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Kenyan Justice Minister Martha Karua has warned British parliamentarians not to treat Kenya as a colony, after a debate on Kenyan corruption.

LAST week, UK minister Baroness Vadera said there was little hope that this month’s Kenyan elections would lead to corruption being tackled.

“The incumbents and the opposition are mostly cut from the same cloth,” she told the House of Lords.

But Ms Karua said the British should concentrate on corruption in the UK.

“They [House of Lords] are our friends but we want to remind them we are not their colony nor do we depend on them for survival,” she told an election rally for President Mwai Kibaki’s Party for National Unity (PNU).

“You must look at issues holistically before passing judgment on the performance of our government in its war against corruption,” she said.

No change
Mr Kibaki won 2002 elections on a promise to fight graft but critics say little has changed. “Ethnicity and patronage are still important determinants of the outcome of elections and a career in politics is still one of the quickest ways of accumulating wealth,” Baroness Vadera told the House of Lords.

“I fear that, whatever the outcome of this election, we cannot expect a dramatic stepchange in governance and corruption.”

Mr Kibaki is seeking re-election on 27 December but faces a strong challenge from his former ally, Raila Odinga.

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