President Uhuru Kenyatta has assured Kenyans that the plans to amend the 2010 Constitution through the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI), which has faced legal obstacles, will be realised.
Addressing Wananchi during the 57th Jamhuri Day celebrations at Uhuru Gardens in Nairobi, the Head of State pointed out that the dream was alive in a bid to address the ‘winner takes it all' question in elections.
“…and although it encountered some legal obstacles, I can only say that BBI is just a dream deferred. One day, someday, it will happen, because the country cannot survive ethnic majoritarianism and exclusion just as it cannot survive unfair and skewed representation,” the President said.
“This is a design defect that we must fix,” he added.
BBI, the brainchild of President Kenyatta and ODM leader Raila Odinga which they hold sought to address exclusion in government, has faced legal challenges at both the High Court and the Court of Appeal .
Now, the Head of State has reiterated his commitment to ensure its realised albeit stringent timelines today. Mr Odinga has in the recent past also hinted at the revival of BBI soon after next year’s General Election.
On Sunday, the President noted that there is no place for one-manism in the project of building new Kenya.
“It is the collective work of every able-bodied Kenyan. And yes, we will disagree sometimes, but in our disagreements, we must remain respectful.”
“In fact, respectful disagreements are what lead to reconciliation. More so because when we disagree, it is a sign that we are making progress,” he said.
The making of a nation and the building of a house are also living processes, he said, adding, “they cannot be static; they must be dynamic.”
In December 1991, we discovered that the one-party system was a design error in our nationhood. And the advancement of the Republic had outlived its usefulness.”
“We made renovations and changed the system. In 2007, we ran into another architectural defect in our nation building project. We discovered that the politics of exclusion in which the ‘winner takes it all’ was not good for our country. We were bold enough to change the Constitution and expand the executive in order to accommodate the excluded,” the President added.
He also recalled his March 9, 2018 ‘Handshake’ with Mr Odinga, underscoring its success in cooling down the 2017 post-election tensions in the Country.
“When the former Prime Minister, Rt. Hon. Raila Odinga and I shook hands on March 9th, 2018, it was because we saw a crack on the wall of our nation.”
“We had run two elections that cost the country Sh1 trillion in business losses and we were staring at a nation divided right in the middle. Because we had disagreed respectfully, we knew that this was a mark of progress,” he noted.
He pointed out that even though it was a difficult move, it came on the recognition that Kenyans needed each other, “nation before self, as our forefathers had taught us to come together, reinforced our resolve.”
