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AU chief heads to Kenya
26/02/2008 15:26 - (SA)
Nairobi - The African Union chief Jakaya Kikwete travelled to Kenya on Tuesday for a two-day visit to support mediation talks seeking a way out of the country's bloody post-electoral crisis, said an official.
The talks, launched by the pan-African bloc and led by former United Nations chief Kofi Annan, were yet to yield a breakthrough since they begun last month.
Kikwete's visit would "re-affirm the support of the AU to the ongoing talks", said Eliphas Barine, a top official in the Kenyan foreign ministry.
Government and opposition negotiators were locked in discussions on the post of prime minister that would be created as part of a power-sharing deal between President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga.
Kibaki declared winner
On Monday, Annan met with Kibaki and Odinga in a bid to break a deadlock over details of the special prime ministerial post in a nation that constitutionally provided for strong presidential powers.
The east African country slid into bloodshed and political turmoil after Kibaki was declared the winner of closely fought December 27 polls, but Odinga accused him of rigging his way to victory.
Kikwete was the president of neighbouring Tanzania and was chosen as the new chairperson of the pan-African body at its summit in Addis Ababa at the beginning of February.
More than 1 500 people had been killed and hundreds of thousands of others displaced by violence that quickly turned into ethnic killings and reprisals as well as a police crackdown.
Annan's mediation was seen as Kenya's best hope for a political solution to one of its worst crises since independence from Britain in 1963.
- AFP
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