President William Ruto has come forward to defend his choice of renting a private plane to travel during his recent visit to the United States.
This is after a lot of criticism from the public as a group of critics wondered why he would not use the official presidential plane or the Kenya Airways plane.
In his statement on Sunday, President Ruto assured Kenyans that the cost of the private plane he rented is cheaper than the amount that would be spent if he used the KQ plane.
“fellow Kenyans, I have seen concern about my transport vehicle to the United States. As a responsible manager of public resources and according to my determination for us to live according to our ability and that I should lead from the front by doing so, the cost was less than traveling to KQ,” Ruto said through his official Twitter account.
The president traveled to the United States on a royal A6-RJU flight.
Many reports estimate that the cost of renting a Boeing business plane like the one that Ruto spent on his visit to the United States is about 18,000$per hour, about Sh2,358,0000.
The trip to Atlanta, USA, where Ruto stopped for the first time, is about 19 hours from Kenya, meaning it would cost Sh71,404,500 at that rate.
Earlier, the US embassy refused to pay President Ruto's travel expenses to the US.
"Just to be clear: the United States did not pay for President Ruto's flight to the United States," US Embassy Spokesman in Nairobi Andrew Veveiros told a local news agency.