Nairobi  - Kenya's cabinet has agreed to implement a report into this year's post-election violence that should see a local tribunal set up to try politicians and businessmen accused of orchestrating the violence.

A commission headed by Justice Philip Waki in October gave the cabinet a deadline of mid-December to create a local tribunal to try those named in an envelope Waki handed over to former UN secretary general Kofi Annan.

Should the tribunal fail to be set up, then the envelope will be handed over to the International Criminal Court.

The cabinet on Wednesday agreed that President Mwai Kibaki and Prime Minister Raila Odinga should head up a commission to implement the Waki report, the president's office said in a statement.

The report has caused controversy, with some MPs condemning Waki's findings and refusing to accept his recommendations.

Others say that accused politicians must stand trial to end a culture of impunity and thus allow the events of the first months of 2008 to repeat themselves.

More than 1,500 people died in clashes between rival tribes affiliated to political parties during the post-election violence earlier this year.

Hundreds of thousands were forced to flee their homes as a campaign of murder, revenge attacks, rapes and the razing of homes swept the country.

The clashes were prompted by Orange Democratic Movement leader Odinga's accusation that Kibaki's Party of National Unity had rigged the elections.

Calm returned after several months and a deal negotiated by Annan saw the creation of a power-sharing government, with Odinga sworn in as prime minister in April.

The cabinet also approved plans to disband the Electoral Commission of Kenya (ECK) - a key recommendation of another commission led by South African judge Johann Kriegler.

Kriegler's commission, which presented its results in September, found evidence of widespread bribery, vote-buying, intimidation and ballot-stuffing.

However, the ECK is not going out quietly. Its head has launched a court battle to prevent the body from being disbanded. (dpa)