The truce between the government and the opposition will be tested this week after Azimio la Umoja One Kenya leader Raila Odinga gave President William Ruto 48 hours to ensure talks begin or they will resume protests.
Mr Odinga said the talks by the bipartisan committee must commence tomorrow, failure to which Azimio will revoke the agreement to stand down the protests.
The notice comes hot on the heels of a demand to have the talks, aimed at resolving the August 2022 post-election stalemate, among other issues, concluded within 30 days.
The Azimio leader said they are ready to explore other options available to them should the committee not resume its engagement.
Mr Odinga pointed to reluctance by their Kenya Kwanza counterparts to begin discussions, accusing the ruling alliance of frustrating last week’s truce through lack of goodwill.
“Now we are seeing signs of reluctance, saying they don’t have a quorum to begin discussions and so on. We have given them today and tomorrow and talks must start in earnest by Wednesday. If their delegation is not ready by Wednesday, we will treat that gentleman’s agreement as cancelled and we will explore other options available to us as Azimio,” said Mr Odinga.
He was speaking yesterday during a press conference at the Jaramogi Oginga Odinga Foundation offices in Nairobi flanked by Narc Kenya leader Martha Karua, Jubilee Party Secretary-General Jeremiah Kioni and Roots Party leader George Wajackoyah.
Mr Odinga added that they knew that the removal of Eldas MP Adan Keynan from the committee was a smokescreen to pacify them as the country was playing host to high-profile leaders including Japan’s Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
“We acted in good faith last Thursday to call off the demonstrations because Kenya Kwanza had approached us and said they were ready for talks,” said Mr Odinga. “We knew that the real reason was because visitors were coming to town and they did not want demonstrations that time. But we did act in good faith ourselves because they said they were serious.”
Last Friday, the committee led by MPs Otiende Amollo and George Murugara resumed engagements, announcing they had settled on advocates Muthomi Thiankolu for Kenya Kwanza and Paul Mwangi for Azimio as joint secretaries.
They further expressed commitment by both sides to iron out the contested issues, saying it had made progress on whether the talks should be purely parliamentary or involve other stakeholders
Speaking to the Nation yesterday, Mr Amollo said the committee will meet on Wednesday.
“I hereby humbly and kindly invite you to a meeting of the bipartisan dialogue committee to be held on Wednesday, May 10, 2023 starting 10am at the Bomas of Kenya,” reads the letter dated May 7 by the Rarieda MP to the 14 members and joint secretaries.
He said the meeting will continue from where they ended last week with finalisation on framework agreement and related issues, decision on the form of the talks and period of the dialogue set to feature prominently.
Kakamega Senator, Boni Khalwale, a member of the committee said he is optimistic of smooth talks this week. His Nairobi counterpart Edwin Sifuna said he is hopeful the talks will yield tangible results as there is no going back should the discussions fail.
