Kenya President, William Ruto has informed Financial Times he won’t be able to travel to London, United Kingdom for the FT Africa Summit owing to the #RejectFinanceBill protests in his country.
In other to save cost and minimise government spending, the Kenyan president, who is the keynote speaker at the event has offered to join the summit virtually.
However, President Joseph Boakai of Liberia said he will be in London for the meeting.
An email from Financial Times made available to TheScrutiny reads “The President of Kenya, H.E. William Ruto has just confirmed his keynote speech at the FT Africa Summit. He joins the President of Liberia as the second head of state participating in the Summit”.
“In a bid to minimise government spending in response to #RejectFinanceBill2024 protests President Ruto will join virtually. Whilst President Boakai of Liberia will attend in-person. Don’t miss this exciting opportunity to hear directly from Africa’s most important leaders on their plans for the future”.
The protests in Kenya have created the biggest crisis of Ruto’s two years in power and have continued even after the president withdrew 2.7bn in tax hikes and fired nearly his entire cabinet.
Many demonstrators are demanding that Ruto step down, blaming him for misgovernance, corruption and the deaths of dozens of protesters during earlier antigovernment rallies.
