Ruto forced to respond after his double speak is exposed
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Ruto Ruto backs summit trips he faulted for ‘summoning African leaders’ after Larry Madowo questions him for double speak
Ruto Ruto backs summit trips he faulted for ‘summoning African leaders’ after Larry Madowo questions him for double speak.
Months after harshly criticizing the practice of inviting African leaders to foreign capitals, President William Ruto has justified his decision to attend this week’s Italy-Africa conference.
Ruto retracted some of the criticism in a statement released following the Rome meeting, stating that he instead approved of the practical solution of choosing a group of leaders to represent the continent.
“I have previously noted that an invitation extended by one country to all 54 African nations did not necessarily serve Africa’s best interests,” he said in a statement after the meeting in the Madama Palace in Rome.
“But those of us present at this conference, representing our colleagues, find it different and inspiring due to the pragmatic approach you have taken, Madam Prime Minister.”
His response comes after CNN journalist Larry Madowo exposed President Ruto wondering why he attended a summit in Italy while he had ruled out attending meetings summoned by one country.
Madowo further went ahead to share Ruto’s clip in April 2023 when he opposed such meetings insisting that only the African Union should represent African Presidents.
“President William Ruto said he and other African leaders would not be summoned by one country. The African Union would represent them going forward. He’s standing just steps away from both the AU chair and the AU Commission chair in Italy while other East African presidents skipped,” Madowo stated.
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Ruto joined several other African leaders gathered for Italy’s Africa Summit.
But Rome is only the latest capital to host such summits after Beijing, London, Moscow, Brussels, New Delhi, Riyadh and Washington.
Ruto had said he supported the idea of being represented by the African Union. It is the same reason he gave when he skipped the Russia-Africa Summit in July last year.
“It is not intelligent for 54 African Presidents to go and sit before one president from another country for a summit. Sometimes, we are mistreated. We are loaded onto buses like school kids. It is not right,” he argued at the Mo Ibrahim Governance Weekend in Nairobi in April 2023.
“The decision we have made as AU is that going forward, if there is going to be a discussion between Africa and any other country, we would send the chair and the bureau. That is the position I am taking as the president of Kenya.”
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