{East Africa’s efforts to jointly combat terrorism and strengthen military capabilities for conflict prevention and crisis management faced a huge blow over the weekend as Kenya refused to sign the Mutual Defence Pact.}
During a Council of Ministers meeting held at Munyonyo Commonwealth Resort, Rwanda and Uganda expressed willingness to sign the defence protocol.
However, it became clear that Kenya did not want to append its signature on the document.
Rwanda’s East Africa Affairs Valentine Rugwabiza told colleagues at the Summit that “Uganda and Rwanda are prepared to sign the protocol. But Kenya is not ready.”
The matter was deferred to the next Northern Corridor Summit.
Kenya did not give satisfactory reasons as to why it was uncomfortable signing the protocol. Some officials said the Attorney General needed to read through the documents.
However, highly placed sources said Kenya was unhappy with Uganda choosing the southern route for the construction of the oil pipeline to the Tanzanian port of Tanga.
“Kenyans are our brothers and sisters. But since we refused to allow the pipeline to pass through Kenya to Mombasa, their attitude has changed,” said a source.
“But we expect them to understand our situation and respect our decisions.”
The East African economic powerhouse has in recent years faced huge terror attacks in which hundreds of innocent civilians have died.
Kenya’s refusal to sign the defence pact is likely to see military cooperation between regional countries backslide.
In October last year, Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta, Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame and Uganda’s President Yoweri Museveni, assented to the defence protocol. This was after its ratification by all the partners.
Under the agreement, armed forces of partner states cooperate in conducting maritime patrols to boost security for the region’s international waters and fight piracy.
The pact further empowers partners states to encounter threats against regional security with immediate collective action.
In this case threats to national security, including armed attacks against a partner state shall be considered threats to regional security.
For example, if a rebel movement attacked any of the countries, member states are expected to rally a joint force to counter the security threat.
The three countries signed a common pact on the establishment of the Mutual Defence, Peace and Security Pact on January 8, 2014 in Kigali.
Other objectives of the pact include peace support operations; prevention of genocide; disaster management and crisis response; management of refugees; control of proliferation of small arms and light weapons; and combating transnational and cross border crimes.
Leave a Reply