Commentary (by Gitau Warigi) - Sunday View - Foreign interests constituted a major stake in the crisis talks

Ref:http://www.nationmedia.com/dailynation/nmgcontententry.asp?category_id=25&newsid=118059


Story by GITAU WARIGI
Publication Date: 3/2/2008

Martin Griffiths, Kofi Annan’s political adviser, likens the deliberations that led to Thursday’s political agreement to what African elders of long ago used to hold under a tree.

Only this time the penultimate talks were not under some tree but in President Kibaki’s Harambee House office.

The point the aide wanted to emphasise was the African nature of the mediation, where there was Mr Annan and his two eminent colleagues - retired President Benjamin Mkapa and Graca Machel - who were joined in the end by President Jakaya Kikwete of Tanzania. And all of this under the happy umbrella of the Africa Union, whose chairman President Kikwete currently is.

ALL INDICATIONS ARE THAT PRESIDENT Kikwete’s last-minute intervention was critical. From the moment on Tuesday when Mr Annan threw up his arms and indicated there was a deadlock, it was clear he was desperate for a big gun like Mr Kikwete to join in to convince President Kibaki, especially, that an agreement was to the government’s and everybody’s interest.

Reports that Mr Annan planned to rope in other regional players, principally President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda, could be credible but have not been verified.

Mr Griffiths, however, was telling only half the story. Much as the AU and more so the neighbouring countries’ input was pivotal, the unspoken truth is that it was the wider international community that forced the Kenyan leadership’s hand.

In this instance, we are talking of the United States and Britain, the latter conveniently hiding under the cover of the European Union.

This was a cover Britain had to take after some solo statements some of its officials made infuriated the Kenya Government to a degree that was frankly startling. The United States, facing no power inhibitions of the sort our former colonial power secretly harbours, was more outspoken.

The clearest marker that the US was not ready to countenance deadlock came the moment Mr Annan hinted of a stalemate.

Immediately, a statement was issued from Washington under the name of Ms Condoleezza Rice, who was at the time visiting the Far East, saying that her country would reassess the legitimacy of either of the two disputing parties (i.e. PNU and ODM) once it concluded who was to blame for the impasse.

It was a loaded threat, meaning the superpower would brand whoever it thought was to blame as some kind of outlaw, with all the negative consequences implied by that.

And, though the US was diplomatic at first in suggesting it was open-minded as to who she thought was to blame, there was no doubt whatsoever that the unusual warning was aimed directly at the government side.

It is important to note that throughout the post-election crisis, the US Government, even as it vociferously protested at the bungled elections, has never questioned the legitimacy of the present government or President Kibaki’s position as such.

That is in contrast with the somewhat incoherent positions taken by different British officials, including the High Commissioner, Mr Adam Wood.

The farthest the US had gone was to say that, as long as the crisis persisted, it was not going to be business-as-usual, a theme that was quickly imitated by the European Union. It was also the US which led the way in imposing visa restrictions on some targeted Kenyans, a theme that was again quickly taken up by the Europeans.

There is no question at all that the government was extraordinarily peeved at all this foreign interference.

The tone and texture of the involvement can indeed be queried, but for anybody to think it could have been fought or wished away is to engage in wishful thinking.

Indeed it is quite correct to paint Mr Annan as essentially the pointman for the international community, but that should be understood in the proper context that foreign interests constituted a major stake in the mediation talks. I am relieved like the average Kenyan as to the outcome on Thursday.

BUT I AWAIT TO SEE HOW THE NEW coalition will work in practice, more so if it will work as a coherent outfit that focuses on what Kenyans expect from government, or whether it will be a hydra with two heads operating at cross-purposes.

It is important to sign off by reminding our government something President Museveni said while recently addressing the East African Legislative Assembly. He said that the Kenyan crisis persisted because there was a problem of leadership. Mr Museveni has a history of being blunt but often very perceptive, and his bluntness is only possibly surpassed by that of Rwandan President Paul Kagame.

The latter’s reported remarks when violence was in full swing in Kenya remain well-documented, though Rwandan diplomats, much aware of their landlocked status, took the care to deny them.