First Daughter Charlene Ruto has addressed the controversy surrounding the arrest and subsequent release of Webster Ochora Elijah, who published a book about her without her consent.
Ochora was arrested for unauthorised use of President William Ruto’s daughter’s identity in a self-published book titled ‘Charlene Ruto and the Youth Uprising’.
He was arrested under the provisions of the Computer Misuse and Cybercrime Act, where he was accused of identity theft. The author was later released on Tuesday, June 3, on a KSh 50,000 cash bail.
Addressing the matter, Charlene regretted that Ochora never reached out to her to inform her that he was planning to write a book about her.
Irked by the move, the first daughter said he, in turn, reported the matter to DCI and pursued the author through the court.
"We have a bad culture in our society where we misuse people's names and we get away with it and it is not right. That is not something that I stand for, so I submitted the statement to DCI and we went through the legal procedures. That is something that we also have to learn as young people, yes we are looking for opportunities, but you can't look for opportunities in the wrong way.The gentleman never came to me with a suggestion that I want to write a book on your behalf and to me, that was a misuse of my name. The day I'm ready to write a book, I will write it otherwise, nobody should write your own book," said Charlene.
