NAIROBI, Kenya Dec 12 – President Uhuru Kenyatta has not given up on the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI).
In his address at the Jamhuri Day celebrations, Kenyatta said “BBI is just a dream deferred, one day, someday, it will happen.”
The constitutional amendment initiative was dismissed by the High Court and later the Court of Appeal before its proponents filed a challenge at the Supreme Court where it is yet to be determined.
“I say again today that BBI is a dream deferred, one day, some day, it will happen,” he said during celebrations to mark the 58th Jamhuri Day celebrations.
The initiative was a product of Kenyatta’s handshake with Opposition chief Raila Odinga, in what was dismissed by Deputy President William Ruto as the “biggest fraud in Kenya’s history” and it was successfully challenged in court by human rights activists.
“And we discovered that the politics of exclusion in which the winner takes all was not good for our county and we were bold enough to change the Constitution and expand the executive to accommodate the excluded,” Kenyatta said.
He called on Kenyans and political leaders to respect each others ‘ opinion and ensure the remaining cracks in the country are fixed.
“We as Kenyans need each other, nation before self, as our forefathers had taught us to come together reinforced our resolve. Therefore again, I will continue to say that we need to come together and mend the crack on the wall of our nation because just as the country cannot survive ethnic majoritarianism and exclusion just in the same breath, it cannot survive unfair and skewed representation,” Kenyatta said.
On November 30 during the State of the Nation Address, the Head of State defended the BBI again and said that political stabilization is a continuous process that every administration must apply their minds to and secure.
“The need for political stabilization is the most urgent task facing Kenya today, and it is the foundation upon, which our greater justice, fairness, health, wealth, and security will be built on. For that reason, it shall happen,” he said.
The BBI process was nullified by the High Court in a ruling that was later upheld by the Appeals court before its proponents moved to the Supreme Court where the matter is still pending.
