NYERI, Kenya Apr 30 – Deputy President William Ruto has called for a peaceful election to avoid a handshake as a way to honour former president late Mwai Kibaki who was buried on Saturday.
Speaking during a state burial at the Othaya Approved School stadium, Ruto said that Kibaki was the father of modern Kenya and as such Kenyans can only honour him through a peaceful and decisive poll that will not call for a handshake.
“I think a befitting sendoff to all of us as we celebrate the third President of Kenya is for us to go into these elections and make sure that the elections will be peaceful and that it won’t be necessary for us to have a handshake. We owe it to president Kibaki as we send him off,” Ruto told mourners at the burial of Kenya’s third president.
Ruto credited Kibaki with monumental development, particularly infrastructure.
“Kibaki can be best described as the father of modern Kenya because he has done a lot for this nation,” said Ruto.
He went on to say that aside from the country’s transformation, Kibaki did not forget the ordinary Mwananchi singling out the Boda boda sector which he said has provided employment to over 1 billion Kenyan. “If there is a demonstration of bottom-up, we can learn from Mwai Kibaki,” DP Ruto noted.
He further praised the former Head of State for the transformation of the education sector and agriculture in the country and laude Kibaki for standing with President Uhuru Kenyatta and him during the criminal case against them at the International Criminal Court (ICC).
Here are some of the photos of the state burial of Kenya’s third president Mwai Kibaki in his rural home in Nyeri.
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Bread, soda and water for Kibaki mourners
NYERI, Kenya Apr 30 – All mourners arriving for the State Burial of former President Mwai Kibaki were given a loaf of bread, soda and water.
Kibaki’s body was transported to his rural home by road from the Lee Funeral Home, in Nairobi.
Kibaki was the third head of state in Kenya’s history, serving from December 2002 to April 2013 following the 24-year authoritarian regime of Daniel arap Moi. Kibaki handed over to President Uhuru Kenyatta whose second and final term ends in August.
The cortege escorted by the military left the Lee Funeral Home in Nairobi at 7am.
The former president who served Kenya from 2002 to 2012 died on April 22 in what is attributed to sickness and old age.
Circumstances surrounding his death have not been made public officially, but his son Jimmy said last week that he had been ailing for several months, the past three months being the worst.
He is being accorded a state burial with full military honours.
On Friday, a State funeral service was held in his honour at the Nyayo National Stadium attended by thousands, including three foreign heads of state-South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, South Sudanese President Salva Kiir and Ethiopia’s Sahle-Work Zewde-and other dignitaries.
Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II sent in her condolence message, praising Kibaki’s “lifelong record of service” to the Kenyan people.
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