Kenya will today explain and defend its decision to close the Dadaab refugee camp to the international community at a global conference on refugees in Turkey. On Saturday, President Uhuru Kenyatta deployed a high-powered delegation led by Deputy President William Ruto to the two-day World Humanitarian Summit that starts today.
Kenya is expressing frustration on bearing the burden of stabilising its neighbour Somalia and hosting hundreds of thousands of Somali refugees. This is what has led to Uhuru’s threat to withdraw Kenyan troops from Somalia and the decision to close the Dadaab camp. Uhuru has taken the international community head-on, telling UN Secretary General Ban ki-Moon last week that Kenya was not backing down on closing Dadaab.
The President has said the Kenyan national interest - and especially security - has been the motivation for his administration’s recent decisions. This country has experienced at least 130 terror attacks since the Kenya Defence Forces went into Somalia in October 2011, killing more than 470 people. The Kenyan authorities have also said that the refugee camps in the north of the country were breeding grounds for terrorists.
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Sources in the Presidency told the Star that Kenya was no longer interested in negotiations as the 2013 tripatriate agreement was yet to be honoured. “No meeting is required between the President and his Somalia counterpart, at the moment. We have an agreement signed three years ago that it yet to be fulfiled,” a senior State House official said.
Today, Ruto is expected to explain and defend Kenya’s decision to close the Dadaab camp, which will see more than 600,000 refugees repatriated. The DP left for Turkey on Saturday night, accompanied by Interior Cabinet Secretary Joseph Nkaissery, his Principal Secretary Karanja Kibicho and Foreign Aff airs PS Monica Juma.
Also in the delegation is National Assembly Defence and Foreign Aff airs committee chairman Ndung’u Gethnji, who was in Jubaland on Friday. The team, which also included Kitutu Chache South MP Richard Onyonka and Pokot South MP David Pkosing, had the blessings of State House in making the trip. Yesterday, Gethenji told the Star that the message Kenya was taking to Istanbul is that the “closure of Dadaab is unequivocal and consistent”. He said that this was one of the resolutions made by the House committee in their report on the 2014 Westgate Mall terror attack. In what is seen as part of Kenya’s diplomatic onslaught, Gethenji and
members of his committee paid a courtesy call on President Shiekh Ahmed Madobe of Jubaland. “He [Madobe] affi rmed willingness to receive the refugees. He was categorical on the returnees in that they are ready to receive their people: 80 per cent of refugees in Dadaab are from Jubaland. ey can make a great contribution to their state. And peace has largely returned to Jubaland,” Gethenji told the Star yesterday.
He added, “ The purpose of the trip was to visit our troops and assess the security situation in Jubaland. Talks with the President revolved around our relationship, security cooperation and return of refugees.” Kenya says that the international community has left it to handle the issue of Somalia on its own, especially in regards to mobilisation of resources. When Uhuru met the UN Security Council on ursday, he outlined the reasons why Kenya was contemplating the withdrawal of its troops as well as closure of the Dadaab camp.
The President held similar discussions with French President Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel in their own capitals last month. “As I have continued to say this is a global, not a regional, war, not a national war, it’s a global war. And we must be able to combine our resources and increase our resources to be able to combat this particular problem, be it on the Horn of Africa, be it in West Africa, be it in the Maghreb, be it in Iraq, be it in Syria, because we must fight this war together,” Uhuru said during the meetings with the two.
The UN Security Council team reported that Uhuru had expressed these concerns and said he did not see the value of Kenyan troops staying in Somalia. “Kenya was questioning whether it was worth the huge cost.
Uhuru asserted that Amisom was not getting the support it needed in terms of resources and equipment, and argued that the UN needed to take on a much greater role in this regard,” a dispatch by the UN stated. On the recent cuts in EU support, the UN team said that Uhuru said it was not Kenya’s role to close the funding gap and the logical conclusion would be for Kenya to pull out its troops.
“Kenyatta also raised the issue of accusations against Kenyan troops being involved in traffi cking of charcoal and other goods in Somalia, saying that if people did not appreciate what they were doing, there was no reason for them to stay,” the UN team said. On Dadaab, Uhuru told the UN team that Kenya was tired of shouldering the huge burden of the refugees and accused the international community of failing to support the government.
Uhuru reiterated Kenya’s commitment to fulfill its international obligations, claiming that it had done more than any country in the world in this regard. “Kenya was beginning to feel, however, that its efforts were taken for granted by the international community, and that international support was not commensurate with the burden, which now also included security threats,” the UN team said of the meeting at State House.
The President also told them that the refugee camps had become breeding grounds for terrorists and a hiding place for weapons. Uhuru also expressed concern over a tripartite agreement three years ago with Somalia and the UNHCR on the voluntary repatriation of refugees. He said that the funding to actualise the agreement had been less than promised and there had been no progress. “Kenya had therefore been forced to take its own measures.
He confirmed, however, that Kenya was still willing to host refugees and would not be closing down all the camps,” the UN team said. Uhuru told the UN team that the Defence Committee of the National Assembly was visiting regional administrations in Somalia to see if they would be ready to receive returning refugees, while stressing that Kenya did not want to put refugees in a situation where they might be harmed.