The Party of National Unity (PNU) is a political party in
Kenya
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originally founded as a political coalition. On 16 September 2007, Kenyan President
Mwai Kibaki announced the party formation and said that he would run as its presidential candidate in the
December 2007 Kenyan elections. It has since become a political party in its own right following conditions set by the Political Parties Act, passed in Kenya in 2008. Recently PNU has launched activities to revamp itself ahead of the
2022 general elections.
Overview
The PNU started out as a coalition of several parties, including the
KANU,
Narc-Kenya,
Ford-Kenya,
Ford-People,
Democratic Party Democratic Party most often refers to:
*Democratic Party (United States)
Democratic Party and similar terms may also refer to:
Active parties Africa
*Botswana Democratic Party
*Democratic Party of Equatorial Guinea
*Gabonese Democratic Party
*Demo ...
,
Shirikisho
The Shirikisho Party of Kenya is a political party in Kenya. (Shirikisho means Union or Federation in Swahili). The party was formed in 1997 and had some political influence in the Coast Region. At the last legislative elections, 27 December 2002 ...
,
National Alliance Party of Kenya
The National Alliance (TNA) was a political party in Kenya. It took on its current identity when Uhuru Kenyatta assumed control and renamed it as the vehicle for his 2012 presidential campaign.
History
The National Alliance was founded as the N ...
and others. President Mwai Kibaki was to be the only personal member of PNU besides the corporate membership through the affiliated parties. The PNU was created shortly before the elections that were held in December 2007. Until the beginning of September it was not clear on which party's ticket the president was going to run. In the
2002 elections, Kibaki ran as the candidate of the
National Rainbow Coalition (NARC), which had since split. The erstwhile original NARC was legally in the hands of its chairperson
Charity Ngilu
Charity Kaluki Ngilu (born 28 January 1952) is a Kenyan politician and the second governor elected for Kitui County. She unsuccessfully vied to be President of the Republic of Kenya in 1997. She served as Minister for Health from 2003 until 200 ...
who showed no inclination of siding with Kibaki for a renewed bid. Kibaki's allies had already pulled out of
NARC and founded
NARC-Kenya which was not on good terms with a number of important politicians in Kibaki's government of national unity which had seen the intake of erstwhile opposition figures since 2005 who held on to their parties like
KANU or
Ford-Kenya.
2007 elections
Poor political preparation of the new party became obvious in the process of nomination for parliamentary seats. Initially, PNU member parties agreed to field parliamentary and civic candidates under PNU, except KANU, which was permitted to field its own candidates. However, this agreement failed to materialise. As a result, some candidates, mainly from Kibaki's former Democratic Party, contested under the PNU ticket and others under their respective parties. In a number of constituencies PNU-affiliated candidates were contesting against each other for the same parliamentary seat.
The PNU fared poorly in the parliamentary elections of 2007, reaching only 43 seats against nearly 99 for its main rival, the
Orange Democratic Movement
The Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) is a centre-left political party in Kenya. It is the successor of a grassroots people's movement which was formed during the 2005 Kenyan constitutional referendum campaign. This movement separated in Augu ...
(ODM). Together with affiliated parties, however, it could command around 78 members of parliament.
On 28 February 2008 through a mediation team headed by former UN General Secretary
Kofi Annan
Kofi Atta Annan (; 8 April 193818 August 2018) was a Ghanaian diplomat who served as the seventh secretary-general of the United Nations from 1997 to 2006. Annan and the UN were the co-recipients of the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize. He was the founder ...
, the PNU government reached a deal with the ODM and leader
Raila Odinga
Raila Amolo Odinga (born 7 January 1945) is a Kenyan politician, former Member of Parliament (MP) for Langata and businessman who served as the Prime Minister of Kenya from 2008 to 2013. He is assumed to be the Leader of Opposition in Kenya sin ...
to share power. The
power sharing deal was the first one of its kind in Africa.
2008 onwards
After the 2007 elections, PNU was registered as a political party in its own right.
George Saitoti
George Musengi Saitoti, E.G.H. (3 August 1945 – 10 June 2012) was a Kenyan politician, businessman and American- and British-trained economist, mathematician and development policy thinker.
As a mathematician, Saitoti served as Head of the ...
served as chairman until his death in 2012, while
Mwai Kibaki was party leader until his retirement from politics, much to the dismay of several of its coalition partners. In October 2012, the party's National Executive Committee entered a tentative election pact with
TNA, where it would surrender the right to field individual candidates in the 2013 in exchange for supporting
Uhuru Kenyatta
Uhuru Muigai Kenyatta (born 26 October 1961) is a Kenyan politician who served as the fourth president of Kenya from 2013 to 2022.
Kenyatta was chosen by Daniel Arap Moi as his preferred successor, but Kenyatta was defeated by opposition le ...
's presidential bid.
The party national executive committee in June 2021 made a resolution that the party will field a presidential candidate in the 2022 general election alongside candidates for all other elective positions indicating that the party is busy preparing to retake the reins of power in 2022.
Structures
When founded, in 2007, the party membership consisted of
Mwai Kibaki as the sole individual member, with all other parties within the coalition having corporate membership. However, in mid-2008 the party embarked on a membership drive and grassroots elections to create structures to function as a political party in its own right. Though an attempt to get the affiliate political parties to merge into PNU failed.
The party leadership structure consists of a Party Leader, National chairman, Secretary-General, and county chairpersons.
Constitution of Kenya 2021 amendment process (BBI)
The Party of National Unity (PNU) in a national delegates conference held on December 19, 2020, endorsed the
Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) report and promised to rally the public behind it. The Party has since then organized forums across the country to educate the public about details contained in the Building Bridges Initiative (BBI) report.
[https://www.kenyanews.go.ke/pnu-embarks-to-educate-the-public-about-bbi/]
References
*''International Herald Tribune'', 16 September 2007
Kenyan president announces new party affiliation for re-election bid*''BBC News'', 16 September 2007
Kenya president eyes re-electionhttps://www.kenyanews.go.ke/pnu-revamps-ahead-of-2022-general-election/
External links
PNUparty.comPNU DiasporaPNU 2007 ManifestoPNU 2007 Parliamentary Candidates*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Party Of National Unity (Kenya)
Defunct political parties in Kenya
Political parties established in 2007