Kenya unswayed by US aid threats over UN voting

A recent State Department report on United Nations voting records shows Kenya to be unswayed by Donald Trump administration threats to cut aid to countries that frequently oppose US positions.

Kenya cast ballots in accord with the US stand on only 20 per cent of 93 final plenary votes in the UN General Assembly last year, according to the report.

UN BUDGET

That proportion is well below the 31 per cent average of all UN member-states’ rate of agreement with Washington on General Assembly resolutions not adopted by consensus.

“This is not an acceptable return on our investment,” Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the UN, commented in conjunction with release of the voting-record report.

She noted that the US pays the single-largest share — 22 per cent — of the UN’s budget, which totals $5.4 billion.

“When we arrived at the UN last year, we said we would be taking names, and this list of voting records speaks for itself,” Ambassador Haley added.

“President Trump wants to ensure that our foreign assistance dollars —the most generous in the world —always serve American interests, and we look forward to helping him see that the American people are no longer taken for granted.”

Ambassador Haley’s implied threat of aid cuts for developing countries that consistently buck the US in the General Assembly may prove hollow, however.

The State Department’s report on UN voting records notes that it “does not take account of support for US policy in other contexts.”

The $1.1 billion in assistance that the US gave Kenya last year is thus unlikely to be in jeopardy due in part to the high value Washington places on Nairobi’s role in fighting Al-Shabaab.

OBAMA

Ambassador Haley’s hard line also does not appear to be influencing UN member-states’ overall voting choices. Member-states’ 31 per cent rate of agreement with the US in the General Assembly last year is 10 points below the 41 per cent average recorded in the final year of the Obama administration.

Kenya’s 20 per cent rate of support for US positions on General Assembly votes is in line with the records of most of its partners in the East African Community.

Tanzania and Uganda each voted in accord with the US 21 per cent of the time last year, while Rwanda took the same position as the US on 28 per cent of General Assembly votes.

Burundi, however, had a rate of only 14 per cent agreement with the US. That was the second-lowest rate among the 193 UN member-states. Only Zimbabwe departed more often from the US position.

The Palestinian-Israeli conflict accounted for many of the issues on which Kenya and the US differed. Washington consistently took Israel’s side on those controversies, while Kenya usually voted in support of the Palestinians’ position.

JERUSALEM VOTE

One key exception to this pattern occurred late last year when the General Assembly overwhelmingly rejected the Trump administration’s decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital.

Kenya was among 21 countries that failed to vote on this issue. The State Department’s report on UN voting practices does not regard a country’s absence as an expression of opposition to a US position.

Indeed, Kenya earned an invitation to a Haley-hosted reception for 63 countries that were either absent on the Jerusalem vote or registered an abstention or voted in agreement with the US.

Trump’s position was opposed by 128 countries and supported by nine, with 35 UN members abstaining on the vote.

EAC

But in a Twitter message following the Jerusalem vote UN Ambassador Macharia Kamau said Kenya would have abstained — and thus expressed at least partial disagreement with the US position—had its UN mission in New York not been closed for the festive season.

Kenya’s rate of agreement with the US was higher in regard to 17 final plenary votes in the General Assembly that the State Department report describes as “important” to US interests.

Kenya took the same position as the US on 38 per cent of those votes — the same rate as Tanzania’s. Uganda agreed with the US on 34 per cent of those “important” votes, while Rwanda’s 63 per cent rate made it the most reliable ally of the US within the EAC on these resolutions.