THE STANDARD
The decision by the Government to throw diplomatic etiquette out the window last Thursday was puzzling and, quite frankly, distressing. This is in reference to the Press release from the Secretary to the Cabinet Mr Francis Kimemia, which accused the United States of America of financing subversive activity in Kenya.
No self-respecting media house would have taken the letter at face value for the simple reason that the allegations made were so serious, one would have expected the communication to have come from the Cabinet Secretary for the Interior, or someone higher up the ladder.
Second, the tone of the letter was so undiplomatic and crude, it did not appear to match the polished communication one expects from a Government that prides itself on doing things differently from its predecessors.
The accusations appeared totally wild and out of place, and the decision to peg their release on the day a demonstration against the State was being broken up by police with batons and in riot gear appeared contrived. It is normal for political lackeys of the Government to make all manner of claims at rallies and rail at “foreign forces”. It is quite another for a government to actually make the same allegations in a casual and lackadaisical fashion, because when that happens, it is no longer “political talk”, but the official position of the President and his deputy.
We are not privy to the alleged intelligence informing the authoring and release of Kimemia’s statement, but the claims sounded so improbable, they only served to make the Government look incompetent and confused. It was also quite instructive that nobody within the very capable Presidential Strategic Communications Unit, or even the Deputy President’s office, was ready to vouch for the authenticity of the Press release when contacted, despite it being signed by Kimemia.
What this reveals is that the Government needs to co-ordinate better and tighten its communication of sensitive information to the media, regardless of its authenticity (the US has dismissed the claims) to ensure it is couched in better language and not sensationalised to justify certain State actions in future. What happened on Thursday should never be allowed to happen again.
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