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Kenya: Revealed - Secret Letters
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The East African Standard (Nairobi)
27 March 2008
Posted to the web 26 March 2008
Ben Agina
Nairobi
Secret letters are being used to keep negotiations for an acceptable Grand Coalition Cabinet going after a one-on-one engagement between President Kibaki and Prime Minister-designate Raila Odinga took a knock on Tuesday.
But it remained unclear if this new strange mode of transacting the affair was a sign that the public show of comradeship displayed by both leaders since the signing of the peace accord last month was a facade.
In themselves, the exchanges in the letters reflect two fundamentally different positions over exactly what transpired between the two leaders behind closed doors at Harambee House on the material day.
The Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) insists that there were no agreements on the sharing of portfolios at the time of adjournment on March 25.
"There were several suggestions but firm positions were neither reached on any proposed splits (of existing ministries) or any allocations of portfolios," ODM states in one of its two letters The Standard obtained last night.
The Orange party is blunt - even uncompromising in its approach.
The party, for example, states that while it is willing to consider letting Party of National Unity (PNU) retain the security dockets, this is conditional on it retaining Finance, Local Government, Public Service and Immigration and Registration of Persons.
Dr Mohammed Isahakia, a technocrat-turned party activist, authored the letters on behalf of the party.
The Orange party also says it will propose matching numbers of Assistant Ministers and Permanent Secretaries for all the portfolios.
He adds: "Following further consultations, our position is that the ministries should all remain as they were at the time the accord was signed, 34, as per our proposal."
In another letter, the party outlines four conditions it says are the principles around which it wants the Grand Coalition Government built.
But replying for the Party of National Unity (PNU), Head of Civil Service Mr Francis Muthaura takes a very different view of the stalemate, insisting instead, that "a lot of progress" was made and all ministries, which were to be the basis of the constitution of the new Government, agreed on when the two principals met.
The Civil Service boss, who left no doubt where his loyalties lay when he recently came out with his own interpretation of Government structure, went on to attach a list of the ministries in his reply to ODM.
In the letters, Muthaura and Isahakia say they have been given instructions. But they do not say who did.
From the exchanges, it is clear that PNU wants to retain 20 ministerial positions in the new power-sharing agreement stating that ODM's stake in the agreement amounts to only 17 ministerial posts.
This now pushed the number of ministries proposed by the Government to 37.
Concurring with Isahakia in his reply, Muthaura said the Government, too, would like to have efficient and well-focused ministerial portfolios.
But there is something else, according to Muthaura, namely that "This Cabinet is being formed in very unique circumstances and therefore the interest of the two sides need to be balanced in accordance with the Constitution and the National Accord."
Finance and Public Service ministries
In that regard, Muthaura said the meeting, which took place between the two principals, President Kibaki and Raila, made a lot of progress as it virtually agreed on all the ministries, which were to be the basis of the constitution of the new Government.
Muthaura said ODM requested more time for consultations on portfolio balance; a matter he says was not achieved through negotiations.
He also acknowledges that there was disagreement on the placement of the ministries of Finance and Public Service.
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ODM wanted both ministries.
Muthaura adds in his letter: "The Government side urges ODM to facilitate completion of this important exercise and negotiations should proceed from the package already agreed between the two principals."
He attached a copy of clustered negotiated allocation of ministries as co-ordinating, infrastructural, productive, security and services.
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