Kenyatta victory could test diplomats’ skills

Only minutes after Uhuru Kenyatta was announced the winner of Kenya’s presidential elections, the first diplomatic incident was in the making. Senior western officials attending a ceremony to usher in the victor, after a nerve-wracking week of vote counting glitches, walked out.

They did so not because they were worried about the credibility of the controversial vote count. Rather it was because Kenya’s newly elected president and his deputy William Ruto are indicted for crimes against humanity, accused at the International Criminal Court of marshalling the militias that hacked people to death and burned them alive in post-election violence five years ago.

That diplomatic two-step is about to become ungainly. Western powers backed the principles of international justice as a way of bringing an end to a long history of impunity in the absence of a government willing to try the leading suspects.

But Kenya’s western allies, already presiding over a steady erosion of influence as China and other emerging powers step up their courtship of Africa, also rely on Kenya for critical military, economic and diplomatic ties.

Britain, the lead donor to the shambolic electoral commission that announced Mr Kenyatta as president-elect, is in an especially difficult position.

Western donors, led by Britain, spent millions of dollars supporting electronic safeguards to protect the integrity of the vote count, all of which failed. Raila Odinga, the defeated runner-up and outgoing prime minister said on Saturday he is taking claims of “rampant illegalities” to the courts; civil society activists called for a suspension of the count.

Ambiguous signals are likely to become a regular feature of western diplomatic relations with Kenya. Despite the chaotic process, international observers were quick to praise the largely peaceful conduct of the polls and to support the embattled electoral body as its counting process unravelled – so much that Mr Odinga claims it is impossible to know who won.

Like much of the Kenyan media, they appear fearful of the consequences of rocking the boat.

“[Western diplomats] make all sorts of statements about the importance of democracy but they’ll always settle for stability over democracy – they don’t want to be blamed for causing conflict,” says Stephen Brown, a Kenya expert at Ottawa University who researches donor relations.

Foreign diplomats also unwittingly played into Mr Kenyatta’s hand: his campaign tapped into a rich vein of hostility towards western paternalism, presenting the ICC case as an example of neo-colonial interference and accusing Britain’s high commissioner of “shadowy, suspicious and rather animated involvement”.

“It’s been a blessing for us,” says an adviser to Mr Kenyatta of the ICC case he believes won votes in a close-run race. It might yet turn into something else. Mr Kenyatta, if he continues to co-operate with the court, faces trial starting in July and potentially long absences from his country.

He and Mr Ruto have vowed to clear their names. But were they to refuse to co-operate with the court that would make it harder for Kenya and for western policymakers who have hinted at possible sanctions. Diplomats have already reduced their contact with Mr Kenyatta to “essential contact” only.

Western donors provide less than 12 per cent of Kenya’s budget through grants and loans. But because of the west’s security concerns in the region Kenya receives significant military aid from the US, the EU and Britain. UK investors make up more than half the capitalisation of the country’s bullish stock market.

“The UK is a meaningful investor with much deeper ties in Kenya than somewhere like Sudan [whose president Omar al-Bashir is also indicted at the ICC and drawn wide-ranging sanctions]; the UK and Kenya are much more interconnected,” says investment adviser Aly-Khan Satchu. “They all have to work out how to square this circle.”

Mr Kenyatta said in a recent interview that he has no problem with the west but has other options: “We will work with those that want to work with us – for me it’s Kenya first.”

Western policymakers may decide to increase their definition of “essential contact”; Mr Kenyatta can soften his anti-western rhetoric. After all, his campaign was somewhat disingenuous. The anti-British sentiment whipped up by his campaign was partly shaped by British consultants, BTP Advisers. “Kenya’s natural inclination is to the west. That’s not going to change,” says a well-connected businessman from Mr Kenyatta’s Kikuyu ethnic group.