No, two men were not arrested for breaking into Kenyan president's residence and sleeping on his bed
IN SHORT: Social media posts allege that two men were arrested for breaking into State House Mombasa and sleeping on the president's bed. But the police have denied this.
Several social media posts claim that two men were caught "sleeping in president William Ruto's king-size bed" at the State House in the coastal city of Mombasa, Kenya.
The post reads: "Kikuyu thieves Maina & Muthoni arrested sleeping in president Ruto's king size bed at State House Mombasa. They broke in from an open window just to feel how comfortable a president's bed is, they said. No other items were damaged or stolen. Guards were alerted after they heard loud 'snoring' sounds coming from the bedroom."
The post includes the mugshots of two men, each holding a Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) board with their personal details. The DCI is the branch of the Kenyan police that investigates serious crime.
The post sparked widespread discussion, including on a popular radio station. The same claim was referenced here. Together, the posts were viewed over 10,000 times and received a lot of engagement.
The Kikuyu are the largest ethnic community in Kenya. Ruto is from the Kalenjin community, which has often been at political odds with the Kikuyu.
State House Mombasa serves as one of the presidential residences and access is tightly controlled by state security agencies. If this were to happen, it would be a major security breach in one of the most heavily guarded places in Kenya.
But is the claim true? We checked.
Satire and a 'mistake'
The original post was made by a channel that describes itself as a source of "satirical fictional news". Based on its other posts, it is clear that the page twists real stories and exaggerates them for humour, making the posts controversial.
Although it identifies as a satirical site, its individual posts are not labelled as such and would, therefore, be widely shared without this disclaimer. When satire is presented as fact, it becomes disinformation.
The radio station discussed the story on their comedy segment following the original post, although it was discussed as if it were a true story.
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In the comments on the original post, many people criticised the mention of the suspects' tribe. The original post also lists one of the suspect's names as "Muthoni", a Kikuyu name, while his mugshot clearly shows that his name is "Muthomi".
"Maina" is a Kikuyu surname, but "Muthomi" is a name from the Meru community, meaning only one of the suspects is Kikuyu. This "mistake" is probably deliberate to create controversy.
DCI denies the claim
The DCI's official social media pages issued two updates on this. In the first update titled "fake news", they displayed an image of the original satirical post marked as fake with a red banner. The word "Kikuyu" was censored from the image.
In a follow-up post with more detailed mugshots of the two suspects, they clarified that they had been arrested in Mombasa on 11 November 2024 for handling suspected stolen property, "contrary to some fake news doing rounds in the online space".
They reported the recovery of items worth over KSh1.2 million (about US$9,200) and said legal action had been taken against the suspects.
In addition, the radio station that discussed the story later uploaded a clip of the discussion, showing that they had quoted a fake screenshot.
The claim that the two men were arrested because they broke into the State House in Mombasa and slept on the president's bed is false.
