Eyes on Kenya

And so you come and talk to me

About “Peace, Love and Unity”

Expecting me to agree

Parroting your parody

In my poetry:

Decorating your tyranny

With bouquets of perfumed words and imagery

To drive away the stench of your treachery

And hoodwink humanity.

I refuse!

I refuse to enter my brain

And ask it to entertain

Even the sound of the idea, that our loves should entwine.

Because what by “Love” you define

Doesn’t tally with mine:

I love my heroes you ignore, persecute and kill,

You love my enemies who rob and enslave me still;

How, then, can there be love between you and me

When the beats of our hearts’ music are not in harmony

When our hearts pump in and out different colours of blood:

No! I refuse!

I refuse to sing your song of submission and despair

I will, instead,

Forge my own words

Which will cry out for my martyred heroes –

Past and present –

Whose blood and tears and death and toil

Gave life to the tree of the freedom of my soil,

Those who always sought

For freedom of speech and thought

And refused to bend or be bought;

Those whose faith never waned to call

For freedom to each and all,

Whose courage was their shield

And with their spear of truth they fought and killed;

Those who, with their lives, they swore

That, come what may, onward they will go

Till their humanity they restore!

Every day, every minute, I hear

The bones and blood of my heroes declare:

“There is a debt to square!”

Them, we have not forgotten

Them, we will always honour and mention.

With their memories we shall rekindle the fire

Spreading its flames of wrath and ire

To burn the roots of our oppression

And uncover your every evil intention!

How, then, can there be “Peace” between us?

How can there be peace between us

When I’ll never accept to bury the people’s anger in the tomb of my verse!

How can I forget decades and decades of my people’s suffering and pain?

Of tears and blood pouring from their limbs, like rain?

How can I ask them to sing your songs in high volume

To stifle the tormented sounds of those you torture and maim?

How can I draw veils over their eyes

To conceal and eclipse the scenes of numerous massacres?

I can still hear the echo of those dead proclaiming:

“Our Country!

Our wounded, mutilated country

Where the dead are not dead

And the living are not living;

Our Country!

Sculptured in fire and blood

Where the north is barren

And the south is hard;

Our Country!

In death we still bleed for you

For we have decided to fear death less

And decided to love death more

Because, if by living we are dying

Why, then, not die a little more

So that we can live longer?”

Should I ignore these voices

Of these noble daughters and sons of my land?

No! I refuse!

For it is their Unity I crave for,

Shoulder to shoulder, arm in arm we go

Not with you, whom we happen to know

That you take from a lamb and give to a lion more;

You, who have torn our house in two:

Ignoring the majority and favouring the few

But, “When the sun is darkened

When the stars fall and disperse

When the mountains are made to move away,

When the camels, ten months pregnant, are left untended

When the wild beasts are brought together

When the seas are set alight

When the souls are paired (like with like)

When of the infant girl, buried alive, is asked: ‘For what crime was she slain?’

When the records are laid open

And the sky is stripped bare…”¹

And there is nowhere to hide,

You, who today judge, shall be the accused!

by Abdilatif Abdalla

London

October 1988

Abdilatif Abdalla, a Kenyan political activist and a Swahili language instructor at Leipzig University Germany, is the author of Sauti ya Dhiki, Utenzi wa Maisha ya Adamu na Hawaa, Kenya Twendapi? and other literary and political classics. He translated Vàclav Havels Die Vernissage (Uzinduzi).

1 The Holy Koran: Chapter 81, Verses 1-11.

Many articles in the Kenyan “blogosphere” (see chart below), local and international media have been written about the post-election crisis. The numbers reach into their thousands. This article tries to give an overview about good articles with background information on Kenya and the current political crisis. It is just a selection and we are sure that we may have missed many good ones. It is just the beginning and we will try to keep it updated, so if you see any good ones that would fit into this page, please use the comment function to add them.

(Topics in alphabetical order)

Constitution

The Draft Constitution of Kenya, known as the Boma’s draft, was adopted by the National Constitutional Conference on 15th of march 2004.

Economy
“The potential impact of economic sanctions on the Kenyan government” takes a closer look at the Kenyan economy and delivers useful statistics and numbers.

The Reuter’s fact box gives an overview about the “Aid to Kenya”, the CIA fact book delivers more economic figures.

