Deputy President Kithure Kindiki has stressed the importance of national interest, saying it is key to survival and sustainability of the country.

Kindiki has emphasised the idea of the national interest after days when he was criticised for suggesting that public interest sometimes comes second.

“Our national interest lies in the most sacred and bedrock principles espoused in the Constitution of Kenya. This includes the inviolability of our country and the protection of every inch of our national territory.

“The national interest is essential to the survival and sustainability of our country today and in the decades to come in a competitive, complex, and insecure world.

“The Bottom Up Economic Transformation Agenda (BETA) and the Vision 2030 aspire to provide a more inclusive country and greater sharing of the national resources to benefit the people of Kenya and pull as many citizens as possible from poverty,” Kindiki said after attending a high-level consultative forum on the review of the foreign policy of Kenya on Wednesday, November 20, 2024.

Criticism

Kindiki’s faced criticism when he spoke at the official opening of the Supreme Court of Kenya’s 12th Jurisprudential Conference in Nairobi when he compared national and public interest.

“I’ve had to ask myself whether the highest interest is the public interest or if there is a higher interest called the national interest because the public itself could hurt the national interests.

“Other than the parameters and the principles of the court helping us to understand the public interest, are there other higher values and principles that are crucial to the existence of Kenya? Because the public can do the wrong things that threaten the existence of the state. That is the dead front of jurisprudence I want us to think about,” he said then.