

Sensing that the ground was shifting beneath him, Jackson Mandago found himself politically cornered. Buzeki was not only eating into his base in Uasin Gishu, but he was also rallying massive support from non-local communities living and doing business in the cosmopolitan county.

Feeling betrayed by the top Jubilee leadership for failing to rein in his rival, Mandago and his close allies, including vocal Rift Valley MPs like Oscar Sudi and Alfred Keter, went on the offensive. They accused unnamed forces within the Jubilee administration of funding and protecting Buzeki to divide the Kalenjin vote and undermine Mandago's re-election.

Veiled Threats Against Uhuru Kenyatta

With his political survival on the line, Mandago took a drastic gamble. Recognizing that President Uhuru Kenyatta desperately needed a massive, unified voter turnout in the Rift Valley to secure his second term, Mandago used that leverage to issue stark warnings to the Head of State.

In fiery public rallies, Mandago and his allies demanded that Uhuru and Ruto explicitly disown Buzeki and campaign solely for Jubilee Party nominees. Mandago went so far as to warn that if the Jubilee top brass continued to entertain independent candidates in Uasin Gishu, local leaders would reconsider their support for Uhuru’s presidential bid, a thinly veiled threat to rally voters to withhold their backing from the President. The tension grew so intense that President Kenyatta at one point bypassed a scheduled road tour of Eldoret town to avoid public clashes between the rival camps.

The Aftermath

Ultimately, Mandago’s high-stakes brinkmanship paid off at the ballot box in August 2017, as he narrowly fended off Buzeki’s formidable challenge to retain his seat. However, the bruising battle left deep scars in Rift Valley politics, exposing the ruthless power dynamics behind the scenes and forever altering the political trajectories of Mandago, Buzeki, and their patrons in Nairobi.


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