“Eyes on the World Bank and Kibaki’s economy” takes a closer look at the economic program of Kibaki’s government and at the World Bank’s interest in Kenya.

Ethnic Violence

Antony Otieno Ong’ayo, a researcher at the Transnational Institute, Amsterdam, gives “An overview of the underlying factors” of “The Post-election Violence in Kenya” at Pambazuka News. It is detailed and gives a great historic overview as well .

“Unearthing of the sources of tribal disagreements and ethno-politics in Kenya” takes a closer look at the historic background of tribalism in Kenya.

The US biased NGO Human Rights Watch published a report about the involvement of opposition politicians in the preparation of the Rift valley violence. “Kenya: Opposition Officials Helped Plan Rift Valley Violence” was published on January 24th 2008.

Health
The article “The effect of the Kenyan crisis on Kenya’s health system” tries to summarize the struggles to keep up the Kenyan health system in this time of crisis. It also refers to an article by the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs IRIN “KENYA: Healthcare threatened by political crisis”

International Medical Corps addresses the issue “Risk of Long-Term Food Insecurity and Malnutrition” in Kenya.

Land distribution

The Africa Policy Institute published a report by Horace Njuguna Gisemba named “The Lie of the land: Evictions and Kenya’s crisis”. It takes a closer look at the history of land distribution and ownership in the Rift valley and disputes the often heard argument of “land distribution” as the underlying cause for the killings. It is controversally discussed at the Kenya imagine.

Media

Reuter’s alertnet posted an article by Joanne Tomkinson called “MEDIAWATCH: Kenyan media inciting ethnic hatred” on Februray 7th 2008. It deals with the local radio stations promoting ethnic hatred.

Humanitarian news and analysis (IRIN) also writes about “Spreading the word of hate” .

John Barbieri, an independent reporter and the founder of the US Coalition for Peace with Truth and Justice in Kenya writes about the “The poverty of international journalism”.

Simiyu Barasa, a member of the Coalition of Concerned Kenyan Writers, wrote an essay on “War journalism: Kenya’s newest tourist attraction” on the kwani blog. Barasa picks up the concept of “peace journalism” by the Norwegian Scholar John Galtun and shows how the local media tries to use their influence to promote peace and fails due to an international “war journalism”. He gives examples how cameras create stories and that media attention is only drawn by violence. This is done by the very same media cooperation which thought it was their responsibility not to show any cruel pictures after 9/11 and during the Iraq war.

The Foreign Correspondents’ Association of East Africa (FCAEA) strongly condemned the violation of press freedoms and intimidation of journalists on January 19t.

Political Parties
The Mukoma Wa Ngugi analysis on the differences within the Orange Democratic Movement and the different political approaches by its leaders. “Understanding the Kenyan Opposition” brings to light the differences between the activist-intellectual left, the Moi-ist retrogressives, and the populists within the party.

“Eyes on Kenyan Political Parties: A call for change” looks at the historic background of Kenya’s Parties and the lack of their political profiles.

In the publication “Political Succession in East Africa – In Search for a Limited Leadership” by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation, Dr. Katumanga Musambayi wrote the chapter: “After the floods – The Rainbow: Contextualising NARC’s election victory – Lessons learnt and the challenges ahead”. It was published in 2006 and gives an overview about the prior election in 2002.

Power-sharing

The full text of the power-sharing deal was signed by Kibaki and Odinga on February 28th 2008.

Religion
Despite the fact that the different religious communities play an important role in Kenya's society, we have not found any deeper analysis on the role of the churches to promote peace and their role in finding a conflict solution.

United States of America

Here we are still looking for a good article, that analyses the change in the US policies towards the Kibaki government.

Our early analysis on the “The role of the US Department of State in the aftermath of Kenyan Election” sees a change in US policies as the results of a learning process due to the mistakes made in the 2005 Ethiopian election.

Patrick Mutahi asks the Question”What is America's stake in this?” and explains their interest according to their “war on terror” policies.

Women's rights
The “Women’s Memorandum to the Mediation Team” was published on Pambazuka News. It was written by the “Kenyan Women's Consultation Group on the Current Crisis in Kenya” a group of women from various backgrounds who met to discuss a solution to the crisis. Among other important points it stresses the importance of women participation in the finding of conflict solutions adhereing to United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325.

