KENYA DEMOCRACY PROJECT IN SWEDEN (KDP-S)

 

 

To: H. E. President Mwai Kibaki,

The Office of The President

Harambee House,

Harambee Avenue
P.O. Box 30510, Nairobi, Kenya.
Tel. 02 227411

 

Through:

Mr. Daniel Tanui,

Chief d’ Affairs,

The Kenyan Embassy in Sweden

Birgerjarlsgatan 37,

103 95 Stockholm, Sweden

 

Through:

Mr. Peter O. Ole Nkuraiyia

The Permanent Secretary,

Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation

Old Treasury Building,

Harambee Avenue,
P.O. Box 30551, Nairobi, Kenya
Tel. 334433

 

7th October 2003

 

Dear sir,

 

REF: SERIOUS CONCERNS OVER THE APPOINTMENT OF MR. MICHAEL DENNIS MUKIRI KINYANJUI AS NEW KENYAN AMBASSADOR TO SCANDINAVIA

 

The recent appointment of eight Kenyan Ambassadors by President Mwai Kibaki to fill positions which have been lying vacant for a long time at eight Kenyan Embassies did not just demonstrate the gender sensitivity of the new President when it comes to appointment of women to represent Kenya abroad. The timely move also demonstrated that President Kibaki is slowly taking control of the situation by appointing Ambassadors in key countries where Kenya has significant political, economic and strategic interests but in which the country’s emissaries have been lacking since Narc took over power. We have in mind the appointment of Ambassadors to represent Kenya in the United States, Britain, France and Scandinavia.

 

As Kenyans resident in Sweden and as political activists who were involved in the anti Moi-anti KANU struggle until the defeat last December of Moi’s 24 years of bloody dictatorship, we greeted the appointment of Mr. Michael Dennis Mukiri Kinyanjui as the new Kenyan Ambassador to Sweden with a lot of trepidation.

 

This is because Mr. Kinyanjui has been Moi’s official Ambassador designate to Scandinavia for more than a year following the transfer of Ambassador Michael Sergon (another Moi appointee) to Israel in August last year. We are concerned with Mr. Kinyanjui’s appointment because it will seal the control of the Kenyan Embassy in Stockholm by known loyalists of the defeated Moi dictatorship, a sad situation that will most likely complicate the good relationship that has been developing between Kenyans in Scandinavia and the new Narc government.

 

Immediately after Narc took over power in January, we took contact with the government through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to try and avert the confirmation of Mr. Kinyanjui as Kenya’s Ambassador to Scandinavia on grounds that the Kenyan Embassy in Stockholm needed a new leadership outlook based on Narc tenets and not KANU. This was done with the full knowledge that the appointment of Ambassadors is the sole prerogative of the President.

 

According to an Official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the appointment of Mr. Kinyanjui by former Dictator Moi had been overtaken by events following the Narc take over, a situation that, we were told, even prevented Mr. Kinyanjui from presenting his credentials to the new President before he could proceed to Stockholm to assume Office. Exchanges between us and the Ministry were published in KUWA Bulletin (March 20023), a monthly Newsletter published by the Kenya United Welfare Association in Sweden (KUWA). Copies of the Newsletter exists at the Kenyan Embassy archive.

 

Kenyans in Sweden who held several demonstrations outside the Embassy to oppose the Moi dictatorship, have had long and bitter battles with KANU diehards in Stockholm who saw Moi as Kenya’s President for life. Apparently, these KANU supporters have been using the Embassy as their centre of operations until the popular defeat of Moi last December when “KANU politics” was effectively relegated to the sidelines and arrogant KANU operatives dispatched to political oblivion where they have been mark-timing.

 

As the anti-KANU forces campaigned for the reversal of Mr. Kinyanjui’s appointment as the new Ambassador following the Narc take over, KANU supporters held a glimmer of hope that Mr. Kinyanjui would wither the storm, land the seat and help (even clandestinely) in facilitating a re-groupment of the vanquished Moi supporters. The appointment of Mr. Kinyanjui therefore is a welcome blessing to pro-KANU elements in Stockholm and a slap on the face to progressive Kenyans who had supported Narc during the anti-Moi struggle especially in Sweden. The last item Narc needs on its reform agenda is fresh political antagonism with Kenyans in Scandinavia on the basis of unpopular appointments of the Kinyanjui type.

