William Ruto, the President-elect will become the first president with Ph.D. academic qualification. However, before ascending the world of both politics and the academic world, the president began his educational journey in Nandi and Uasin Gishu Counties.
Ruto attended Kapsabet High School that will shortly boast of producing two of Kenya’s five presidents
A lot has transformed at Kapsabet High School since the new president-elect William Ruto sat for his A-level exams in the 80s.
“We received his excellency the president from Wareng High School, he joined when he was index 3, we received him on 18th March 1985, to join a level class Form 5, which then was a science class. He was admission number 5065,” explains Kipchumba Maiyo, Kapsabet High School Chief Principal.
In the two years he spent at the school, he was a dweller of Solai House, Cheruiyot dormitory, cube number 5G which has since been converted into a library.
The structure that housed his classroom, Form 5G, is now part of a primary school next to to the high school.
The school principal says that the luck with number five for the president-elect perhaps started at Kapsabet High School.
“On the magic of number 5, his class, form five g, his cube number five, his fifth political term, him being the fifth president and his win being validated on the 5th of September, “explains the principal.
It is that luck that students in Kapsabet school, some in the classroom the president-elect sat before, hope will rub off on them.
“I’m really proud, just imagining that maybe he sat in this class makes me even more proud,” Ivy Jepkirui, a pupil at Kapsabet High Primary says.
“This has given me inspiration that I can become who I want in the future. It inspired me that no matter where you are from, it doesn’t affect what you become in the future,” Richy Barack a pupil at the same school adds.
Although many of the staff who worked at Kapsabet High School during the president-elect’s time have left, one old man, whose cooking kept the future president well fed, remembers the young man quite vividly. He now works at the school as a groundsman.
“Najiskia vizuri sana kwa vile yeye amekua kiongozi wetu. Na kusema ukweli amekua mtu mwenye bidii sana. Yeye alikua ni mtoto msomi sana na mwenye bidii,” Sirma Kiprop, a groundsman at Kapsabet High School said.
The chap who would eventually become Kenya’s fifth president is said to have been a keen and meticulous learner excelling in the subjects he studied, as well as in co-curricular activities, including being a member of the Christian union, the debating club, volleyball and tennis teams.
With its former student poised to take the reign of the country’s top leadership, Kapsabet High is also set to add to its alumni, the name of another president. The country’s second president, the late Daniel Arap Moi, also schooled there.
