Kenya, 2014

It is a great pleasure to address

the General Assembly at its sixty-ninth session. As the

current Chairman of the East African Community, I am

particularly pleased to see The Honourable Sam Kutesa

preside over the General Assembly. I assure you,

Mr. President, of the full support of my Government

during your presidency.

I would like to begin by lending my voice to all of

those who have called for urgent and sustained attention

to the devastating Ebola crisis in Liberia, Sierra Leone

and Guinea. Beyond the tragedy of the thousands who

have lost lives and loved ones and the many more

living with that threat, livelihoods and businesses have

collapsed and aspirations for shared prosperity continue

to shrink day by day. Kenya stands in solidarity with

the countries affected by this devastating virus.

Earlier this month the Kenyan people gave

$1 million to the effort to bring the crisis under control,

and we stand ready to do more. Last week, ministers

of health from the East Africa region converged in

Nairobi and agreed on measures to safeguard our

populations and ensure that the virus does not spread

in our region. The suspension of international flights

into Monrovia and other affected capitals, including

by Kenya Airways, followed a stark warning from the

World Health Organization (WHO). Those measures,

among others, have isolated the affected countries and

further hurt the people and economies of the region.

With regard to Kenya, our intention was not to

do harm, but the warning from the WHO left us, as

a regional hub, with few options. We stand ready

to resume Kenya Airways flights once appropriate

measures are put in place. Kenya believes that nothing

in the immediate future requires more attention and

determined response from the international community

than the effort to stop and contain that devastating

virus. I therefore welcome the establishment by the

Secretary-General of the United Nations Mission for

Ebola Emergency Response, which I am sure will guide

a collective global response.

The Ebola crisis underlines the imperative to build

strong States that can withstand crisis and respond to

emergencies. State weakness in many African countries

comes from a history of development paradigms and

practices that weakened the State. We must commit

to building strong, resilient and accountable States

that can effectively respond to shocks, adversities and

emergencies in the future.

You, Sir, are presiding over a session of the General

Assembly of historic significance to humankind. The

sixty-ninth session will oversee the development and

adoption of the post-2015 development agenda. This

effort will build on the work of the Open Working Group

on Sustainable Development Goals, which developed

those goals. Kenya is indeed proud to have been at the

forefront of driving the Open Working Group process.

The new world development agenda must address

itself to the entire cross-section of social, economic

and environmental challenges that face the world in

the twenty-first century. Issues of sustained economic

development, equality among nations, climate change,

industrialization, biodiversity loss and environmental

protection must now go hand in glove with the traditional

challenges of poverty, disease, hunger and inequality

within nations. The new agenda must therefore be

universal and comprehensive and responsive to all

nations equally in order to be transformative in its

impact.

We in Kenya recognize, however, that a number

of obstacles stand in the way of achieving the new

development agenda. The most immediate of these are

terrorism and violent extremism. In Kenya, we stand

at a critical moment. As we deepen our democracy, we

find our nation thrust onto the front line of a regional

and global war against terror. We have become acutely

aware that the interplay between democratization, on

the one hand, and effective counter-terrorism, on the

other, presents severe challenges to our security and

our governance institutions. Increasingly, terrorist

actors are exploiting the expanded democratic space,

sometimes feeding into and even influencing local

politics. Unless we can provide an effective buffer to

fight back against that tendency, Kenya and indeed other

countries will find it difficult to entrench democracy

and the post-2015 development agenda.

Besides the immediate threat of terrorism, the state

of economic and social well-being is also affected by

the lack of sustainable peace and security in many

of our countries. From the Central African Republic

to Mali, Libya and even as far afield as the Middle

East and Europe, we see new conflicts and crises that

could derail or delay development. In Kenya, we are

particularly concerned by the perennial fragility that

has come to characterize the greater Horn of Africa.

In Somalia, Kenya continues to sacrifice lives

and resources in an effort to bring peace to our

neighbour. We do this trusting that the international

community will stay the course in Somalia. This

involves consolidating peace and investing in stable,

responsive national institutions that guarantee public

safety, promote democracy and civil liberties, as well

as development and peace in the country and region.

As we meet here, South Sudan also remains

in turmoil. Kenya and other countries of the

Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD)

have invested considerable effort in ending that tragedy

and sparing the people of South Sudan further suffering.

Regrettably, however, progress has been slow. We

cannot let that young nation and its people down. At

this session of the Assembly, I make a special plea for

South Sudan, for no nation has, over the years, suffered

as much neglect from the international community.

Similarly, no country today remains as desperately

in need of rapid and transformative economic and

social development as South Sudan. We cannot allow

a return to political chaos, economic collapse or social

desperation. I implore the leaders of that young nation

to demonstrate determined and enlightened leadership

and to make peace without further delay. Such action

will save the people of the nation enormous suffering

and offer hope of a better future. I thank the Security

Council for its continued cooperation with IGAD in the

search for peace in South Sudan. It is this concert of

action that will help to bring about lasting peace, which

in turn will form the basis for a transformative post-

2015 development agenda for South Sudan and all of its

neighbours.

On the continent of Africa the development

model of the past 50 years has run its course. That

outmoded model was defined by negative trade

relations, paternalistic global governance regimes

and overreliance on official development assistance.

Moreover, it was driven by external prescriptions for

development that were heavy on political instruction,

but light on economic and social transformation.

