Supporters of the new constitution say it will pave the way for real change Kenya is set to adopt a new constitution on Friday, more than three weeks after it was overwhelmingly approved in a national referendum.
President Mwai Kibaki will sign the document into law at a large ceremony in the capital, Nairobi.
The constitution is expected to bring significant changes, with political supporters hailing it as the birth of the second republic.
The debate over a new constitution has lasted 20 years.
The new constitution will bring a more decentralised political system which will limit the president’s powers and replace corrupt provincial governments with local counties.
It will also create a second chamber of parliament – the Senate – and set up a land commission to settle ownership disputes and review past abuses.
It is hoped that the changes will help bring an end to the tribal differences which have brought violence to the country in the past.
The BBC’s East Africa correspondent Peter Greste says the debate for a new constitution ebbed and flowed with each new political crisis until the elections of 2007, which were followed by the worst ethnic violence Kenya has yet seen.
In its wake, everyone acknowledged that something fundamental had to change if the country was to avoid yet more trouble, our correspondent says.
“The historic journey that we began over 20 years ago is now coming to a happy end,” Mr Kibaki said earlier this month after the results of the referendum were announced on 5 August.
“There will be challenges along the way. But it is important that we look forward with renewed optimism to better days ahead.”
Our correspondent says that the previous constitution allowed politicians to exploit tribal divisions, left courts weak, and concentrated power in the president’s hands.
While many Kenyans say that this is just a start – and that things could still go very wrong – most believe it is a fundamentally better document than the last.
President Kibaki won a landslide victory in 2002 promising to change the constitution within 100 days of taking office. In 2005, he held a referendum but it failed to pass.
The previous constitution was negotiated with the British at Lancaster House, in London, in the early 1960s.
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