{{A former senior diplomat under President George W. Bush has criticised the United States for not formally recognizing Uhuru Kenyatta\u2019s victory in last week\u2019s elections.}}<\/p>\n
Jendayi Frazer, a former United States Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs said the US and Europe were playing a dangerous game for their delayed endorsement of Kenyatta\u2019s presidency.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf the US, the UK and the Europeans don\u2019t want to deal with Uhuru Kenyatta, he has another option,\u201d she cautioned.<\/p>\n
Speaking in an interview with American TV channel PBS, Frazer said that Kenya is a strategic partner to the United States and a key ally in the fight against terrorism in addition to being East Africa\u2019s economic hub.<\/p>\n
\u201cMany American businesses like FORD, General Electric and others are based there so it\u2019s key to the region as whole,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
However, she warned that the West risked losing it\u2019s strategic influence in the region.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe geo-strategic environment has changed entirely and particulary (in favour of) China. The Chinese have changed the playing field (and) if the US, the UK and Europeans don\u2019t want to deal with Uhuru Kenyatta, he has another option,\u201d she explained.<\/p>\n
Frazer who says she has been to Kenya twice this year said the fact that the Chinese ambassador and Foreign Ministry have already welcomed Kenyatta by referring to him as President-elect.<\/p>\n
Frazer accused the US, Canada and Britain of meddling in Kenyans domestic affairs by threatening to put trade sanctions to Kenya, if they elected Kenyatta.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey are in a bad situation because prior to the election, they threatened the Kenyan electorate by saying \u2018if you elect Uhuru Kenyatta, there will be consequences; we may put trade sanctions,\u2019 which was extra ordinary because the case for Kenyatta is not proven,\u201d she explained.<\/p>\n
She said that the diffusion of power, the expectations about the new institutions as well as the lessons learnt from the 2007 General Elections had accounted for the lack of violence this time.<\/p>\n
Frazer also explained that the tribal competition is still imminent and that this election was based on community voting for \u201ctheir boys\u201d .<\/p>\n
\u201cThe need for healing and reconciliation is still much there in Kenya,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
{Wirestory}<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
{{A former senior diplomat under President George W. Bush has criticised the United States for not formally recognizing Uhuru Kenyatta\u2019s victory in last week\u2019s elections.}} Jendayi Frazer, a former United States Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs said the US and Europe were playing a dangerous game for their delayed endorsement of Kenyatta\u2019s presidency. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[99],"byline":[170],"hashtag":[],"class_list":["post-6505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-greatlakesnews","byline-igihe"],"bylines":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"contributors":[{"id":170,"name":"IGIHE","slug":"igihe","description":"","image":{"id":0,"url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&d=mm&f=y&r=g","alt":"Default avatar","title":"Default avatar","caption":"","mime_type":"image\/jpeg","sizes":[]},"user_id":8}],"featured_image":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6505\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6505"},{"taxonomy":"byline","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/byline?post=6505"},{"taxonomy":"hashtag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.igihe.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hashtag?post=6505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}