We now know better. We know that our social

and economic transformation shall come first from

within our nations, our region and our continent, and

only secondly from the complement of external ideas

and resources. Equally important, those external

contributions must recognize the primacy of our

aspirations and ideas. They must value and safeguard,

rather than simply exploit and consume, our domestic

resources and the product of our people’s labour. For

the post-2015 development agenda to be transformative,

therefore, it must first embrace the primacy of

developing countries whose people seek sustained

development most. Anything less will be a recipe for

failure.

We cannot speak of development or of

transformation when millions of the world’s people

are mired in and are broken by unrelenting poverty,

disease and hunger. The business of ridding the world

of those plagues, touched upon but not fully embraced

by the Millennium Development Goals, must be the

first of the aspirations of the post-2015 development

agenda. Equally important, it must be fully financed

and accelerated, if we are to lay the groundwork for a

transformative agenda for the next generation. I cannot

emphasize that point enough. The scourge and shame of

debilitating poverty, preventable diseases and chronic

hunger must be erased from our global civilization. In

reaching the sustainable development goals we have set

ourselves, within a time frame of 15 years, we must not

fail.

This year, at the United Nations, Kenya is proud

to have presided over the Conference of States Parties

to the Convention on the Rights for Persons with

Disabilities. Kenya also presided over the United

Nations Forum on Forests and co-chaired the Open

Working Group on Sustainable Development Goals.

Kenya is currently presiding over the UNICEF Board,

as it seeks to provide global leadership for issues of

concern to the world’s children and their well-being.

Kenya is a member in good standing of the

international community and it intends to continue to

shoulder its global and regional responsibilities. Kenya

is especially proud of the scores of Kenyans who work

for the United Nations here in New York, but also further

afield in peacemaking, peacekeeping, peacebuilding

and in many United Nations organizations in various

United Nations stations around the world, including

Nairobi. I salute all those Kenyans — every single one

of them — for their dedication and commitment. We in

Kenya believe that no nation is too poor or too rich, too

big or too small to play its rightful role in making the

world a better place for all.

At the national level, Kenya grounds her

transformative agenda on a strategic vision — our Vision

2030. Importantly, in 2010 we adopted a new democratic

Constitution, which expanded and guaranteed a

wider range of rights for our people and defined

new institutions for the advancement of those rights.

Drawing on that, we have re-engineered our system

of governance, making it more democratic, inclusive,

devolved and responsive. We have also significantly

expanded participation in political and development

decision-making.

In four short years, we have begun to witness the

fruits of those foundational changes. Aware of the

imperative to carry along all our people in development,

my Government launched targeted interventions for the

most vulnerable in society. Those include a number

of financial initiatives and training programmes

for women and youth. We have also prioritized the

advancement of children’s rights and welfare through

initiatives that reduce mortality and morbidity. Chief

among them are universal immunization coverage, the

promotion of breast-feeding for the first six months

of a child’s life, the provision of fortified foods and

insecticide-treated mosquito nets, as well as free care

for mothers and children in all government hospitals.

In that respect, I wish to commend the first Lady

of Kenya, Ms. Margaret Kenyatta, for successfully

launching the Beyond Zero Campaign that is tapping

into private sector financing to bolster the management

of chronic preventable diseases, including HIV/AIDS,

and to improve maternal and child health throughout

the country.

Kenya is today on track to achieve universal

primary education. Based on that, we have expanded

our vision to include universal secondary education. We

are seeking to build a more inclusive society, and strive

to leave no one behind. It is for that reason that my

Government has implemented a social protection cash

transfer programme to orphans and vulnerable children,

persons with severe disabilities and our elderly citizens.

The programme targets 450,000 households throughout

Kenya. Impact evaluations indicate that the programme

has reduced poverty, improved family health and raised

school enrolment.

As the Assembly is aware, Kenya is a leading

tourist destination. We are also endowed with a number

of rare species, some endangered, which we hold in

trust for humankind. My Government attaches great

value to conservation. We continue to raise awareness

of the need to step up the fight against poaching and

illicit wildlife trafficking. We have enacted laws to

help fight the scourge, and continue to work with other

countries and organizations to enhance the protection

of our fauna and flora. Similarly, Kenya remains at the

heart of international efforts to mitigate and adapt to

challenges relating to climate change. We continue to

work towards achieving 10-per cent forest cover; we are

well above global targets for renewable energy use, and

fully support all measures agreed upon at the recent

United Nations Environmental Assembly in Nairobi.

Recognizing that our prosperity is linked to that

of our neighbours, Kenya is engaged in a range of

programmes and activities to hasten eastern African

integration. We have eased the movement of goods

and services across our borders. More importantly, our

people can travel, work and settle across east Africa.

We have also grown our trade volumes and are looking

to closer integration across a range of other sectors.

Those are a few highlights of my Government’s

transformative agenda. We are committed to

safeguarding and expanding those initiatives by creating

an enabling and secure environment. In light of that,

my Government continues to invest heavily to combat

extremists and terrorists. The global effort needs to be

reinforced because, as we know, the intent of terrorists

is to destroy free, secure and democratic nations and

people. As long as international terrorism exploits our

open, multicultural and multi-religious society and

gravely harms our social fabric, our progress towards

achieving the goals of a transformative agenda will no

doubt be slowed.

Kenya believes in a better, happier and more

prosperous future for all. It is my hope that the confluence

of forces that have come together to continually make

our development efforts unnecessarily difficult will

be persuaded with urgency, to reassess their motives

and hopefully re-engage within the global community

and with our country and region in a more positive,

constructive and humane manner; recognizing that, in

the end, no one people, nor one country, not even any

one continent, can inhabit the world peaceably alone

in isolation from the rest of the globe. We are in this

world together to succeed together, to win together and

to build a better future for all everywhere, together.