Former Tanzanian president Benjamin Mkapa has said locking out Mr William Ruto and Ms Martha Karua from the post-elections violence mediation team in 2008 helped secure a power-sharing agreement between President Mwai Kibaki and Orange Democratic Movement leader Raila Odinga.- DN
Violence erupted after the December 27, 2007 elections where the incumbent, Mr Kibaki of the Party of National Unity (PNU), was declared winner of the presidential vote, results disputed by Mr Odinga and many other observers. - @dailynation
@dailynation In his book, Mr Mkapa also reveals how Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni nearly rocked the mediation boat as wealthy Kenyans piled pressure on the negotiators and belligerents for an agreement.
@dailynation The talks would eventually lead to the signing of the National Accord and subsequent formation of a government of national unity – also known as the Grand Coalition Government.
@dailynation Mr Mkapa recalls that Mr Ruto of ODM, who is now Kenya’s Deputy President in the Jubilee administration, and Ms Karua of PNU, now Narc Kenya leader, “were the most difficult people to deal with”.
@dailynation "The atmosphere changed when we got Kibaki and Odinga together without Karua and Ruto present,” Mr Mkapa says in his memoir My Life, My Purpose. A Tanzanian President Remembers.
@dailynation The book was launched in Tanzania’s commercial capital Dar es Salaam on Tuesday. It recounts the intrigues that characterised the 39-day mediation that was chaired by former United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who died in August last year.
@dailynation In his book, Interventions: A Life in War and Peace, Annan also dedicates a chapter to Kenya’s post-election violence.
@dailynation The book says Mr Kibaki’s negotiating team was more obstinate than Mr Odinga’s during the talks.
@dailynation Contacted, Mr Ruto told the Sunday Nation: “Kenya has moved forward.”
Ms Karua, a former Justice minister, said: “Let him (Mr Mkapa) have fun.”
Ms Karua, a former Justice minister, said: “Let him (Mr Mkapa) have fun.”
@dailynation Apart from the two, others in the negotiating team were Mr Musalia Mudavadi, Dr Sally Kosgei and Mr James Orengo for ODM. The PNU side was represented by Prof Sam Ongeri, Mr Mutula Kilonzo and Mr Moses Wetang’ula.
@dailynation Mr Mkapa described the Kenyan experience as his toughest mediation assignment outside his country, where he navigated talks in 2000 to block attempts by Zanzibari president Salmin Amour to extend his stay in office for a third five-year term.
@dailynation Mr Mkapa’s account of his mediation in Kenya and later in South Sudan as well as Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, is captured in chapter 15 of the book under the title ‘Pseudo Retirement’.
@dailynation The Tanzanian leader says it was the decision of his successor Jakaya Mrisho Kikwete to sidestep Mr Ruto and Ms Karua that broke the deadlock in the talks.
@dailynation ODM and PNU teams could not agree on almost anything until Mr Odinga and Mr Kibaki were hoarded into a room with only the negotiators, who included Graça Machel, the wife of former South African president and freedom icon Nelson Mandela.
@dailynation Mr Kikwete had just assumed the chairmanship of the Africa Union from Ghanaian President John Kufuor, who first steered the talks in Kenya before Annan was asked to step in by the UN.
@dailynation Before then, Mr Mkapa says in his book, the ODM and PNU sides were intransigent as they argued fiercely about who won the election and thus deserved executive control of State levers. It was particularly difficult for ODM to accept Mr Kibaki as president of Kenya.
@dailynation We would meet each team separately, then together. When together, they would have fierce arguments. Sometimes I thought they would literally go for each other’s throats - Benjamin Mkapa
@dailynation Ironically, if matters got very heated, we would adjourn to have coffee and stroll outside together, where they would mix as if they were compatriots or even friends, conversing easily and sometimes laughing. - Benjamin Mkapa
@dailynation He recalls that President Museveni muddied the already dark waters when he arrived later in January to try to help things out in his capacity as chairman of the East Africa Community.
@dailynation But the Uganda leader, Mr Mkapa adds, made remarks that painted him as being pro-Kibaki. Mr Museveni would quietly leave the talks and fly back home.
@dailynation Mr Mkapa says his involvement in the talks shortly after the post-election skirmishes in December 2007, was first under the umbrella of the African Forum of Former Heads of State.
@dailynation Mr Mkapa believes that a visit by the mediation team to camps where victims of the violence and the internally displaced were, calmed tension and restored hope in Kenyans.
@dailynation He says he was saddened by the images he saw at Eldoret stadium and Kiambaa Church, also in Eldoret, where more than 40 women and children were burnt to death on New Year’s Day in 2008.
@dailynation Poor innocent children were killed or injured. So sad. What did uhuru (independence) mean to these suffering people who had lost loved ones, had been injured and fled their homes? How could any leader condone this? It was tragic. I hope this never happens in my country- B. MKapa
@dailynation In the locked room with only Mr Kibaki, Mr Odinga and their lawyers Amos Wako and James Orengo respectively, the mediators made it clear that Kenya’s burden and the way out of the bloody crisis was squarely on their shoulders.
@dailynation We locked ourselves in until we finally resolved the outstanding issues. We stressed to the two leaders that what mattered was mutual respect and establishing a working relationship as it was high time for them to be pragmatic - Benjamin Mkapa
@dailynation The team eventually agreed on issues that the government of national unity would tackle and the size of the Cabinet, which ended up with 44 ministers and many assistant ministers.
@dailynation Once Mr Kibaki and Mr Odinga agreed to share power, the negotiation team put an extra valve, skipping the need to have the two leaders’ locked-out cronies endorse the deal.
@dailynation When these two (Ruto and Karua) heard that they were being invited to witness the signing of the agreement, they were furious, saying there had been a conspiracy to persuade Kibaki to agree - Benjamin Mkapa
@dailynation The former Tanzanian head of state says he is proud to have been part of the efforts to prevent a precipice in neighbouring Kenya, and puts it down to negotiators being honest with the antagonists about the grim consequences and appealing to their inner conscience as humans.
@dailynation Locking Ruto, Karua out of 2008 PEV talks saved Kenya, says former Tanzanian president Benjamin Mkapa in his new autobiography launched last week in Tanzania. bit.ly/2NUVIu8 cc @cobbo3
