 |
| Daily Nation Photo |
It is shortly after 2 am in Nairobi, and it is time to call the referendum for the “Yes” (Green) side in the referendum that took place yesterday. The “Yes” side has 4,112,900 (66.8%)and the “No” side has 2,040,700 (33.2%). There are just under 3m votes to be announced, and even if the “No” side took 75% of it, it will not overturn the result.
So President Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga, who were leading the “Yes” side can turn off the lights, kiss their wives goodbye, and wake up to take a sweet victory to the bank.
The new Kenya constitution has the most progressive bill of rights in Africa, a notch better than even South Africa’s. But the referendum outcome is significant for greater reasons in Africa.
In December 2002, Kenya became the country – and so far only – country in the wider Eastern Africa in which an opposition defeated a ruling party at democratic elections.
The constitution change today represents the FIRST TIME that a group of reformists have actually managed this kind of reform through a civil political process. Everywhere else in Africa, radicals and reformists (and I use these words cautiously here) have only changed constitution after they seized power through a military coup (Jerry Rawlings in Ghana, Thomas Sankara in Bourkina Faso, etc), or through an armed rebellion (Yoweri Museveni in Uganda, the ANC in South Africa, SWAPO in Namibia, Meles Zenawi in Ethiopia, the list is endless).
The question is why Kenya? That is a story I will venture to tell another day, but you clever Facebookers are welcome to take a stab at it.
So President Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga, who were leading the “Yes” side can turn off the lights, kiss their wives goodbye, and wake up to take a sweet victory to the bank.
The new Kenya constitution has the most progressive bill of rights in Africa, a notch better than even South Africa’s. But the referendum outcome is significant for greater reasons in Africa.
In December 2002, Kenya became the country – and so far only – country in the wider Eastern Africa in which an opposition defeated a ruling party at democratic elections.
The constitution change today represents the FIRST TIME that a group of reformists have actually managed this kind of reform through a civil political process. Everywhere else in Africa, radicals and reformists (and I use these words cautiously here) have only changed constitution after they seized power through a military coup (Jerry Rawlings in Ghana, Thomas Sankara in Bourkina Faso, etc), or through an armed rebellion (Yoweri Museveni in Uganda, the ANC in South Africa, SWAPO in Namibia, Meles Zenawi in Ethiopia, the list is endless).
The question is why Kenya? That is a story I will venture to tell another day, but you clever Facebookers are welcome to take a stab at it.
No comments:
Post a Comment