This Thursday, February 23, Abdelmadjid Tebboune received the Speaker of the Kenyan Parliament, Moses Wetangula, who is on an official visit to Algeria at the head of a parliamentary delegation. The day before, Wetangula had talks with the head of diplomacy, Ramtane Lamamra. On this occasion, the two parties pledged “to build a mutually beneficial strategic partnership to strengthen their contribution to the realization of the continental agenda, to mobilize support for just causes, in particular decolonization in Western Sahara, and to combine efforts to find African solutions to African problems”, indicates the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in a press release.
The Speaker of the Kenyan Parliament is known for his support for the Polisario. A recent report of the South African center “Institute for security studies” claims that Moses Wetangula, a former foreign minister, convinced President William Ruto to withdraw his tweet, of September 14, in which he had announced the rupture of diplomatic relations with the “Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR)”. Wetangula is also the leader of the FORD Kenya Party, a member of the Kenya Kwanza coalition which backed Ruto’s candidacy for the August 2022 presidential elections.
The meeting between Abdelmadjid Tebboune and the Speaker of the Kenyan Parliament comes as a response to the meeting between the Head of Government, Aziz Akhannouch, and the President of Kenya, William Ruto, on January 26 in Dakar. “Kenya and the Kingdom of Morocco enjoy deep economic relations, particularly in the areas of trade, agriculture, health, tourism and energy. We are committed to accelerating and strengthening our strategic ties for the shared benefit of the citizens of both countries,” Ruto wrote on Twitter at the time.
