Former deputy president Rigathi Gachagua has lifted the curtain on what he describes as a concerted push by President William Ruto to bring Wiper leader Kalonzo Musyoka into the broad-based government.
Rigathi said the head of state has been making a series of private calls aimed at convincing Kalonzo to join a broad-based government, a move Rigathi framed as strategic and urgent.
"The timing," Rigathi suggested, is "deliberate."
The ruling coalition has just emerged from by-elections that many view as a political windfall: the government side won more seats than the opposition, a result that has been read as a fresh sign of President Ruto’s electoral momentum.
That success, Rigathi implied, gives the presidency leverage in talks and makes the offer on the table more attractive.
Rigathi portrayed the outreach as part of a larger effort to stitch together a broader governing coalition ahead of the 2027 cycle.
He said Ruto is using private channels rather than public declarations, hoping that a quiet rapprochement with Kalonzo would alter the balance of power and blunt opposition unity.
Rigathi also advised that any approach to Kalonzo should go through him, underscoring how personal and tactical these conversations have become.
If Kalonzo accepts, the implications would be immediate and complex.
A formal defection or alliance would fracture the opposition narrative of cohesion and could shift electoral arithmetic across several regions where Kalonzo commands influence.
That shift would likely strengthen the presidency’s bargaining position with smaller parties and local power brokers, and complicate the opposition’s strategy of presenting a united front.
Analysts say such a realignment could alter candidate selection, campaign coalitions and the framing of key issues ahead of 2027.
But Rigathi’s intervention also exposed fault lines.
His public remarks underline tensions within the anti-Ruto camp and signal a contest for who controls negotiations with rival leaders.
Kalonzo himself has publicly dismissed talk of a coalition with the presidency in recent weeks, insisting the reports are speculative and that the opposition should remain focused on campaigning.
Rigathi’s comments, and the clear jockeying, suggest those denials may not end the back-room manoeuvring.
For the presidency, the upside is obvious: a high-profile alignment with Kalonzo would broaden Ruto’s appeal among voters who respect the Wiper leader’s standing, while eroding the opposition’s claims of momentum.
For the opposition, the stakes are also high: losing Kalonzo would force a rapid re-calibration of alliances and messaging.
For the country, the unfolding drama promises a reordering of political loyalties in plain view of an electorate already watching the by-elections as a bellwether.
Rigathi’s disclosures put pressure on both sides to make their next moves in public as well as in private.
Whether those secret calls amount to a decisive courtship, a negotiation tactic, or a gambit to unsettle rivals, they have already changed the conversation, and raised the odds that the shape of the national coalition heading into 2027 will look different from today.