"Violence and women in Kenya" portraits the Kenyans Prof. Wangari Maathai, Dekha Ibrahim Abdi and Gladwell Otieno and takes a closer look at violence against female candidates in the pre-election period.

Again: If you know other background articles on the current situation in Kenya, please use the comment function or the "Contact Page" to add them. If you leave a comment you have the option to be notified for any further comments.

With an article at Reuter’s AlertNet, Joanne Tomkinson from Oxfam followed up the issue of the responsibility of local Kenyan radio stations in inciting ethnic hatred before and after the general election. We previously reported about the role of Kenya’s media in our article: Eyes on the Media in Kenya; Kenya’s Wolf in Sheep skin or her redemption?

MEDIAWATCH: Kenyan media inciting ethnic hatred

Written by: Joanne Tomkinson

Messages of hate aired on radio stations and the internet are partly to blame for the post-election bloodshed in Kenya. There are worrying echoes of the Rwandan genocide when local radio stations urging people to “kill the Inkotanyi [cockroaches]” were widely thought to have contributed to the slaughter of 800,000 people in 1994.

Kenya has been convulsed by bloodshed since President Mwai Kibaki’s disputed re-election at the end of December. More than 1,000 people have been killed and an estimated 300,000 people have fled their homes.

Even before the election, many radio stations broadcasting in Kikuyu, Luo and Kalenjin languages were airing inflammatory comments about members of other communities, according to the Inter Press Service (IPS), a global news agency.

“The ethnic hate our radio station was propagating about those from outside the community was unbelievable,” one Kenyan journalist told the IPS.

David Ochami, a commissioner with the Media Council of Kenya, says that long before the elections radio stations were inciting ethnic consciousness “making people support leaders from their own tribe and harbour bad feelings about people from other communities“.

Call-in shows have provided a very vocal platform for “hate speech”, as callers are not always vetted before being put on air, writes the IPS.

Insults of “baboons”, “weeds” and “animals of the west” are common and though comments rarely call for violence, they do often draw on cultural differences and long-standing disputes about access to land, according to Caesar Handa of Strategic Research, an organisation monitoring the airwaves after the election.

The chilling power of these comments is very worrying in a country where many people trust their local stations and take what they broadcast as the truth, Handa says in Kenyan newspaper The Nation. The Mashada forum, an online chatroom, has been forced to close due to the large number of inflammatory messages posted on its pages.

“The majority of interaction on Mashada.com has begun to reflect the negative aspects of what is happening in Kenya,” the forum’s moderator is quoted as saying on the White African blog.

“Facilitating civil discussions and debates has become virtually impossible,” he writes.

By banning all live political broadcasts after the election, the government forced many people to turn to radio stations and internet sites to get updates, according to Eyes on Kenya, a non-governmental organisation analysing events in the country.

Such is the power of these stations, they “should be closed with immediate effect,” writes the Eyes on Kenya commentator.

But the problems with the Kenyan media go beyond call-in shows and chatrooms.

Although he praises the courage of many Kenyan journalists, Antony Otieno Ong’ayo, a researcher at political think tank Transnational Institute, says the local media is prone to partisan reporting in its news coverage.

Writing for Pambazuka, a pan African news site, Ong’ayo says that media owners, blog sites, and local newspapers have failed to be open about the other reasons for the violence – poverty, inequality, corruption and unequal distribution of resources.

“Such bias will direct attention in the wrong direction, and could be used to gang up against other communities,” Ong’ayo says.

International coverage of the violence comes in for similar criticism from Kenya expert, David Anderson, an Oxford University professor. The media’s focus on inter-tribal violence doesn’t tell the whole story, he tells Reuters.

“Describing it as ethnic violence is not quite right. This is political violence of the most classic kind. Ethnicity is how you mobilise it: that’s the modus operandi, not the rationale.“

(c) by Gado

Human Rights watch accuses local ODM leaders in the Rift valley region of organising atrocities

“Human Rights Watch investigations indicate that, after Kenya’s disputed elections, opposition party officials and local elders planned and organized ethnic-based violence in the Rift Valley, Human Rights Watch said today. (Read and comment here)

We are waiting for an official statement from ODM. They have to take actions now.

