EAC adopts political confederation model to create awareness

Cabinet Secretary Rebecca Miano. [Elvis Ogina Standard]

East African Community (EAC) has launched a political confederation model to promote participation in a bid to inform the policy decisions to be made among the member states.

The Ministry of EAC, Arid and Semi-Arid Lands and Regional Development Cabinet Secretary Rebecca Miano presided over the National stakeholders' consultation in Mombasa on Monday, May 8.

She noted that the Ministry has made major strides since its revival in 2000 in the implementation of various pillars towards regional integration as Kenya gets third in line for the launch after Burundi and Uganda.

"We have made significant progress in our shared economic and social-cultural cooperation and productive and services sectors and more recently, enhanced cooperation in defence and interstate security," Miano said.

The CS noted that they have met a number of obstacles in their journey to the establishment of political confederation citing lack of awareness across the regions.

The Ministry has tasked its stakeholders to a team of constitutional experts including former chief justice of Uganda Justice Odoki and former attorney general Amos Wako to create awareness on the issue.

"It will listen and engage the Kenyans on what type of Confederal Constitution EAC should have. The team will hold meetings in our former provincial headquarters and will listen to respondents from all 47 counties. Thereafter, it will sit in Nairobi to listen to other national stakeholders," she added.

The experts will major on cooperation under the political confederation; the governing structure of the political confederation; modes of decision-making by the confederal authority and the governance principles of the confederation which entails the relationship between individual Partner States and the confederal authority.

Additionally, it will focus on funding the operations of the confederal authority; the mode of adoption of the constitution establishing the political confederation and any other constitutional issues of concern to stakeholders.