Posts falsely claim video shows Kenyan President William Ruto’s deputy accusing him of bribery

“Amesema (Gachagua has said) MPs were paid Sh 2 million each by Ruto to vote Yes on the finance bill 2024! (sic),” reads part of a post shared more than 200 times on X.

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A screenshot of the false X post, taken on September 11, 2024

Published on August 7, 2024, the post includes a TikTok video showing Gachagua addressing a crowd in Swahili.

"They talked and said, 'Tell the president if he wants us to pass it [the bill], we want a bribe of two million Kenyan shillings’. The president accepted. Is that corruption or is it not?” Gachagua appears to ask, to which the crowd responds: “It is corruption.”

The post claimed Gachagua was referring to the Finance Bill 2024 that triggered widespread protests in June 2024, eventually forcing Ruto to withdraw it (archived here).

On social media, parliamentarians were accused of taking bribes to pass the bill and some received threats after their contact information was leaked. The home of Kimani Kuria, who sponsored the bill, was vandalised (archived here).

The claim that Gachagua publicly proclaimed Ruto guilty of orchestrating bribery was repeated in this X post.

However, the video circulating online is old and has been edited.

Altered video

A closer analysis of the clip reveals an irregular jump at the eight-second mark, suggesting possible digital manipulation.

A keyword search for “Gachagua accuses Ruto of bribing MPs” on Facebook and Google revealed footage published by two local media outlets (here and here) on January 31, 2021 (archived here and here). 

“Mathira MP Rigathi Gachagua accuses President Uhuru of bribing Mt. Kenya MCAs to pass BBI report,” reads the caption on one of the videos shared by Standard Digital.

MCAs refers to Members of the county assembly; Kenya has 47 county governments.

The second outlet, Nation, wrote: “Mathira MP Rigathi Gachagua accuses President Uhuru Kenyatta of ‘bribing’ Mt Kenya region MCAs.” 

The clip in the false posts was taken from the same event broadcast online by Standard Digital and Nation three years ago.

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A screenshot of the false post (left) and the video on Nation published in 2021 (right)

At the time, Gachagua was a member of parliament while Ruto served as deputy president under Kenyatta.

In the original footage, Gachagua accused Kenyatta – not Ruto – of bribing lawmakers at the county level to secure the passage of the constitutional amendment bill, commonly known as the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) and unrelated to the 2024 finance bill.  

But in the altered clip, some of Gachagua’s comments were removed, changing the context. 

A small edit at the end of the first sentence saw the words “to buy vehicles” omitted. Gachagua originally remarked: “They [MCAs] talked and said, 'Tell the president if he wants us to pass it [the bill], we want a bribe of two million Kenyan shillings to buy vehicles’.” 

The next line was cut out entirely to mask the fact that Gachagua was talking about the BBI and not the finance bill. He had said: "When the president was told that these people have said without two million Kenyan shillings for us to buy cars, we will not pass the BBI.” 

This missing sentence accounts for the jump in the video at the eight-second mark.

In full, Gachagua’s comments aimed at Kenyatta in 2021 were: "They [MCAs] talked and said, 'Tell the president if he wants us to pass it [the bill], we want a bribe of two million Kenyan shillings to buy vehicles each one of us’. The president was told that these people have said without two million Kenya shillings for them to buy cars they will not pass the BBI. The president accepted. Is that corruption or is it not?"

Meanwhile, although MPs allied to Gachagua claimed they were offered bribes to secure the passage of the Finance Bill 2024, the deputy president denied he and Ruto had dished out “dirty cash” to “corruptly influence” the vote (archived here and here).

Unrelated bill

The Building Bridges Initiative emerged after a surprising “handshake” between Kenyatta and his longtime rival Raila Odinga, following Kenya's contentious 2017 general election (archived here).

The gesture paved the way for electoral reforms through the BBI, which proposed expanding the executive branch by creating a new position of prime minister.

Kenyatta argued that the reforms would dismantle the winner-takes-all electoral system, often blamed for recurring political violence in Kenya.

However, critics, including his estranged deputy Ruto, viewed the initiative as a power-sharing deal designed to allow Odinga to become president while Kenyatta, who was ineligible for a third term, would serve as prime minister.

Odinga dismissed these claims as “propaganda peddled by busybodies" during an interview with AFP.

The Supreme Court ultimately blocked the constitutional reforms, declaring them illegal (archived here).