By OSCAR OBONYO
oobonyo@standardmedia.co.ke
After weeks of intensive legwork by his foot soldiers and as the clock ticks away to the February 5, 2014 date with his accusers at the International Criminal Court (ICC), President Uhuru Kenyatta has opted to take charge of his own destiny.
It is a move that has seen him personally engage world leaders, including making phone calls to US President Barack Obama and United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon to plead his case outside the court. Details of the latest outreach moves remain a closely guarded secret by State House.
In the region, the President is leaving nothing to chance and has just returned from Botswana, a nation that was fiercely opposed to Kenya’s push for deferral of the ICC cases, and which threatened to execute an arrest warrant should one ever be issued against the President.
Deferral request
But as things stand, there is no indication that the ICC is contemplating issuing such warrant. President Uhuru has several times declared in public that he would fully co-operate with the court.
On Wednesday, President Uhuru was in Gaborone, the capital city of Botswana, and held talks with President Ian Khama on what officials of the two leaders vaguely described as “bilateral, regional and international issues of mutual concern”.
Prof Peter Kagwanja, the Chief Executive of the African Policy Institute sums up the President’s approach thus: “He is on a charm offensive in a bid to get the entire continent behind him.”
He further argues that Uhuru doesn’t want to hear dissenting voices on the deferral bid and that with East, West and North Africa fully backing him, his visit to Botswana was meant to rally Southern Africa support.
A few weeks ago, the President sent Cabinet secretaries Amina Mohammed (Foreign Affairs), Fred Matiang’i and Najib Balala to seek the support of United Nations Security Council members over the deferral of the ICC cases.
The move followed the African Union extra-ordinary summit in Addis Ababa where Kenya was given the mandate of leading the deferral request and the subsequent lobbying by some top members of the Jubilee government around the continent.
Leader of Majority, Aden Duale, views the President’s actions as those of a team player, who is taking over a baton from fellow athletes to complete an otherwise tough race. Duale was involved in the second phase of shuttle diplomacy that won Kenya support of the African Union.
“We have also managed to mobilise 34 African countries to push our case during the conference of nations that subscribe to the Rome Statute later this month. We want to use this opportunity to amend the Rome Statute to exclude the indictment of serving African leaders,” Duale told The Standard on Sunday.
Two weeks ago, the Kenyan mission in New York, played a key role at a UN Security Council interactive forum called “The Arria Formula” or “The Interactive Dialogue”.
“We believe that the dialogue has helped inform and better educate the UN Security Council on the issues surrounding the request for deferral and on the necessity for the deferral itself,” said Kenyan ambassador to UN Macharia Kamau yesterday.
Following the interactive dialogue, the envoy is now assured that the UN Security Council will move back into its sessions under its regular agenda to deal with the request from a position of information.
“It is expected that the Security Council will take up the matter of the request of the deferral by the AU over the next five to 10 days,” said Macharia.
He also revealed that African members of the UN Security Council (Rwanda, Morocco, and Togo) have agreed to work together to sponsor a resolution in the council that will facilitate the process of effecting a deferral as requested by the AU.
There are, however, no specific dates for when a decision by the UN Security Council can be expected but Macharia says it is anticipated that the decision will be made within a fortnight.
The opposition and members of the civil society are however raising the flag over possible misuse of public funds by the Executive to fight personal court battles. Mwalimu Mati of Mars Group Kenya, for instance, calls for more transparency on the use funds from the public coffers on ICC-related operations.
Letter to Cameron
Among the questions Mati wants answered is whether the country’s engagement in shuttle diplomacy was discussed and approved by Parliament. Just who gave the exercise the nod and from which kitty are the shuttle diplomacy operations funded?
The answers may not be forthcoming just as yet, but the President continues to push harder, now almost single handedly.
Besides consulting directly with fellow Heads of State, The Standard on Sunday has reliably established that Kenyatta has personally written to key world leaders including Obama and UK Premier David Cameron, inviting them for the Jubilee celebrations on December 12.
The letters, a copy of which The Standard on Sunday has seen, are signed by the President himself and not officials of Foreign Affairs ministry. Kenyatta is also said to have made follow-up calls to the leaders requesting their company.
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