“Raising the debt ceiling is a non-issue because we have the solution – the growing of marijuana,” he has previously said. “It will enable this country to pay its outstanding debts, and ensure Kenyans have enough money wherever they are.”
In June, Wajackoyah launched a manifesto that he called the “10 commandments of the Roots Party”. They included legalising marijuana; rearing snakes and extracting their venom for export; hanging people found guilty of corruption; implementing a four-day work week; andThe candidate was once a street child taken in by Hare Krishna worshipers. He reportedly claims to have more than a dozen degrees, and has worked as a grave digger in the UK, where he lived as a refugee.
Ruto – who comes from a modest background – presents himself as a champion of the poor. But both leading candidates are among Kenya’s wealthiest citizens, in a country where the president himself says as much as two billion Kenyan shillings of public funds are lost each day to corruption.