24/05/2023
PRESS STATEMENT BY AZIMIO LA UMOJA ONE KENYA COALITION PARTY;
MAY 24, 2023.
This was a meeting of the Azimio leadership and our delegation to the bipartisan talks.
The meeting received a progress report on the talks and events leading to the decision by our team to declare a stalemate and suspend the talks.
The meeting discussed in detail the continuing attacks on Azimio la Umoja by Kenya Kwanza despite our protests and express provisions of the Constitution.
A number of issues emerged.
First, the talks appear to have proceeded well until yesterday when our delegation tried to move into substantive issues.
As Kenyans are aware, our substantive issues remain as follows:
a) Immediate steps to lower the cost of living. We dare add that cost of living has acquired more urgency in light of the Finance Bill, the continued rise in the cost of basics like unga, sugar and fuel, the continuing fall of the Kenya shilling and the new raft of taxes that the Kenya Kwanza administration is determined to push down the throats of suffering Kenyans.
b) Audit of IEBC election servers.
c) Restructuring and reconstitution of the IEBC.
d) An end to the efforts by Kenya Kwanza to incapacitate, kill or take over other parties. We hasten to add that the desire to kill political parties go beyond the attacks going on and include efforts by the Kenya Kwanza regime to deny funding to Azimio-affiliated political parties.
It is a standard procedure that for any team of negotiators to delve into substantive issues, they need to agree to take some preliminary steps that preserve the substantive matters.
Going by this established principle in negotiations, our delegation asked that there be some preliminary actions on the cost of living, agree to the preservation of the IEBC servers in light of the fact that we have asked for audit of the same, suspension of the selection panel of IEBC in light of the fact that it is an agenda of the talks, and a cessation of Kenya Kwanza invasion of Azimio as talks go on.
Unfortunately, our team met resistance, hostility and outright rejection on all the desired preliminary actions.
Kenya Kwanza could not commit to stop the invasion of Jubilee, preservation the servers, interim measures at reduction of cost of unga and suspension of the process of hiring new IEBC commissioners.
In other words, Kenya Kwanza wants to continue with measures that make cost of living even more expensive, they want to interfere with the IEBC servers, proceed with the picking of new IEBC commissioners and continue invading Azimio parties while we sit in board rooms talking about the same issues.
Our delegation therefore came to the decision that if the interim measures cannot be guaranteed, there would be no need to move into substantive issues.
The framework agreement that set up the talks provides for a seven-day suspension of talks in the event of stalemate and our delegation proceeded to invoke this provision.
If at the end of the seven days we will not be able to resume, the talks will be considered to have collapsed.
A number of other issues have emerged from the talks.
One is that the Kenya Kwanza side is essentially several teams in one; the members are answering to different bosses and are not moving in the same direction. They are getting different instructions and area clearly pulling in different directions.
Secondly, Kenya Kwanza has no clear direction on whether the talks should proceed or not. Deliberately, they have no clear direction from Mr. William Ruto on how to proceed.
Three, Kenya Kwanza sees the talks as a process of managing the political situation, calm down the political temperatures and continue with business as usual.
Fourth, the destabilization of the Jubilee Party is a do-or-die agenda, sponsored by the highest level of Kenya Kwanza leadership whose aim is to ensure Kenya Kwanza obtains a super majority in parliament and amend the constitution, remove presidential term limits, abolish devolution and remove the independence of constitutional commissions and place them as part of the Presidency.
Kenya Kwanza also wants to remove the necessity of Parliament approving every tax measure and wants to give the President power to impose some taxes without always having to go through a Finance Bill for every increase.
In light of the above, we state as follows:
a) We endorse the decision by our delegation to walk out of the talks. Until Kenya Kwanza agrees to deal with the interim issues raised by our team, the talks will remain suspended.
b) The issue of opening the server, cost of living , cessation of attacks in Jubilee and other political parties are not negotiable
c) We recognize the resolutions of our affiliate party Jubilee reached at the Party’s Special National Delegates Convention, including the change of leadership, which must be taken as final. We demand that these resolutions be respected and enforced by the Office of the Registrar of Political Parties.
d) Kenya Kwanza must make no mistake that Azimio will do everything possible to protect its affiliate parties from these heinous attacks. We ask all Kenyans to join us in protecting multiparty democracy for which many Kenyans lost their lives.
e) All Jubilee Party Members of Parliament who have crossed the floor and joined Kenya Kwanza must go for by-election. Those who hold their positions by virtue of their nomination by Azimio must have their nominations revoked.
f) The Registrar of Political Parties Ms. Anne Nderitu must leave office in view of clear manifestations that she has been co-opted into partisan and illegal schemes by Kenya Kwanza to cripple instead of protecting political parties. Anne Nderitu no longer enjoys the confidence of her clients, the political parties.
g) The meeting resolved and has given authority to our team in the bipartisan talks to issue a notice of dissolution of the talks in the event Kenya Kwanza will not publicly accede to the interim measures in the next 6 days in line with the provisions of the framework agreement.
h) Thereafter the Azimio Coalition will communicate our next cause of action at a PG scheduled for Tuesday next week.
