By Wangui Kanina and Andrew Cawthorne
NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenya's new parliament sought onTuesday to speed up legislation ratifying a fragilepower-sharing deal intended to guarantee the peace after apost-election crisis that killed more than 1,000 people.
Members of parliament proposed procedures so that two billsenshrining the new arrangement and amending the constitutioncould be approved within a five-day limit rather than the usualtwo weeks after their publication.
Speaker Kenneth Marende was expected to ratify that onWednesday, meaning the bills would probably pass early nextweek, analysts and politicians said.
President Mwai Kibaki and former opposition leader RailaOdinga signed a pact two weeks ago to end a crisis that alsodisplaced 300,000 people, damaged Kenya's reputation as one ofAfrica's most stable nations and dented its promising economy.
Odinga had accused Kibaki of stealing the December 27 votethrough fraud, while the government accused the oppositionOrange Democratic Movement (ODM) of fomenting violence.
Despite optimism over the political accord, there isgrowing unease among some Kenyans that leaders are now focusedon how to divide top jobs rather than tackle deeper issues ofethnicity, land distribution, poverty and corruption.
"Now we are hearing all this talk about expansion of thecabinet to grotesque proportions just so that there can be aslot for every man and his dog," political commentator MachariaGaitho wrote in Kenya's leading newspaper, the Daily Nation.
All parties had promised in their pre-election manifestoesto streamline government, but under the new power-sharing deal,the cabinet would swell to 38 members. There would also be noofficial opposition, which is worrying many in Kenya.
"Discussion on a new governance structure should not beabout sharing power -- it should not be about sharing thespoils, 'jobs for the boys', or 'eating together'; it should beabout sharing responsibility," Gaitho added.
ECONOMIC RECOVERY
Odinga, 63, a former political prisoner, is expected totake the prime minister's job once it is ratified byparliament. But his ODM has reacted angrily to a governmentstatement that Kibaki, 76, will retain power to appoint theprime minister.
The accord says the post should go to the party with thelargest number of parliamentary seats, which is currently ODM.
Monday's statement by the head of the public serviceFrancis Muthaura also implied the prime minister's positionwould be third in rank after the vice-president, currentlyKalonzo Musyoka, the third-placed candidate in the Decembervote.
ODM spokesman Salim Lone said Muthaura's interpretation ofthe accord was "mischievous".
"Kenyans have begun the slow process of healing,reconciliation and rebuilding their shattered lives. They willnot accept to be dragged back to the period of mayhem, violenceand disruption by retrogressive forces," he added.
Despite the politics, Kenya's economy is recovering quicklyfrom the crisis, with the local shilling currency back topre-election levels and stocks also making a recovery.
(Editing by Matthew Tostevin)
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