- The upper house of Parliament of UK, the House of Lords has backed a proposal, to extend the scrutiny period for the Agreement establishing an Economic Partnership Agreement between the UK and Kenya.
- The delay exposes tensions between Kenya and its East Africa Community (EAC) partners over the deal. The deal has to be ratified by both the British and Kenya parliaments.
The upper house of Parliament of the UK, the House of Lords has backed a proposal, to extend the scrutiny period for the Agreement establishing an Economic Partnership Agreement between the UK and Kenya. The International Agreements Committee had proposed a 21-day extension of the February 10 ratification deadline for the new trade pact with Kenya which was backed by the parliament. The delay exposes tensions between Kenya and its East Africa Community (EAC) partners over the deal. The deal has to be ratified by both the British and Kenya parliaments.
Kenya pursued a new bilateral trade deal with the UK post-Brexit, after partner states of the EAC failed to conclude an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA)with the EU. There have been several concerns about the proposed trade agreement between Kenya and The UK. It was pointed out that UK-Kenya Agreement may have disruptive political and economic impacts on the East African Community. Other EAC members had opposed the two countries’ bilateral decision to roll over the EU-EAC EPA, expressing their preference to renegotiate a future deal as one trading bloc.
Political experts have pointed out that the UK government had overlooked the risks of its impact on regional cohesion in East Africa. It is also alleged that the UK government has not offered other options for ensuring continuity of trading arrangements with Kenya and why it chose not to replicate the EU’s Market Access Regulation (MAR) that guided economic partnerships between the two sides were also not clear. Speaking about the delay, Kenya’s Trade and Industrialization Cabinet Secretary Betty Maina termed it as ‘an administrative’ matter only.