Number of reported rapes have doubled

Violence against women seems to explode. According to reuters , reported cases of rape and sexual attacks against women have doubled in areas of Kenya hit by political violence amid a climate of impunity for gangs carrying them out, a senior U.N. official said on Tuesday. In an interview with Reuters, Kathleen Cravero, director of the world body’s Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery, called for aid programs in the East African nation to make sure that vulnerable women and girls were protected from attack. “In Nairobi hospital and in the medical centers and hospitals around the areas of greatest violence, the number of rapes and sexual attacks being reported by women and being handled by medical personnel has doubled,” Cravero said. “What that tells us is that we have a very serious problem indeed because only a small percentage of rapes and sexual attacks are ever reported in Kenya or in many other countries.”Cravero stopped short of directly accusing the Kenyan government of ignoring the problem but said the political violence had led to “an environment that is tolerating very high levels of rape and sexual attack against women”. She said she was sure there was targeting of women for political or ethnic reasons although there was no evidence that either side was particularly responsible. But much of the sexual violence was opportunistic, she said.”Gangs find a woman who’s searching for firewood, gangs find a couple of young girls that are fetching water,” Cravero said. “There’s nothing to stop them, there’s a climate of impunity, they’re sure there will be no consequences, so it happens, and this is what we have to stop.”

We ask for support for setting up Rape crisis centers. For those wishing to contribute to the appeal for rape crisis centres, the bank details are available from vicky@urgentactionfund-africa.or.ke

War media
The film-maker and member of the Coalition of Concerned Kenyan Writers Simiyu Barasa brings the discussion about the role of local and international media forward with the powerful essay “War journalism: Kenya’s newest tourist attraction” published on the kwani blog.

Barasa picks up the concept of “peace journalism” by the Norwegian Scholar John Galtun and showed how the local media tried to use their influence to promote peace and failed due to an international “war journalism”. He gives examples how cameras create stories and media attention is only drawn by violence. This is done by the very same media cooperation which thought it was their responsibility not to show any cruel pictures after 9/11 and during the Iraq war.

Charity event in Boston

People on the other side of the ocean will have the chance to raise money at a benefit concert in “The Roxy” in Boston, Ma on Feb. 2nd. Numerous Kenyan artist will preform. The money will go to the Kenyan Red Cross. It is organized by “Vuma Kenya”. For more information look up the Joseph Karoki blog.

Tribe

Because the words “tribe” and “tribal” have had a great recurrence of no less than once in each media reporting about Kenya, Pambazuka Editors try to give a very detailed and lengthy definition that fits. What’s in a word? What does the word “tribe” carry? Here below Pambazuka Editors give you a few snippets of what is a long struggle to get US Mainstream media to stop using a racist and stereotypical lens in its coverage of Africa. One can find the fascinating discussion at www.h-net.org/~africa. They end with an excerpt from an Africa Action essay on the word.

A way forward?
Do we see a way forward in the Kenya’s stale-mate? Nation Media reports the news that the rivals Kibaki and Odinga are actually slated to meet together today at Harambee House.

President Kibaki and the Orange Democratic Movement leader Raila Odinga have both arrived at Nairobi’s Harambee House for the first face-to-face talks over the political crisis out of disputed election results. No agenda has been given for the talks brokered by a team of international mediators led by former UN chief Kofi Annan. Mr Odinga was accompanied by one of his party’s top officials, Mr William Ruto. President Kibaki arrived with five members of his Cabinet, including Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka and Ministers George Saitoti (Security), Martha Karua (Justice), Samuel Poghisio (Information) and Ali Mwakwere (Transport).

We eagerly await results of the talks, and cross our fingers for an end to the violence.

The second part of our article Eyes on the International Community concerning elections in Africa about Ethiopia is out now. The next part will be about the election in in the Democratic Republic of Congo and and will be published in the following days.

From the Human Rights Watch Internet-Page:

“Human Rights Watch investigations indicate that, after Kenya’s disputed elections, opposition party officials and local elders planned and organized ethnic-based violence in the Rift Valley, Human Rights Watch said today. [...]

A Kalenjin preacher in a village in Eldoret North constituency told Human Rights Watch that on the morning of December 29, 2007, a local ODM party mobilizer “called a meeting and said that war had broken in Eldoret town, so the elders organized the youth into groups of not less than 15, and they went to loot [Kikuyu] homes and burn them down.” [...]

