Charlene Ruto: My office is not taxpayer-funded
Charlene Ruto with Kenya High School students donate foodstuff at Langata Primary School on November 18, 2022.
President William Ruto’s aggressive daughter Charlene Ruto has come out to defend her remarks on the Office of the First Daughter.
This is after her recent remarks were largely criticised by Kenyans.
Through a statement, Ms Charlene said that the office exists, but as a private entity.
“The Office of the First Daughter is a private entity. It is neither a constitutional office nor is it being funded by Kenyan taxpayers. The office runs to purely facilitate the activities of & any programs being run by Ms Charlene Ruto,” statement reads.
She added that through its independent structure, and facilitators, the office has engaged various players across the country and beyond in line with some of its objectives of championing youth based agendas and climate change advocacy.
“The Office of the First Daughter has at all times acted in good faith to ensure that the Kenyan Youth have a voice and get access to opportunities to enable sustainable livelihoods.”
In a recent video, Charlene was seen speaking to an audience during a summit when she called forth her team and began introducing them.
“So before again I continue, I wanted to introduce quickly my team from Kenya. So, I’ll start from the back. This is Mike Sagana, he’s one of my team members. He’s a politician and he’s principal advisor in my team. And this is Jermaine Momanyi, he is the head of trade and investments at the office of the first daughter…” began Charlene Ruto.
Some of the audience could not stop laughing in disbelief.
“…I don’t get what’s funny,” Charlene said in reaction to the audience laughing.
The Kenyan Constitution does not provide for any office named Office of the First Daughter.
Ms Charlene has been the talk of town recently since her father took over the office in August.
At one point, Ms Charlene also said that while pursuing her degree certificate at the Daystar University, she used to hustle, selling smokie kachumbari to students.
