Institution
Building Bridges to a United Kenya Taskforce
The handshake that ended a political crisis, the reform process it launched, and the courts that later ruled it unconstitutional.
Kenya's 2017 general election produced Africa's first judicial annulment of an incumbent president's re-election, when the Supreme Court found irregularities in the August vote and ordered a rerun. The rerun in October returned President Uhuru Kenyatta to office after opposition leader Raila Odinga boycotted it, and the country entered 2018 with its two main political camps in open, at times violent, confrontation, Odinga's supporters going as far as staging a mock swearing-in of him as an alternative "People's President."
On 9 March 2018, Kenyatta and Odinga ended that standoff with a public handshake and a joint commitment to a shared set of national priorities. Kimani and Paul Mwangi were appointed the same day to co-lead, as joint secretaries, the process of translating that commitment into action: first a 14-member Presidential Taskforce, gazetted that May, which spent seventeen months consulting more than 7,000 citizens across all 47 counties before submitting its report in October 2019.
A second, distinct body, the BBI Steering Committee, was gazetted in January 2020 specifically to validate the Taskforce's findings through further consultation and translate them into concrete legal instruments, including a draft constitutional amendment bill, which it submitted in October 2020. Both reports carry Kimani's and Mwangi's signatures as the process's joint secretaries, and both are archived here in full alongside this record.
The Steering Committee's draft amendment bill was the instrument that then went to a public referendum process, IEBC signature verification beginning that December, county assembly approvals, and a National Assembly vote, before running directly into Kenya's courts.
Three successive rulings, from the High Court in May 2021 through the Court of Appeal that August to the Supreme Court in March 2022, found the constitutional amendment process unlawful, chiefly on the ground that a sitting president has no constitutional authority to initiate an amendment through the "popular initiative" route the Constitution reserves for ordinary citizens. The initiative that began with a handshake meant to unite the country ended without the referendum its own two reports had been built toward.
Independent Sources for This Introduction
Canonical
- Building Bridges Initiative (BBI), decision of the Supreme Court — Media Summary — The Judiciary of Kenya
- Petition No. 12 of 2021 (Consolidated with Petitions 11 & 13 of 2021) — full Supreme Court judgment, The Judiciary of Kenya
- David Ndii & others v Attorney General & others [2021] KEHC 9746 (KLR) — full High Court judgment, Kenya Law
- Interim Verified List of BBI Supporters — Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission
Contemporary Reporting
- 14-member Building Bridges initiative task force gazetted — The Standard
- Kenya: How Building Bridges Initiative Report Seeks to Change Governance Structure — allAfrica
- Kenya's high court issues landmark ruling blocking BBI bill as unconstitutional — ConstitutionNet
- Supreme Court brings Uhuru, Raila BBI journey to an end — The Standard
- Uhuru, Ruto and Raila launch BBI report at Bomas — Nation
Chronology
| 2017-08-08 | event | Kenya's disputed general election President Uhuru Kenyatta is declared re-elected with 54.3% of the vote against opposition leader Raila Odinga's 44.7%. Odinga petitions the Supreme Court, alleging irregularities. |
| 2017-09-01 | event | Supreme Court annuls the election result The Supreme Court of Kenya nullifies the presidential election over irregularities in the vote-transmission process, ordering a fresh election within 60 days, the first time an African court has overturned an incumbent president's re-election. |
| 2017-10-26 | event | Repeat election; Odinga boycotts Odinga withdraws from the rerun, calling it neither free nor fair, and Kenyatta is re-elected essentially uncontested. Odinga's supporters later stage a symbolic 'swearing-in' of him as an alternative 'People's President,' and the country enters 2018 with its two main political camps in open, at times violent, confrontation. |
| 2018-03-09 | event | The handshake, and the appointment to implement it Kenyatta and Odinga publicly shake hands and announce a joint commitment to a shared set of national priorities, the 'Nine-Point Agenda': ending ethnic antagonism, building a shared national ethos, addressing devolution and divisive elections, corruption, shared prosperity, security, and responsibility. The negotiation itself was between the two principals alone. Martin Kimani and Paul Mwangi (representing Odinga) are appointed the same day to co-lead the process of translating the agenda into action. |
| 2018-05-24 | event | The Building Bridges to Unity Advisory Taskforce is gazetted A 14-member presidential taskforce is formally established by gazette notice to consult the public and recommend how to implement the Nine-Point Agenda. Kimani and Mwangi serve as the taskforce's joint secretaries, an administrative and coordinating role distinct from the 14 substantive commissioners. |
| 2019-11-26 | Report | Building Bridges to a United Kenya: Taskforce Report Joint Secretary, Building Bridges to a United Kenya Taskforce (with Paul Mwangi) |
| 2020-01-10 | event | The BBI Steering Committee is gazetted President Kenyatta appoints a second, distinct body, the Steering Committee on the Implementation of the Building Bridges to a United Kenya Taskforce Report, by Gazette Notice No. 264, with an explicit mandate to validate the original Taskforce Report through further public consultation and translate its recommendations into concrete legal instruments, including a draft constitutional amendment bill. Kimani and Mwangi continue as the new committee's joint secretaries. |
| 2020-12-30 | event | IEBC begins verifying signatures for the constitutional referendum The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission launches the process of verifying supporting signatures for the Constitution of Kenya (Amendment) Bill, 2020, the referendum-bound instrument the Steering Committee's report had proposed. This is a process the courts would go on to find the IEBC lacked the quorum and legal framework to properly conduct. |
| 2020-10-16 | Report | Report of the Steering Committee on the Implementation of the Building Bridges to a United Kenya Taskforce Report Joint Secretary, BBI Steering Committee (with Paul Mwangi) |
| 2021-05-13 | event | High Court rules the process unconstitutional A five-judge bench of the High Court unanimously rules that the Constitution of Kenya (Amendment) Bill 2020, drafted to enact the taskforce's recommendations, is unconstitutional, finding among other things that a sitting president cannot initiate constitutional change through the 'popular initiative' route reserved for ordinary citizens, and that Kenya's constitution has a judicially enforceable 'basic structure' that this process would have breached. The 321-page judgment also finds the IEBC lacked the quorum, voter-registration completeness, and legal framework to conduct the referendum's signature verification lawfully. |
| 2021-08-20 | event | Court of Appeal upholds the ruling A seven-judge bench of the Court of Appeal affirms the High Court's decision by a 5-2 majority, keeping the constitutional amendment bill blocked. |
| 2022-03-31 | event | Supreme Court delivers the final ruling The Supreme Court unanimously upholds the finding that the amendment bill is unconstitutional because Kenyatta, as president, could not lawfully initiate it through a popular initiative, though six of seven judges also reject the High Court's separate finding that Kenya's constitution has a judicially enforceable 'basic structure' immune to amendment altogether. The ruling ends the Building Bridges Initiative's path to a referendum. The process that began with a handshake meant to unite the country closes with the country's highest court ruling that the president had exceeded his constitutional authority in pursuing it.
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