Human Rights Watch spoke to numerous members of Kalenjin commmunities around Eldoret who provided similar accounts. In many communities, local leaders and ODM mobilizers arranged frequent meetings following the election to organize, direct and facilitate the violence unleashed by gangs of local youth. [...]

Many Kalenjin community leaders told Human Rights Watch that if the area’s ODM leadership or the local Kalenjin radio station KASS FM told people unequivocally to stop attacks on Kikuyu homes, then they believe the violence would stop. “If the leaders say stop, it will stop immediately,” said one Kalenjin elder.

[...] Human Rights Watch also collected accounts from several Kalenjin men present at community meetings where local elders and ODM mobilizers urged Kalenjin residents to contribute money toward the purchase of automatic weapons. [...]”

Kenyan novelist and play writer Ngugi wa Thiong’o published a comment today from the diaspora in the United States via BBC news. He compares the incident of the Eldoret church massacre with the massacres in Bosnia, Iraq and Rwanda. He then says that the “ethnic cleansing” must be separated from the accusations of a rigged election. To him it seems like a “co-ordinated program with similar acts occurring in several other places at about the same time against ordinary members of the same community.” He also says that Ethnic cleansing does not happen spontaneously, that it is almost always premeditated by members of the political elite, who usually do not have to suffer the consequences of their actions. He proposed an inquiry by the United Nations as necessary, that if political organizations have a “campaign on a program that consciously seeks to isolate another community as a community, then they ought to be held fully accountable for the consequences of their ideology and actions.” He continues to say that this should not only be the case if such is instigated by the government, but also if “such a massacre is inspired by a program of an opposition movement… “ He then says that they must be condemned “even when they (the campaigns) are clothed in progressive, democratic-sounding words and phrases.” In conclusion he urges “all progressive forces not to be so engrossed with the political wrongs of election tampering that they forget the crimes of hate and ethnic cleansing.”

Ngugi wa Thiong’o

We would like to add some remarks to Ngugi wa Thiong’o’s comment. We can not say that we could have foreseen what happened in post-election Kenya, not even after reading Ngugi’s novel “Wizard of the Crow”, “…where the ruling party and the opposition parities engaged in Western-sponsored democracy become mirror images of one another in their absurdity and indifference to the poor.”, as he writes. No doubt, it is a great novel with fitting reflections on Kenya’s and Africa’s political situation. But the book does not lift Ngugi wa Thiong’o to the position of the prophetess Cassandra as he implies. Despite the inadequateness of the Kenyan political Parties, one should take into account that ODM obtained so much support, because it was more likely to deliver the promised constitution. Of course, from the lookout of a prophetess, that might be very little, not bringing uhuru, not breaking the claw of the World Bank. But, decentralizing and sharing power, having control bodies against corruption, and elevation of human rights would have made a difference especially for the poor. Or in Binyavanga Wainaina’s words: “A Constitution that names and recognizes the tribal nations within our nation, that decentralizes some power and that includes us all in the process is possible.”

An 11-year-old survivor stands amid the burnt out ruins of the Kenya Assemblies of God Pentacostal church, where at least 18 people were burnt alive ,near Eldoret in western Kenya (from josephkaroki)

(more…)

When Kenya gained independence, it was with a multi-party constitution under the „Majimbo“ (federal) system. It slowly evolved into a one party sytem by 1969 under the leadership of the flamboyant orator Mr. Jomo Kenyatta. These oratorical skills were of importance back then in the denouncing of the colonial ills, and these he wielded with shrewdness that has never been challenged in the region. The aspect of majimbos fell apart when he made Kenya a republic looking out for prosperity of all Kenyan people after 1963 elections which KANU won. The then existing opposition KADU and APP were drawn into the fold reducing Kenya to a one party system meaning that there were no checks on the powers of the executive that a multi-party system does. This led to a centralisation of all political and economic power around him.

