NAIROBI — President William Ruto has defended his predecessor, Uhuru Kenyatta, against criticism over one of his signature health schemes, insisting that Kenya’s new model builds directly on the foundation Mr Kenyatta laid.
Speaking in Kajiado on Tuesday, Mr Ruto praised the Linda Mama programme — launched during Mr Kenyatta’s presidency to provide free maternal healthcare — as a critical step toward today’s broader system.
“Let me defend my former boss, President Uhuru Kenyatta. We should be magnanimous about the time he led our country,” Mr Ruto told the gathering. “The Linda Mama programme was a strong foundation. We developed it under the Jubilee administration, under the leadership of President Uhuru, and we learned a lot from it.”
His remarks come days after Mr Kenyatta, in a rare public appearance at his Jubilee Party’s national delegates conference, questioned the current government’s leadership and called for politics built on vision rather than division.
Mr Ruto pushed back gently, saying Linda Jamii — the expanded scheme his administration unveiled — was not a rejection of Linda Mama but an improvement. While the older programme focused mainly on maternal care, Linda Jamii covers prenatal, delivery and postnatal services, while extending benefits to children and entire households.
“Linda Mama was good. Linda Jamii is broader. It no longer targets only mothers but also children and households,” he said.
According to the President, financial support under Linda Jamii is significantly higher, with payouts ranging from Sh10,000 to Sh30,000 per enrollee compared with Linda Mama’s Sh2,000 to Sh2,500. The scheme has since been folded into the government’s universal health coverage drive, now run by the Social Health Authority (SHA).
Officials say the number of beneficiaries has jumped from seven million under the National Health Insurance Fund to 26.5 million under the new authority. “We learned lessons from Linda Mama, which is why we designed a better Linda Jamii programme,” Mr Ruto said. “And we have progressed further into universal health coverage, now reaching the wider Kenyan community.”
The comments appear aimed at calming tensions within Mr Ruto’s political base, where some allies have criticised Mr Kenyatta’s legacy. Over the weekend, the ruling United Democratic Alliance argued that Linda Jamii marks a clear improvement. Party secretary general Hassan Omar described it as “ahead in terms of scope, quality, and inclusivity.”
For many Kenyans, though, the debate is less about political credit and more about whether the ambitious health reforms will deliver. With costs rising and access uneven across the country, the challenge for both leaders’ legacies may lie not in their words but in how well the system serves those most in need.
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