Three years on, Agenda IV issues not tackled

Posted Saturday, February 26 2011 at 20:11

It will be three years on Monday that the national accord was signed to bring an end to post-election violence. And three years on, it is a good time to reflect on the record of the governing coalition.

There have been some notable successes. Considering the depth of ill will and suspicion that attended the run-up to the last election, the fact the coalition has held for three years is, in itself, a significant achievement.

The coalition has broadly managed to fulfil the first objective set out by the mediators, which was to bring an end to the violence that tore the nation apart after the results of the presidential contest were announced.

It has been less successful in other fields, particularly in tackling some of the problems that pose the biggest challenge to national unity, a set of tasks labelled Agenda IV issues by the mediators.

There has been no substantial progress in addressing the question of mass youth unemployment, a problem that helps feed cyclical waves of communal violence by supplying willing fighters to take up arms at low cost.

Other questions like addressing historical grievances and rationalising the nation’s land tenure systems remain pending and continue to pose threats to the nation’s fragile peace.

Fortunately, the new Constitution provides a framework for dealing with many of these issues. There can be no doubt that the adoption of a new Constitution was the most important political development of the last three years.

It was a moment that illuminated the best aspects of Kenyan civic life when the nation engaged in a long, civil and peaceful debate over the institutional framework through which it should be governed.

The task ahead is to ensure the new Constitution is implemented in a timely fashion and that the spirit and intent of the drafters, who took in the views of millions of Kenyans, is respected in the implementation process.

This requires a degree of unity and patriotism that has been elusive in the two institutions that are central to the implementation phase – the Executive and Parliament.

In the remaining months of the coalition, it is vital that all the players involved in government recognise that theirs is a transitional mandate that was designed to prevent the nation from descending into civil war. They should consider suspending the hostilities that threaten to derail the Constitution implementation process until the statutory three-month period before the next elections, when politicians would have every reason to focus fully on campaigns.

They must continue to focus their attention on the Agenda IV issues which represent the nation’s best chance of averting a return to ethnic violence.

Institutional reforms must be accompanied by serious work on the economic front to tackle the problem of unemployment and to offer the youth adequate avenues to become productive members of society.

It is notable that economic growth has returned to around pre-crisis levels, and key sectors such as tourism, agriculture and financial services are recording reasonable growth again.

But policy makers must heed the lessons of the economic miracle of the Asian tigers which demonstrated that only double-digit growth can make a meaningful dent on the major crises that affect Third World countries such as Kenya.

This calls for innovation at all levels of government and a commitment to spend less time on political intrigue and more time seeking ways to boost economic growth.

The coalition has overall been a modest success, considering the stalemate that resulted from the last presidential election. The challenge for Kenyans is to ensure that all necessary reforms are implemented to make sure the sort of crisis that nearly resulted in civil war three years ago is not repeated.