Business Daily (Nairobi)
Jim Onyango and Mwaura Kimani
10 July 2009
As the fate of the suspected masterminds of the post-election violence was left in the hands of International Criminal Court prosecutor on Thursday, the Kenyan business community was left agonising on how the negative attention will hurt the economy.
Mr Kofi Annan, the man who brokered the political truce that led to the creation of a coalition government last year, finally handed over the envelope that contains the names of key suspects to ICC prosecutor Luis Moreno Ocampo - in a move that will either accelerate, or scuttle, attempts to form a local tribunal to try the suspects.
Mr Annan said in a statement from Geneva that Kenya could still establish a local tribunal.
"Any judicial mechanism adopted to bring the perpetrators of the post-election violence to justice must meet international legal standards and be broadly debated with all sectors of the Kenyan society in order to bring credibility to the process."
The names were handed over to Mr Annan by Justice Phillip Waki who carried a judicial investigation on the role of politicians in organising the ethnic killings that followed the disputed results of the General Election.
The Waki Commission had mandated Mr Annan to hand over the names of top suspects behind the violence to the ICC if Kenya's Parliament failed to establish a special tribunal to prosecute the masterminds.
An earlier attempt to meet the deadline set by the Waki Commission to establish the tribunal passed after Parliament threw out a government bid to establish it.
Mr Annan said in a statement from Geneva that he had informed both President Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga that the names had been given to the ICC prosecutor.
But the handing over of the sealed envelop to the ICC is poised to damage the image of Kenya's exports at a time when businesses had started to show signs of recovering from the last year's post election violence.
Heightened international attention on Kenya would threaten the flow of international investments to the country as business financiers watch the goings on in Kenya.
"The international community and foreign community sees Kenya as a country that doesn't have strong structures to be trusted with the prosecution," said Mr Patrick Obath, the chairman of the Kenya Private Sector Alliance.
"This in turn depicts a bad business environment, " said Mr Obath, adding there has been a strong feeling among Kenyans that the perpetrators should be tried at the Hague owing to the weak systems which could be compromised.
Heighten pressureThe move by Mr Annan will also heighten the pressure on President Kibaki and Prime Minister Odinga to prod MPs to agree to the setting up of a tribunal.
Kenyans are divided on whether to try the suspects locally or in the Hague.
In February, Parliament blocked a Bill backed by President Kibaki and Prime Minister Odinga to establish a special tribunal to try the sponsors of the violence in which at least 1,300 people were killed and 300,000 others were displaced.
Fresh attempts to reintroduce the bill has been met with hostility from some MPs, who say past tribunals or commissions to net corrupt individuals had failed.
ICC's Moreno-Ocampo has said he will prosecute the suspects if Kenya fails to establish a tribunal in a year.
For a country which is increasingly becoming host to foreign business and political interests, the intervention by the ICC is seen as the only key that might unlock what has been a stalled process of trying the suspects.
Business leaders and diplomacy experts are now warning that failure by politicians to set up the tribunal might hurt Kenya's image in the international radar furthers.
Analysts warned that political sentiments arising from the slow implementation of reforms and trying of the suspects, could cause jitters in the money markets at a time when the economy is reeling from the impact of global financial crisis.
"The message is clear that the international community is increasingly losing confidence on the pace of reforms, " said Adams Oloo, a political analyst at the University of Nairobi.
"Its now between Kenya and the Hague, " said Dr Oloo. "In the past, this only happens to unstable countries."
Political turbulence has been singled out as the biggest threat to a good business environment, overtaking the global economic recession, according to a recent survey by PricewaterhouseCoopers, the consultancy firm, an issue that has seen business leaders' confidence in the economy drop to a new low.
"Confidence in Kenya as a stable country is quickly dwindling with dire effects on the business environment, especially tourism which relies heavily on" said Mr Mike Macharia chief executive of Kenya Association of Hotel Keepers and Caterers.
"This is what politicians must realise and set up the tribunal and other governance structures otherwise businesses will suffer," said Mr Macharia.
Donors, led by Sweden are already pegging their commitments towards Kenya on the ability of the Government to push through key reforms such as electoral law and tackling corruption.
Sweden signed a Sh17 billion grant with Kenya on Wednesday, which will be forthcoming only if the reforms are implemented.
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