 

The issue is that Mr. Kinyanjui’s appointment has simply re-enforced the Kenyan Embassy in Stockholm as a KANU base regardless of who is in power in Kenya. Given that the Kenyan Embassy in Stockholm carters for the whole of Scandinavia, it is our view that the Office of the President reconsider this faulty appointment and possibly post an individual who is linked to the new Narc government and who is in a position to clean the ghost of KANU from this strategic Embassy.

 

Such a move will not only help to strengthen Narc support in Scandinavia but will also weaken attempts by KANU supporters to regroup.  Mr. Kinyanjui’s appointment is being seen here as a victory for pro-KANU bigots and not as a progressive development which could further the political interests of Narc in Scandinavia.

 

If the Narc government ignores these strong signals and proceeds with the appointment, it is most probable that a new battle will be opened in Stockholm between KANU and Narc supporters. The immediate consequence is that the growing working relationship between Kenyans in Scandinavia and the Kenyan Embassy in Stockholm on the basis of the Narc take over may ultimately collapse.

 

Already, doubts are lingering because of the infighting within Narc and the Kinyanjui appointment is likely to scare many Kenyans away from Narc because of the difficulty in understanding how Moi’s Ambassador designate could be allowed to assume Office in Stockholm after the Dictator suffered massive defeat at the hands of Narc.  We have nothing personal against Mr. Kinyanjui. But the reality in Stockholm is badly slanted against him.

 

We are not saying that all Moi’s appointees should be sacked en masse because such a position would be unrealistic. Our point is that the position of Ambassador to Scandinavia is too critical to be left on the hands of an individual known to have pledged full allegiance to a ruthless Dictator who stole the country’s wealth and murdered thousands of innocent Kenyans as he managed the country like a private business while citizens sterved.

 

Any Ambassador posted to Scandinavia will, naturally, require the support of Kenyans in Scandinavia. The truth is that any Ambassador who has been strongly associated with KANU in the past is not in a position to harness the kind of unity needed among Kenyans to help promote the image of the country in Scandinavia at a time when the tourism industry is tottering.

 

Moi’s Ambassadors in Scandinavia have a history of corruption, visa fraud, neglect of Kenyan citizens in Scandinavia, divisions on ethnic lines, Passport fraud, violence at the Embassy, harassment of non KANU Embassy staff and a host of other vices that threatens to resurface with another Moi appointee. In fact the whole ambition of progressive Kenyans working with the Embassy to promote Kenya’s image in Scandinavia may be up for sabotage as KANU elements celebrate the appointment of one of their own at the Embassy. What is more?  

 

We campaigned for the recall of Mr. Idha Salim as Kenyan Ambassador to Scandinavia when it became clear that Salim was anti the democratic movement that was seeking to overthrow Moi.  When he was replaced with Mr. Sergon in 1998, we honestly worked with Mr. Sergon for two years, thinking that he was progressive before we discovered his dirty KANU tricks aimed at dividing Kenyans in Sweden on ethnic lines. Subsequently, we opened a campaign against him as the boss at the Embassy until last August when he was eventually transferred as the atmosphere in Stockholm became hot and unbearable. The struggle against Sergon is well documented. Narc should spare Kenyans in Scandinavia another looming struggle against Kinyanjui in Stockholm at a time when the main focus should be reconstruction of our battered country and not confrontation.

 

We hope that the Office of the President will consider our petition and possibly rescind the appointment of Mr. Kinyanjui on grounds that it is contradictory in relation to the current political climate, likely to be antagonistic on the long term and utterly negative when it comes to the growing cooperation between Kenyans in Scandinavia and the new Narc regime.

 

In a nut shell, Mr. Kinyanjui will simply enhance the image of the Kenyan Embassy in Stockholm as a “KANU Embassy” regardless of any good intentions by the Narc leadership. This possibility will not auger well for a new regime elected on a reform platform and at a time when Narc is dealing with an internal crisis on the question of Prime Minister and the Memorandum of Understanding allegedly signed between NAK and LDP in the run up to the defeat of the Moi dictatorship.  

 

Yours sincerely,

 

Okoth Osewe

Co-ordinator

Kenya Democracy Project (KDP)

Scandinavia

 

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osewe@hotmail.com

osewe@chello.se