The recent elections have been called into question, and the resulting riots and killing are showing a country on the brink.
Here's a sampling of information that I've found:
Kenya election riots leave at least 140 dead
By Mike Pflanz in Nairobi
Last Updated: 9:57am GMT 01/01/2008
Tribal killings fuelled by fury over a "rigged" presidential poll have swept Kenya as the wave of post-election violence claimed at least 140 lives.
At sunrise, enraged supporters of Raila Odinga, the opposition politician who President Mwai Kibaki claims to have defeated, emerged from slums and villages to vent their fury over what they believe was a "stolen election".
Mr Kibaki responded with an uncompromising New Year message, insisting that the contest had been "free and fair" and pledging to "deal decisively with those who breach the peace".
A dusk-to-dawn curfew was imposed in the town of Kisumu, a stronghold of support for Mr Odinga where about 53 people have been killed.
Troops enforced this measure by shooting on sight.
In Nairobi, protesters fled slow moving lines of riot police, firing tear gas and flanked by armoured trucks loaded with pepper-spray cannons.
"They are here fighting us, but we are the ones who have to fight because we have been given the wrong president," said Eric Ochola, 23, as he fled the latest police advance in Nairobi's Kibera slum.
"Look around at the poverty here, look at these houses, they are not fit for pigs. This is the country we want to change, but this fake president has slapped us in the face and told us to go home. We will not. We will fight for the choice we made at the ballot box."
Kenya on the brink of civil war
Last Updated: 2:17am GMT 01/01/2008
Adrian Blomfield witnesses the tribal bloodshed and terror around Nakuru
The road from Nairobi to Kisumu, normally a busy artery ferrying goods to Uganda and tourists to the Rift Valley'sflamingo-lined lakes, became an avenue of terror as tribe turned on tribe and neighbour on neighbour.
Kenya election riots leave at least 140 dead
Brandishing bows and arrows, their heads draped in the traditional leaves of war, fighters from the Kalenjin tribe marauded through a Kikuyu village, razing homes and erecting road blocks.
Despite sporadic flare-ups over the years, Kenya is unused to violence on this scale
"No to peace," chanted the tribesmen, who support Raila Odinga, the presidential challenger.
"We are a country at war," one said as he twirled an axe in his hand. "We will not stop fighting until Raila is declared president."
The victims of Kenya's anger towards President Mwai Kibaki, once regarded as one of Africa's few genuine democrats, now seen as its newest autocrat, were everywhere to see.
Is Kenya turning into a police state?
disappointed, angry and jaded. :
Those are the words that describe millions of Kenyan voters.
Disappointed at their current president, Mwai Kibaki, for playing Moi-politics.
Angry at their ministers of parliament, voting an unprecedented number out of office.
Jaded by the election results - wondering if bothering to come out for the next elections is even necessary.
Of the three, I would suggest that citizens being jaded is the most harmful for the long-term. Why bother voting if you can’t have the confidence in your government to count them openly and honestly?
From KenyaPundit about the Media Blackout imposed by the government:
As far as the arrest rumor, consensus is that Pentagon rumors HAVE NOT been arrested.
Drove to a friend’s house less than ten minutes away and had to go through a police checkpoint. Very scary.
I have no news to report. It’s a total total blackout. Watching TV feels like watching TV under some crazy dictatorship. I mean we all know that the country is on fire, but KBC is airing Just for Laughs. WTF???
I, however, remain committed to keeping whatever news I can flowing so keep the info coming (even though it might sit in moderation for a while). And hopefully I’ll have something updates tomorrow from what is now for all intents and purposes my bunker.
Kenyan Pundit also has news about the situation on the ground there - food shortages, inability to find money in ATM's, the seeming coming war along ethnic lines and those tensions - it's very informative.
From Thinker's Room:
I Cry. My Country Has Been Robbed
30December
Rumours going round are to the effect that Raila Odinga and William Ruto have been arrested, and William Ruto has been shot. Reportedly this is after ODM announced their intentions to name a parallel government, a move, I must confess, is not entirely wise given the current situation.
More as I get it.
I have just been watching President Kibaki been sworn in, amid applause from his cabal of powerful friends and cronies. As far as I can tell it seems to have been a private ceremony for himself and his friends.
I don’t know whether to laugh or cry at the fact that Kibaki’s friends and minions were already gathered and ready for swearing in minutes after the announcement was made.
I refuse to call him and his ilk honourable. They are no such thing.
While he and his friends are sipping tea and eating crumpets in statehouse I find myself at crossroads.
I question the very beliefs I once held true — that democracy at the end of the day triumphs.
I feel outraged that Mwai Kibaki can with a straight face tell me how he feels “humbled that the people have elected him” and how he urges his opponents to “respect the electoral process”.
