William Ruto is living up to long-held fears that he is a brute who is prone to influence for self-gain.

Thursday, 15 September, 2022

Nairobi.

The Communist Party of Kenya expresses solidarity with the people of Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic, SADR. It condemns the decision by President Ruto to rescind recognition of the SADR, also known as Western Sahara; a brutal policy which has sacrificed a group of people for exploitation and slaughter by the Moroccan King.

Kenyans know all too well the pain of colonisation: we suffered the savagery of British colonialism, and continue to endure exploitation and robbery, among other effects of neo-colonialism and imperialism perpetuated by the United States of America and Britain. For the President to turn around and support the occupying Moroccan force is hypocrisy and this type of inhumanity is contrary to the nature of the Kenyan people. We urge Kenyans not to turn a blind eye to the savagery unleashed upon the people of Saharawi as the Moroccan King continues to plunder, kill, maim and slaughter them.

We also point out that the King has rejected any referendum process to give the people of Saharawi a chance to choose freedom and self-determination. Instead, he is courting favours from weak-minded, would-be imperialists and dictators to support his occupation. The allegations that President Ruto's objection to Western Sahara to decide its future through a referendum was a compromise reached after Ruto held successive meetings with Israeli and US delegations before his inauguration is an even bigger concern. The Communist Party of Kenya believes that the immediate and drastic change of directive is highly influenced and borne out of sheer ignorance by the President and his advisers.

Mr Ruto's remarks will have a zero-sum legal effect because they violate the position of the African Union and its Constitutive act. The Kingdom of Morocco and Western Sahara are both members of the African Union. Rather than engaging in such careless talk, Mr Ruto should be championing a peaceful conflict resolution. He should pressure the Moroccan King to give in to the referendum and immediately stop human rights violations in the occupied territories, rather than bowing to the Moroccan King.

Today's onslaught on the people of Western Sahara is a glimpse of how bankrupt Mr Ruto's foreign policy will be: prone to influence, ignorant of facts and barren of logical arguments. We want to warn Kenyans that the worst is yet to come, and they should be prepared to resist. The Communist Party of Kenya (CPK) and the Kenya Western Sahara Friendship Society (KWSFS) stand shoulder to shoulder with the people of Western Sahara. The people of Saharawi will succeed because their fight is just. Morocco is the predatory occupying force, and they will fail.

Long live the Saharawi People!

Long live the Polisario Front!

Long Live Kenya-Western Sahara Friendship!

Down with Morocco Occupation!

Ashlyn Ajiambo

Secretary of Ideology and International Affairs

Communist Party of Kenya (M-L)

About the state of Western Sahara:

The decolonisation process of Western Sahara was interrupted violently when Morocco invaded and occupied parts of the Territory by force on 31 October 1975. Since then, the Moroccan Monarch has blocked Western Sahara from exercising its inalienable right to self-determination and independence under conditions acceptable to her population. The illegal annexation of parts of Western Sahara affirms that Morocco does not exercise any sovereignty or administering power over Western Sahara.

Under the occupation, Morocco has committed massive human rights violations and repressed fundamental freedoms of Saharawi civilians in the occupied parts of the Territory, similar to the repressive and discriminatory policies pursued by the British colonialists in Kenya. Morocco has adopted a systematic, chauvinistic and genocidal policy in the Sahrawi-occupied territories intended to occupy the land coercively and exterminate its people by all means.

Moroccan authorities are involved in the disappearance of Sahrawi human rights activists, the torture of prisoners of conscience, arbitrary detention, police brutality, intimidation and extrajudicial executions. The entire occupied territories continue to be under a military siege, and a total media blackout, whilst Moroccan authorities deny the people of Western Sahara access to international media and observers.