Keynote Statement at the UN Security Council Arria-Formula Meeting on Haiti

Yesterday, President Kenyatta returned home from Washington DC after what was a historic whirlwind tour of historical diplomatic proportions for Kenya.

President Kenyatta had left Nairobi and traveled to Addis Ababa to attend the inauguration of Prime Minister Abiy of Ethiopia, and while there took the opportunity to remind the leadership and the Ethiopian people that the time for making peace in Ethiopia had come, that the new government was now formed and the Prime Minister installed and given a fresh mandate to build peace and bring the nation of Ethiopia together.

From Addis Ababa, President Kenyatta flew directly to Bridgetown, Barbados, on what must have been among the first nonstop transcontinental and trans-Atlantic flights of any head of state in either direction. President Kenyatta made that trip because he wanted to be in Bridgetown to meet and commune with the Caribbean community at a significant global conference on international trade and development, UNCTAD.

While in Barbados, President Kenyatta spoke with leaders from the region and reiterated what he had said during the first-ever African-CARICOM conference, which he had hosted less than a month before: that the bonds of blood, experience and heritage between the Caribbean and the African continent can never be broken, not even after the treacherous, exploitative and horrific history that both the Caribbean and Africa suffered at the hands of European colonizers and modern-day imperialists.

Upon leaving Bridgetown, President Kenyatta came directly to New York to take up his presidency of the United Nations Security Council. That event was itself a historic milestone for Kenya, given the enormous peace and security challenges facing countries on our continent. For President Kenyatta, being at the Security Council was an opportunity for Kenya, and for himself, to provide leadership and to be a beacon of hope in guiding the resolution of security and development challenges in our region and continent, and to send the signal that business as usual at the Security Council would never deliver the solutions necessary for greater peace and security, nor the hope for social and economic transformation yearned for throughout the world.

While in New York, President Kenyatta engaged the New York diplomatic corps at the International Peace Institute, in a presentation built around an idea whose time has come: that the deep bond between the African people and the larger global African diaspora has matured and come into its own.

In speaking to both the UN Security Council and the International Peace Institute, President Kenyatta reminded everyone of the Secretary-General's refrain that humanity faces a stark and urgent choice, "to either break down or break through." He reiterated the Secretary-General's sentiment that the inability of multilateral institutions to deliver bold solutions, including for the COVID-19 pandemic, climate change, sustainable development, and state collapse, had become something the world could no longer ignore, and that we would do so at our collective peril.

President Kenyatta, in speaking to these concerns, singled out what in his mind was the starkest failure of multilateralism: Haiti.

Haiti, a nation that has faced incessant, protracted state collapse, social, economic and political implosion, most demonstrates just how deep the failure of multilateralism has been in our world. For over half a century, the international community has been unable to help this great and historic republic of the western hemisphere find sustainable peace, establish credible and responsible governance, and facilitate development for its citizenry. Today, Haiti is a society on the verge of irreversible collapse.

That it has taken an African president traversing the continent and the Atlantic to deliver this message is immensely significant and a seminal moment in our collective history. The message is as simple as it is poignant: the world can no longer turn its back on Haiti, and cannot continue to provide solutions to Haiti's problems that do not speak to Haiti's people's needs.

President Kenyatta's message is clear: post-colonial Africa, now having come of age, must embrace a global consciousness, beyond Pan-Africanism, that sees the suffering of its kith and kin across the globe and makes that suffering and injustice its concern. This consciousness recognizes that there are close to half a billion people of African ancestry outside the African continent who not only yearn for a connection with the mother continent, but who also recognize that their political, economic and social future is connected to Africa and to African roots and the future promise of the African continent.

Africa itself has come to realize that it must rise to the challenge presented not just by fellow African countries facing social, political and security challenges, but by the challenges facing societies and communities of the African diaspora, who need the solidarity and commitment of African nations in the wake of the horrors they face in a modern globalized world that demonstrates little solidarity for the suffering of humanity, and particularly for people of African descent.

To concretize his concerns and chart a way forward, President Kenyatta asked the international community to take up five considerations:

First, CARICOM should scale up its efforts to bring all Haitian stakeholders to the table for an inclusive dialogue to decisively address the political challenges, though this requires Haitian stakeholders to acknowledge that their country needs a political reengineering to usher in a people-centred political dispensation.

Second, the international community and institutions should work with CARICOM and Haiti to identify needs and support a comprehensive development agenda for Haiti, including the formation of a Group of Friends for Haiti.

Third, there is a need to rebuild Haiti's battered institutions, including legislative, judicial, administrative and infrastructure, going beyond physical facilities to the training of human resources to restore confidence, competence and discipline in the delivery of services.

Fourth, given the frequent environmental disasters that have plagued Haiti as a reminder of the impact of climate change, and with the next UN Conference of the Parties on climate change (COP26) approaching, the international community should deliver climate-action-linked economic recovery initiatives for Haiti, including infrastructure.

Fifth, the Security Council should strengthen the mandate of the United Nations Integrated Office in Haiti (BINUH), which as currently constituted is no longer adequate given the evolved situation, and should be expanded to go beyond offering advice to providing real and tangible support.

President Kenyatta emphasized that the challenge for Haiti is not necessarily a need for a sympathetic response for humanitarian and emergency needs alone, important and crucial as that is. Haiti needs support to turn around state collapse, to build its institutions for government and governance, to rebuild its social and security apparatus, to reestablish its health and education infrastructure, to help the nation rise again and win the confidence of its citizens and its investors. This is why President Kenyatta promised that Kenya will avail 2,000 places in Kenyan institutions, in training and capacity building, in areas of governance, government, policing, defense, health, teaching, and any other area Haitians themselves recognize as fundamental for their national turnaround.

President Kenyatta is reaching out to the international community, CARICOM and like-minded partners across the globe, north and south, African, American, European and Asian, to join him in availing Haiti the deep institutional support its fundamental needs require, in an effort to save this great republic whose latter-day condition is a scar on the world's conscience.

I thank you.