Musalia Mudavadi, cabinet secretary for foreign affairs, has said that the government is making headway in preventing Margaret Nduta’s impending execution in Vietnam.
Speaking at a joint news conference with Dutch Foreign Affairs Minister Caspar Veldkamp in Nairobi on Wednesday, March 19, Mudavadi stated that his ministry was in continuous contact with the Vietnamese government over the possibility of rescinding the execution.
Speaking to the reporters, the CS stated that although the government has subsequently obtained documentation regarding Nduta’s claims from Vietnam, they had not yet received definitive input on the subject.
The former vice president voiced optimism in the attempts to prevent the victim’s execution in a foreign country, albeit noting the complexities of Nduta’s situation.
Regretfully, a Kenyan is dealing with this kind of circumstance. It is unpleasant, and my PS has been attempting to communicate with his counterpart in Vietnam on behalf of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in particular,” Mudavadi promised.
In order to prevent an execution, he continued, “the talks have been for us to see if there can be a mitigation in this process and we hope that there will be some success.”
Although he seemed hopeful, Mudavadi explained that the administration was discussing clemency for Nduta rather than trying to overturn the ruling.
He continued by revealing that, in addition to Nduta, around a thousand Kenyans were incarcerated abroad for various offenses.
Nonetheless, Mudavadi pointed out that the government did not know the precise offenses that each of the 1,000 people had committed, even though he claimed that their sentences had already begun.
In the midst of demands for the repatriation of Nduta, 37, who was convicted guilty of drug trafficking and given a death by lethal injection sentence, Mudavadi provided an update on her case.
Nduta reportedly worked for a man named John, who asked her to deliver a luggage to a woman in Laos. However, she was caught in Hanoi, Vietnam, for the job.
The 37-year-old told the Vietnamese court in defense that she had no idea the drugs were in her suitcase. She did not enter a guilty plea to the crime, but on March 6 she was given the death penalty.
