President Ruto quietly pushing campaign for Njoki Ndungu's ICC Judgeship
National
By
Patrick Vidija
| May 07, 2026
President William Ruto has mounted a quiet but powerful campaign rallying behind Justice Njoki Ndung’u in a historic bid for ICC Judgeship, The Standard can reveal.
A source within the Presidency told the publication that on the sidelines of this Monday’s swearing-in ceremony for newly appointed Judges to the High Court and Environment and Land Court at State House, President Ruto convened an intimate but significant caucus with Chief Justice Martha Koome, Prime Cabinet Secretary Musalia Mudavadi, Head of Public Service Felix Koskei, and the woman at the centre of it all, Lady Justice Njoki Ndung’u, Kenya’s candidate for a seat on the International Criminal Court.
“The meeting was brief, with an unambiguous message, Kenya is fully behind Justice Njoki,” the source said, adding, “That President Ruto, Chief Justice Koome, and Prime Cabinet Secretary Mudavadi stood together to strategise on her campaign speaks volumes. This is not a partisan endeavour; it is a national one.”
If the campaign goes through, it could place one of Africa’s most distinguished legal minds in the world’s foremost international criminal justice space.
In March this year, Ruto nominated Ndung’u, who is a sitting Supreme Court Judge, as Kenya’s candidate for the International Criminal Court (ICC) judge post.
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Ndung’u will compete with six other candidates for the judicial position in elections scheduled to take place from December 7 to 17 in New York.
The other candidates include Evelyn Ankumah of Ghana, Rosette Muzigo-Morrison of Uganda, Deo John Nangela of Tanzania, Yoshimitsu Yamauchi of Japan, Diana Carolina Olarte Bácares of Colombia, and Guénaël Mettraux of Switzerland.
Of the seven nominees, four are women and three are men. Four represent African States, one represents the Asia-Pacific States, one represents the Latin American and Caribbean States (GRULAC), and one represents Western European and other States.
According to our source, Ruto believes that Kenya has produced legal giants who have shaped the continent.
In Lady Justice Ndung’u, the source said the head of state indicated that Kenya presents the world with a candidate whose life’s work has been the relentless pursuit of justice, for women, for the marginalised, and for the rule of law itself.
“The ICC would not simply be gaining a judge. It would be gaining a champion,” the source quoted President Ruto.
The source said Ruto indicated that Njoki Ndung’u has been there from when Kenya’s Supreme Court was established in 2011, helping shape the nation’s highest jurisprudence, contributing landmark decisions in both constitutional and criminal law that have defined Kenya’s legal identity in the post-2010 constitutional era.
To him, this is why the Lady Justice is the right candidate for the ICC.
Ruto told the meeting that Ndung’u’s influence reaches far beyond Kenya’s borders in that long before she ascended to the Supreme Court bench, she was already changing lives.
“As the principal architect of Kenya’s Sexual Offences Act, she led the transformation of the country’s legal framework for addressing gender-based violence, a law that gave voice to survivors who had long been failed by the system,” the source said.
She also played a central role in the development of the Maputo Protocol, the African Union’s landmark treaty on the rights of women, an instrument that has shaped gender jurisprudence across 54 nations and remains one of the most significant legal achievements in Africa’s modern history.
Her successful bid would see her become one of 18 judges serving on the International Criminal Court in The Hague, Netherlands.