SENATOR OMTATAH ; RUTO IS LIKE A HYENA ATTRACTING ONLOOKERS IN THE MARKET

Busia Senator Okiya Omtatah has dismissed the notion that President Ruto still calls the shots in Mt. Kenya —following him pull massive crowds in his Mt. Kenya tour. Claiming that those who showed up were not die-hard supporters but simply curious onlookers coming to look at a 'Hyena' in the market.

During a morning interview on the Iko Nini podcast on Sunday, April 6, 2025, Omtatah metaphorically likened Ruto to a hyena brought to a livestock market—not because anyone intends to buy it, but because people gather to stare out of curiosity, only to end up buying cows and leaving the hyena behind.

Omtatah did not major on the ongoing claims of mass bribing but insisted that the turnout only reflected the boredom of jobless citizens looking to kill time.

“When Kenyans hear even the slightest commotion, they rush to see what’s happening—even if it’s a bomb that’s gone off—even if it ends with them being clobbered by police, and there’s a saying where I come from that says, ‘if you go to a cattle market and bring along a hyena and put it on display, everyone in the market will rush to see the hyena, but when it’s time to buy, they’ll buy cows and leave the hyena,’ so that Mt Kenya tour by Ruto was like a hyena at the market—people showed up to marvel at the beast but no one intended to take it home, so I don’t see the problem with people going to see a caged hyena, and even then, the turnout wasn’t all that, because whether they were paid or not, most people are just unemployed and looking for something to do.”

The senator furthered that , the head of state should not boast of such crowds instead, it should strike him that these were young , jobless and desperate people , who resorted to show up just to break their idle monotony.

“So Central is right here in Kiambu—just go through and you’ll see how many young people are just lounging with nothing to do; some of them spend their days drinking, so they figured, ‘Why not go see what a hyena looks like?’ So honestly, I don’t see anything major that happened there, " he said.

Omtatah was also asked to address a past moment where netizens criticized him after the abduction of cartoonist Kibet Bull, with some accusing him of collaborating with the same government he constantly trolls to orchestrate the act.

In response he vehemently denied the claims, saying even Kibet Bull himself could publicly vouch that he played no part in this and it was part of the government's plot to indict him.

“I saw when people started saying I was working with the hyena, but they didn’t realise I had already cornered them, and once I submitted my affidavit, they backed down and said they were now investigating the matter, the case of Kibet Bull, and even Kibet Bull will tell you I wasn’t involved in any way—they tried so hard to pin it on me, but in the end, it amounted to nothing.”

The vocal senator went ahead tying it to another abduction involving a Kenyan named Bob Njagi, who was just abducted after leaving Omtatah's home , however, he cleared that he absolutely had no hand in this either.

“You know, there are some things you simply can’t do—Bob Njagi had just left my place when he was abducted, and when they started their whole independent candidate push, I guided them a lot, but later on things shifted to talks of abduction, and the truth is something that’s incredibly hard to cover up," he added emphatically.