Raila was 'too strong' a candidate to win AU election - Analyst weighs in on Kenya's loss

Raila Odinga, Kenya’s candidate in the AU Commission chairperson race, was too strong a candidate to win. This is according to international relations and security expert, Dr Edgar Githua.

Speaking on Citizen Digital’s X Space on Tuesday night analysing Kenya’s defeat at the AU election, Githua said there were several extra continental and intracontinental factors that made Kenya lose this election. 

“Raila was presented as a very strong candidate and sometimes when you're too strong or you look like you cannot be controlled, you become a danger. Remember the AUC chairperson is supposed to serve the secretariat, but he works for the summit, which is the main decision making organ of the African Union,”  he said.

Githua continued, “The heads of state at the summit are the bosses who call the shots at the African Union. If they end up getting an AUC chairperson who is almost their peer or whom they feel will not bend to their interests or will not be intimidated by them, that person becomes a danger.”

The election for AU Commission chair took place last Saturday, during the 38th AU Summit in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.

Djibouti’s Foreign Affairs Minister Mahmoud Youssouf was elected chairperson of AUC after securing 33 votes in the seventh round of voting. 

Youssouf will replace the outgoing Moussa Faki of Chad, who has held the position for eight years.

Forty-nine heads of state took part in the vote, with the winner needing two-thirds of the total votes, totalling 33.

Raila faced Youssouf and Madagascar’s former Foreign Affairs Minister Richard Randriamandrato in the elections.

According to Githua, geopolitics and rivalry between the various voting blocks may also have cost Raila the election.

“Kenya is a very strong country diplomatically and, Kenya’s star has continued to rise and has been on the rise especially after former President Uhuru Kenyatta's shuttle diplomacy and the number of trips he made outside, president William Ruto came on the same trajectory, has already gone to very many countries, pretty much raising Kenya's profile,” he said.

“In international relations, there's something we call the balance of power. When you seem like you're becoming too powerful, other countries gang up to cut you down to size because they do not want you to become too powerful. Because if you become too powerful, you are going to become a threat to their interest.”

Listen to the entire X Space here. Citizen Digital X Spaces happen every Tuesday at 7pm.