Diaspora Lobby Wants Release of Final BBI Report Suspended

Commonwealth Voter Privileges Right Association, a lobby of Kenyans living in the diaspora has called for a delay in the release of a final report by the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) taskforce.

The lobby in a petition to the BBI team said the report should not be released until there is a consensus among Kenyans to amend the 2010 constitution through a referendum.

The BBI team led by its chair Senator Yusuf Haji is expected to submit the final report to President Kenyatta and ODM leader Raila Odinga. 

The association argues that some groups including elected leaders were not given the chance to participate in the process.

“It would be necessary to allow debate on all the issues that arose during the Building Bridges Initiative public meetings before coming up with a conclusive report of what the public wants as the outcome,” part of the lobby’s petition reads.

The group warns the country could be left divided as witnessed after the 2005 referendum.

“We wish to bring to your attention of dispute that arose after the 2005 referendum. We do not want a process that would leave Kenyans more divided,” David Kimengere Waititu, the lobby’s organizing secretary told Daily Nation. 

“At the end, this will result to a badly contested referendum and create a poisoned society ahead of the 2022 general elections. In this regard, it is our view that the process be suspended and as a team the BBI should mid-wife a meeting between the proponents of the process and their opponents together with all stakeholders in a conference to iron out all contested issues,” Kimengere added.

Last week, Raila opined a referendum to introduce changes to the constitution could be held in November or December this year.

“Initially we were thinking that we would be able to do a referendum by July or August but this has not been possible. We are hoping Covid-19 will peak by September and after that, it will start going down in October. We will be in a position to do a referendum by the end of November or sometime in December,” he told NTV’s Kennedy Muriithi during an interview.