Western envoys have lost interest in democracy, good governance and the rule of law

Joseph Kazungu Katana, the-star.co.ke

Image from article, with caption: Opposition leader Raila Odinga meets diplomats at his Capitol Hill office on December 8, last year

Excerpt:

Eleven Western diplomatic missions based in Nairobi last week were unhappy with Kenyan opposition leaders, in particular ODM/NASA leader Raila Odinga, for refusing to recognise Uhuru Kenyatta as the President and William Ruto as the Deputy President. 

In a no-nonsense joint statement and article in the dailies, the diplomats called Raila “a father of multiparty democracy” who had “made unsubstantiated claims about elections and unilaterally sworn himself in as ‘President’, in deliberate disregard of the Constitution for which he so proudly fought.”

The statement further called on the Opposition to desist from “stoking or threatening violence”, which would risk Raila’s legacy. The diplomats also placed Raila’s recognition of Uhuru as the caveat to any dialogue. ...

These diplomats should continue to deal with errant regimes and the Opposition with impartiality if they want to continue enjoying trust from the vast majority of Kenyans.

Further, in the past — during the 1980s and 1990s — Western diplomats rarely issued joint press statements from Nairobi. Each country had a specific message regarding Kenyan politics and they said it as such. The US Embassy, for example, often issued stand-alone press releases and used public diplomacy to showcase its global power and influence in Kenya. This had tremendous impact on democratisation, governance and the rule of law. The British Embassy did it its own way. It hardly issued press releases, either singular or in concert with the other diplomats: Rather they protested or supported the Moi regime through a government-to-government approach rather than public diplomacy. Therefore, joint statements are hypocritical: They do not necessarily reflect the true positions of the countries represented and they have minimal impact. No matter the protests by the diplomats against the Opposition leaders, what Kenyans want is a restructured IEBC, without which, they should not expect to live and vote in free, fair and transparent elections. They want the diplomats to support them because the envoys do provide financial and other resources to the IEBC [JB - see] to manage elections without undue external influence.

The donors could do this by forcing the desired change at the IEBC or deny it funds if push comes to shove — exactly as they did to the Daniel Moi regime in 1991. Orderly Kenyan elections mean a lot to the West as well. Stolen elections lead to frustration and chaos that leads to the outflowing of refugees to the US and Europe. It is already a major problem in some of these countries.

America, which is expected to lead the diplomatic corps in Nairobi as the only superpower, is undergoing some kind of crisis in its official policy approach to Africa, including Kenya. President Donald Trump is talking about “America First” and “Making America Great Again.” These concepts in part mean some issues affecting Kenya must be resolved by Kenyans themselves through dialogue, irrespective of political differences. The electoral reforms are among these issues. The sooner this issue is addressed, the better for Kenya — with or without diplomatic support.

Gone are the days when influential US Secretaries of State such as Henry Kissinger, George Shultz, Colin Powell, Madeleine Albright, or Condoleezza Rice, among others, made the US policy pulse felt in Kenya and elsewhere.

The State Department is not the priority for President Trump. US Foreign policy is now made at the White House, via Twitter.

This may perhaps explain, in part, why Ambassador Robert Godec, a man who in the 1990s served in Kenya as Economic Officer long before he assumed his new position, prefers to issue joint statements alongside the other Missions in Nairobi. Nevertheless, given the US superpower status, and Britain as the former colonial power, these two countries and the rest of our development partners, such as Germany, the EU and the Nordic countries, have roles to play in support of advancing Kenya’s democratic gains. ...