'President Ruto has personal interests in Haiti mission,' Senator Sifuna claims

Ruto has maintained that the mission will still go ahead despite a ruling by the High Court that termed it unconstitutional. 

According to Sifuna, Ruto's defiance is tied to personal gain from the mission and that the indisputable truth will come to light in due time.

"The question I ask myself [is] what is the thing that Ruto is going to gain from this deployment in Haiti because it doesn't make sense to anyone else; to ordinary Kenyans, to the courts, why is he insisting," said Sifuna.

"I cannot think of any other reason other than pecuniary interest and it will emerge in the fullness of time we will see that this deployment was not done in the interest of the people of Kenya or in the interest of the people of Haiti. It is private pecuniary interests."

The legislator was speaking on Citizen TV's Daybreak Show on Thursday.

While speaking to Reuters on Tuesday, President Ruto said the U.N.-approved security mission to the Caribbean nation is bound to happen as planned.

Ruto added that Haiti had asked for help months ago, and he expected a request would come shortly that would satisfy the demands of the court.

"So that mission can go ahead as soon as next week if all the paperwork is done between Kenya and Haiti on the bilateral route that has been suggested by the court," Ruto said following an Italian-Africa summit in Rome.

Kenya in collaboration with forces from Bahamas, Antigua and Barbuda, and Jamaica, is set to embark on the mission aimed at tackling rampant gang violence in the Caribbean nation. 

The US has pledged to donate Ksh.32.5 billion ($200M) to get the deployment off the ground.

Kenya committed in July 2023 that it would deploy 1,000 police officers, saying it was doing so in solidarity with a brother nation.

"The mission is on course. The mission is a bigger calling to humanity," Ruto said, stressing that it was a police rather than a military operation.

The UN said last week that it had documented 4,789 people killed by gang violence in Haiti last year, and another 3,000 people had been kidnapped.

Meanwhile, Kenya's government has pledged to appeal the court's decision arguing that it is crucial for Kenya to bring peace to the Caribbean nation.

The Azimio la Umoja One Kenya coalition, the opposition party, has urged the US to respect the High Court's ruling, underscoring that domestic and foreign entities that hold reservations about the ruling should respect the autonomy of the Judiciary.