2023-11-16 22:18:45
NAIROBI.- The Kenyan Parliament approved the deployment of a thousand police officers in Haiti as part of a multinational United Nations mission, despite the controversy that this initiative has generated and the temporary blockade ordered in October by a Kenyan court.
“This House has approved the deployment of National Police Service agents to the Multinational Security Support Mission in Haiti,” announced the vice president of the Kenyan National Assembly (Lower House of Parliament), Gladys Shollei.
Thus, Shollei indicated that the deputies of the National Assembly have not received the judicial request from the High Court of Nairobi, which last month ordered the temporary blocking of the deployment of the Kenyan Police in Haiti, in response to the demand of the lawyer and opposition politician. , Ekuru Aukot.
The plaintiffs maintain, among other arguments, that the Constitution of Kenya limits the deployment of police for operations within the national territory.
Despite this legal battle, the Kenyan Government gave the green light on October 13 to the deployment of the Police in the Caribbean country to fight once morest insecurity, although the Minister of the Interior, Kithure Kindiki, indicated then that Parliament would have the last word regarding that movement.
In addition, the head of the Interior assured that Kenya must first receive the 36.57 billion shillings (regarding 225 million euros) that he estimates the deployment will cost.
«Our parliamentarians are disobeying a court order. (…) Our Parliament has sold its soul to the United States, which wants to clean up the disaster it has caused in Haiti,” Aukot lamented this Thursday, according to statements reported by local media.
The initiative has also been opposed by several opposition deputies, but the ruling coalition, Kenya Kwanza (“Kenya First”, in Swahili), of President William Ruto, has the majority in the National Assembly.
Kenya has offered to lead a multinational mission in Haiti, approved on October 2 by the UN Security Council, which the Haitian Government itself requested a year ago and which always had the support of the UN Secretary General, Antonio Guterres.
Several Caribbean countries have also shown their willingness to participate with an undetermined number of agents in the mission, including Jamaica, Barbados and the Bahamas.
The UN has indicated that the mission would not resemble a peacekeeping or interposition force, as is usually the case, but rather would be a mere police support force under the orders of the Haitian Police.
Haiti is immersed in a deep crisis marked by extreme violence, with armed groups that control the capital, Port-au-Prince, and other parts of its territory, and are responsible for hundreds of murders, rapes, kidnappings and other crimes.
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