A Kenyan power-sharing government was sworn into office today.
The 41-member cabinet, Kenya's largest and costliest, was sworn in at the State House residence of President Mwai Kibaki, who split government posts with the party of his election challenger, new Prime Minister Raila Odinga.
The two men met secretly on Saturday and broke a six-week deadlock over forming the coalition, the cornerstone of a power-sharing deal agreed in February to tackle the East African country’s post-election crisis.
The new cabinet is supposed to steer the redrafting of a new constitution within 12 months, to help address issues of land, wealth and power that fuelled the crisis.
The inauguration makes Mr Odinga only the second prime minister in Kenyan history. Founding president Jomo Kenyatta was prime minister for the year after independence from Britain in 1963, until his title was changed.
For years, Mr Odinga has sought to be Kenya's president and came within a few hundred thousand votes in a December 27th election, which Mr Odinga said Mr Kibaki stole. That unleashed riots that police violently suppressed and a cycle of ethnic killings.
The violence paralysed parts of the country and seriously harmed Kenya's image as the stable, prosperous country in east Africa.