President William Ruto on the evening of Sunday, July 28, hosted a town hall meeting with Mombasa residents where he discussed an array of issues of the county and national importance.
During the question-and-answer session, the head of state delved deep into, among other issues, his plans to create more jobs, his achievements, and the strategies he is putting in place to improve the country’s economy.
Notably, Mombasa town hall engagements mark a shift from the traditional media interviews President Ruto has been holding in the recent past.
A source intimated to TUKIO.co.ke disclosed that Ruto plans to hold more town hall meetings, where he will be engaging Kenyans directly, and fewer legacy media interviews going forward.
This, the source said, is a result of the growing concerns that the media has been advancing their agenda at the expense of that of the public whenever they are interviewing the president.
As witnessed before and as pointed out by Ruto, the media interviewers, through their hard-hitting questions with little room for the head of state to express himself, only aim to paint the president in bad light.
Through the town hall engagements, President Ruto aims to directly engage the citizenry and address issues bedeviling them without the now apparent media interference.
The decision follows the recent roundtable interview with the head of state at the State House in Nairobi.
During the interview, for instance, Citizen TV’s Linus Kaikai pressed the president to explain why police officers allegedly shot a boy in Rongai a record eight times during demonstrations.
However, the reports on the boy’s shooting were incorrect.
A postmortem examination of the body of the 12-year-old boy showed he regrettably died from severe haemorrhage caused by a single bullet that severed arteries, veins and punctured his lungs.
Also, during the heated interview, a journalist put to task Ruto to answer why a medical doctor was reportedly killed during the demonstrations while discharging her duties.
However, KMPDU secretary-general Davji Atellah clarified that a lady named Margaret Obuya was mistakenly identified as a doctor as she was in the process of buying drugs at Transchem Chemist in the CBD during the protests.
This interview missharps have since necessitated the need for the president to engage the public directly to avoid misinformation.
With the town hall sessions, Ruto will have a chance to directly hear from the citizens and understand and address their concerns instantly.
This, as pundits argue, will be a more transparent and direct line of communication.
