Raila meets US congressman, to explain election boycott

Opposition leader Raila Odinga is set to explain to an American audience why he led a boycott of the October 26 presidential election.

He was to face President Uhuru Kenyatta for the second time but he pulled out citing lack of reforms at IEBC.

This saw Uhuru win 98 per cent of total votes cast and the other five candidates he faced share two per cent.

Raila is scheduled to deliver a speech on Thursday at the headquarters of Center for Strategic and International Studies at 5.30pm Kenyan time.

The centre is one of the leading policy think tank institutions in the world. Raila's lecture is titled 'Overcoming Kenya's political crisis and advancing democracy, rule of law and stability'.

Raila, who left Kenya for the US on Monday night and arrived on Wednesday morning, started the tour with a series of meetings.

One was a closed-door session with House of Representatives director Gregory Simpkins. The NASA leader also met Gregory Simpkins, Staff Director in the US House Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health and Human Rights, at the Africa-America Institute.

"[They discussed] ways to secure electoral justice in Kenya, following two sham elections," NASA said via Twitter on Thursday morning.

Opposition leader Raila Odinga during his meeting with US House of Representatives director Gregory Simpkins, November 8, 2017. /COURTESY

The Opposition chief is also expected to meet Kenyans living in the United States and address electoral injustice in Kenya.

He will not address the Congress as had earlier been reported because he is not a head of state.

This is Raila's first trip abroad after the controversial repeat presidential election that was marred by a voter turnout of 38.84 per cent and violence in his strongholds. The election turned the global spotlight on Kenya.

Read:Raila flys out to US to meet Congress on Kenya’s situation

After the repeat election, Raila's opposition alliance called for civil disobedience, including protests and a boycott of products and services by firms friendly to Uhuru's government, to force reforms.

The Opposition did not challenge Uhuru's victory at the Supreme Court and there has been no protest action, but voter and rights activists lodged cases on Monday.

The court has 14 days to review them.

Source