I feel mad that Samuel Kivuitu is cracking jokes at State House while my country falls apart because of him and his puppeteers.
I feel that the people of Kenya have been completely robbed of everything they have gained over the last 40 years. We lacked few things but at least we were generally a fair people.
I feel that the change we thought we had in 2005 was just an illusion.
I feel that all the time (3+ years), love, devotion and attention I dedicated on Mzalendo.com, sleepless nights sacrificed, hours of my time and resources have been pissed away in just a few days.
I feel that Kenyans have been robbed of something that can never be valued — their electoral process.
I feel challenged even now to respond to the question I had been asked earlier in the day — “Is there any point voting?”
I feel cheated because the same cabal that has been in power since independence is still in power.
I feel cheated that an administration rejected by the ballot can somehow find itself into the presidency.
I feel sad that Kenyans optimistically queued on the 27th thinking they could control their destiny and the very people they entrusted spat on their good faith and goodwill.
From HuffingtonPost.com
Kenya Church Torched, 50 Reported Killed
ELIZABETH A. KENNEDY and TOM ODULA | January 1, 2008 09:47 PM EST |
NAIROBI, Kenya — A mob torched a church where hundreds had sought refuge Tuesday, and witnesses said dozens of people _ including children _ were burned alive or hacked to death with machetes in ethnic violence that followed Kenya's disputed election.
The killing of up to 50 ethnic Kikuyus in the Rift Valley city of Eldoret brought the death toll from four days of rioting to more than 275, raising fears of further unrest in what has been one of Africa's most stable democracies.
The latest violence recalled scenes from the genocide in Rwanda in 1994, when more than a half-million people were killed. The question facing Kenya is whether the politicians will lose control of the mobs, triggering a civil war.
President Mwai Kibaki, who was swiftly inaugurated for a second term Sunday after a vote that critics said was rigged, called for a meeting with his political opponents _ a significant softening of tone for a man who rarely speaks to the press and who vowed to crack down on rioters.
But opposition candidate Raila Odinga refused, saying he would meet Kibaki only "if he announces that he was not elected." Odinga accused the government of stoking the chaos, telling The Associated Press in an interview that Kibaki's administration "is guilty, directly, of genocide."
The violence _ from the shantytowns of Nairobi to resort towns on the sweltering coast _ has exposed long-festering tribal resentment.
The people killed in Eldoret, about 185 miles northwest of Nairobi, were members of Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe.
They had fled to the Assemblies of God Church on Monday night, seeking refuge after mobs torched homes. Video from a helicopter chartered by the Red Cross showed many homes in flames and the horizon obscured by smoke. Groups of people were seen seeking sanctuary at schools and the airport, while others moved into the forest.
The totality of the links given in this post point to a very bad situation developing in Kenya. I have to tell you, reading about the tribal violence that seems to be bubbling up badly reminds me of Rwanda. I hope this doesn't spin out of control like that.
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3 comments:
The tension in Eldoret has come to a head as the Kikuyu powers that be, allocated large farms in the non-kikuyu area to Kikuyu's, instead of developing the local poeple, that why we are seeing all the pictures of burning farms.
I guess life is sometime a circle, not that I think that people should be burnt in a church, but the blatant power abuse by the Kikuyu leaders was at some point going to come back to haunt them!
It looks like American style voting has been adopted by Kenya.
The opposition leader had a good lead for quite a long time...but on election day, there was a miracle victory for the President.
The Presidents numbers are not reflected in the streets of Kenya.
I think all Countries should be required to meet certain international standards when it comes to elections. It should be a condition for UN membership. Of course that won't happen... the U.S. would oppose any attempt to bring integrity to the voting process.
It's a shame to see all of the violence there. But if people don't feel that they have legitimate, peaceful means of expressing their anger or disapproval (like at the ballot box, or the Courts)....when the institutions are corrupt and broken, then they often feel they must turn to violence as an alternative.
Every election is a high stakes affair, involving as always aggressive campaigning, passionate speeches, oratory to rally the troops, spin in newspapers, flyering, lies -contortions and outright falsification and even the macho grandstanding that we as Kenyans have come to accept as part and parcel of our political culture. That is standard fare, expected and a part of the competitive aspect of modern politics.But some actions go a little too far, especially because once committed they unleash forces that cannot be restrained and whose effect will be most difficult to mitigate against.
With all due respect to you on your blog and odm sympathizers Young Kenyans reported the Following well before the elections( All well documented)A report complied in early December stated the following
1.What the ODM has introduced in this election, is a determined effort to decide that any result that does not have them winning both State House and Parliament has been arrived at by a nefarious rigging scheme. This crusade is so determined and nothing it seems is too large a stretch for it. Not content with demonising Steadman the pollsters, they are now determined to paint a picture using some alien logic of a collusion by the media and the all the pollsters to give a low 40s approval figure to Raila Odinga, when he instead should have a 55% backing.
