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Kenya's Foreign Affairs secretary Amina Mohamed. PHOTO | DIANA NGILA
By PATRICK LANG’AT
Posted Monday, October 3 2016 at 13:25
IN SUMMARY
The post became vacant after the expiry of term of South Africa’s Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma who had been at the commission’s helm since 2012.
Kenya has nominated its Foreign Affairs Cabinet Secretary Amina Mohamed to contest for the chairperson of the African Union (AU) Commission, President Uhuru Kenyatta revealed Monday.
Ms Mohamed, who has had an illustrious career as a diplomat and has been celebrated as one of the most successful Cabinet secretaries in Kenya, will battle it out with three other Africans for the top, influential post.
“I see that Amina is doing well and this looks like an Amina thing. We have nominated her (the CS) to be the AU chairperson,” President Kenyatta said at State House Nairobi when he rose to address a Youth Summit.
The three who will battle it with Ms Mohamed are former Ugandan vice president Specioza Wandira Kazibwe, the Equatorial Guinea Foreign Minister Agapito Mba Mokuy and his Botswanian counterpart Pelonomi Venson Moitoi.
Suspended
The nomination process for the next African Union Commission chairperson was opened afresh after the AU Heads of state Summit in Kigali in July failed to elect the successor of South Africa’s Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, who has been at the helm since 2012.
During the Kigali summit, none of the three contenders for the position obtained the required two-thirds majority, after seven rounds of voting.
By October 14, the recruiting panel will circulate the list of those nominated for the top job, in readiness for the election in January 2017.
Ms Mohamed has served in the public service for 29 years and was once Kenya’s Ambassador/Permanent Representative at the Permanent Mission of the Republic of Kenya to the UN in Geneva.
The United Nations (UN) Secretary General then appointed her the United Nations Assistant Secretary General and Deputy Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in Nairobi.
The CS has led Kenya to organise huge global conferences starting with the Global Entrepreneurship Summit addressed by US President Barack Obama, the World Trade Organisation 14th ministerial conference and recently the 14th United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) conference, all in Nairobi.
Kenya nominates Amina Mohamed for AU chair job