2.This idea, that ODM already has the election sewn up and that the government is planning to rig it out of its legitimate victory has been repeated so often, and given such prominence by the ODM friendly East African Standard, and the party’s top officials that is now accepted in many quarters as truth. This is especially the case given two crucial characteristics of our electorate. The first is that the majority live in concentrations where one candidate or party holds sway. A man living in Oyugis for example or in Kerugoya is unlikely to have met more than five people of political persuasion different than his own.
3.ODM has proved very adept at drawing out large crowds, and their candidate is without a doubt the most skilful of the candidates on the pulpit. These large numbers, beamed about the country indicate the ODM leader’s popularity with the youth and the unemployed; they indicate the curious thrall in which the colourful ODM juggernaut holds large parts of the country. What these television and print images do not show however is in what standing the ODM leader is held by those employed in activities that would preclude their attendance of his rallies, it does not reflect the evolution of perception or indeed give a breakdown across the different national regions.
4.These fantasies, unhindered by a media that has totally abdicated its role as public watchman, are based on ignorance of the fact that there are already massive measures in place by the political parties, local NGOs and foreign observers to ensure that the election is regulated in compliance with the law. They also choose to ignore the fact that since the 2002 elections, the ECK pays a mere coordinating role with the actual counting taking place at the polling station, rather than at some underground point of rigging. But this is not private knowledge; the ODM knows that the government cannot rig the election. Even more, the ECK chairman has indulged the Orange parties and has bent over backwards to prove to them that there is nothing untoward going on. Still, they persist, and yesterday the ODM’s presidential candidate was in meetings with the American Ambassador, seeking to internationalise the issue of his most fertile imagination.
5.These imaginings are a political ploy, straight out of the perpetual victim philosophy that has caused its candidate to repeatedly allege that the State had hired assassins to finish him off. So should we pay him any mind? Yes, Raila’s cries must not be ignored because they influence many Kenyans perception and are from his lips a powerful cudgel, as dishonest and irritating as they may be. It is commendable that the ECK is doing everything in its power to prove Raila’s claims not only untrue but also unreasonable. The claims about the black-book and double registrations for example have been properly dealt with and with 20,000 observers from the EU alone; there will be no voting station that is unwatched.
6.It is clear what the ODM parties are trying to do. Their employment of the talents of **** Morris evinces this desire to win at all costs, fair or foul and it is a strategy that Kenya can ill afford. **** Morris, for those Kenyans who may have forgotten is particularly famous for his involvement in the ‘revolution’ of the Ukraine where his strategy was to flood the streets with flag-carrying protesters after the election, thereby creating the perception of a defeated government that had rigged itself back into office. Just like in the Ukraine, it is clear that in Kenya, an opposition win is the desired result for both the British and the American governments. These governments then went on to underwrite the sustained effort of the demonstrations and its international portrayal as a display of democratic will, against an unpopular government never mind that half the country supported the incumbent. The international media are already being alerted to the role they will be required to play in this coup, a make-believe spontaneous ‘Orange Revolution’ coming to our streets if Raila and his shadowy allies are not pleased with the election result.
7.The election is unlikely to be glitch free, and the need to vigilance can hardly be overstated but it is also fact that such a large conspiracy as the ODM suggests would not go off succesfully. Indeed so slim are its chances of success, that it is extrememly unlikely that any such attempt will even be made. There is a big difference between random electoral failures and a concerted campaign to cheat at the elections. Any such scheme would long ago have been discovered, not just for its sheer unwieldy nature, but also because the polling officials are drawn from all corners of the country and have in all likelihood support for all shades of political opinion, including being supportive of the ODM.The media must now point out to Kenyans that the national population dispersion is such that the president may be dominant in only two provinces, but still have a large percentage nationwide. Articles such as Dennis Onyango’s in the Standard or Raila Odinga’s statement that because he was leading in all but two provinces and only just in the national polls, then the opinion polls were definitely biased will only serve to incite the public who cannot be expected to comprehend basic statistics. Statements such as ODM secretary general Anyang’ Nyong’o’s assertion that it is impossible to close a five point gap in the approval ratings also fly against reason, especially as earlier in this very year, his party’s candidate lagged far behind in the opinion polls. To the innocent mwananchi, already driven into frenzy by the heat and passion of the campaign period, it will be difficult to accept defeat after such rhetoric. Worst of all, this is an attempt at blackmail against the PNU, essentially a demand that the PNU stop campaigning and concede the election, or else…
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