Jomo Kenyatta (middle) and Daniel Arap Moi (second from the left) before Independence

His ideology of a government of political unity survived unscathed 1966. The Limuru Conference in 1966 was the turning point in the blind following of the ideology when it was questioned by Mr. Oginga Odinga and the newly formed Kenya People’s Union (KPU) . Odinga’s ideology was dismissed by the government with chants of Uhuru na Kazi (independence and work) as the lazy Socialist (Marxist). October 1969, during the opening of a hospital in Nyanza, Kenyatta was booed and heckled (a serious shock to him). The presidential escort fired live ammunition into the crowd (what is known today as the Kisumu massacre) killing 11 people. This ideological conflict between Kenyatta and Odinga and the aftermath was quickly transposed into a ethnic rift. This rift was widened and solidified by the assassination of Tom Mboya who was a political hero amongst the Luos and also supported in poor Kikuyu areas, allegedly by the government which was then considered a Kikuyu turf.

Tom Mboya in London for the Lancaster House Conference on the Kenya Constitution, January 1960. © Corbis.

(more…)

Watching Kenya go up in flames is comparable to a house go up in flames? The initial reaction is always to put out the fire first or help the victims and only after the fire is out is the problem analysis done. Why are we doing it differently this time? Why start with the fingerpointing other than handling the problem at hand? Ethnic violence.

Many would want to say that the flawed election is the core source of all this but we all know that it was only a catalyst to an already existing problem.

Every one who calls themselves learned are saying that they cant shed blood. You know, stuff like “An, I CANT KILL YOU,NEVER!” I believe we are all responsible for what’s happening to Kenya in different ways.

Last year during the campaigns I was the office head of the PNU camp and my office mate the ODM camp and it being our first day at work this year we naturally started talking politics.

Since the election I have had this attitude that the whole electoral system needs an overhaul,rigging was done but we need to embrace peace since Kenya as a country is greater than any one of us. So that is the message I started preaching…you know not defending Kibaki or the ECK.

(more…)

I have just come across a piece by Binyavanga Wainaina. It may have been criticised as a literary piece but it does have some message that I have read and found powerful. Its a message that would echo my experience, in reference to media reports. He says:

We are a strong economy in this continent. We have a well-trained army, and police force and civil service. We have some of the most competent technocrats in any developing country. We even have a lot of goodwill across ethnic and class lines, and if we act now, things will improve quickly. All the foreign correspondent stuff about “atavistic hatreds” and such is not true. For every place where there are things burning, there is a recent historical problem that has got to do with big political games, by big political leaders.

My experience with foreign media came from an article by the Guardian. It had this sentence and I quote

“In the worst incident of post-election violence so far, dozens of Kikuyus – members of the same tribe as the president, Mwai Kibaki _were burned alive in a church by Luos_, members of the tribe to which Odinga belongs.”

I wrote back to writers and the editors saying the information they gave was a dangerously wrong information that is misleading as well as inciting. I also told them to get their facts right and urged them that in understanding the current political situation, one should exercise care in such a report and so should care be exercised in tribal labels in such incidents. I asked them to take the article off the web or make corrections.
Within a couple of minutes, it had been corrected to read: “In the worst incident of post-election violence so far, dozens of Kikuyus – the tribe to which the president, Mwai Kibaki, belongs – were burned alive in a church by members of another tribe, the Kalenjin.”

The country is currently having a media black-out imposed on local media and there is a heavy reliance on foreign media. Many a reputable foreign media with millions of readers often make such “mistakes” which unduly influences perception of the situation in Kenya by those who could be Kenya’s saving grace, the people who can exert external pressure. There is a call for a thoughtfulness behind reporting so that there is not such a stark reference to ethnicity and a realization that one cannot draw such an ethnic line to Kenya’s troubles.

Another interesting change was made in the Reuter’s article Kenya govt says ready for new vote if court orders

Reuters wrote:

“More than 300 people have died in the clashes — some between police and protesters, others pitting members of Odinga’s Luo ethnic group and other tribes against Kibaki’s Kikuyus.”

Odinga’s Lous and Kibaki’s Kikuyus? It seems that in the eyes of writers of such remarks Kibaki and Odinga are kings of two tribes in war because the leaders told them so.

I belief that I was not the only one complaining to Reuters. It was changed to the sentence:

“At least 300 people have died in the wave of bloodshed that followed Kibaki’s disputed victory.”

The old version can still be found in google’s cache.

More and more Kenyans get involved in what could be a civil society peace and democracy movement independent from tribal heritage or Party Membership. Those people deserve better than being put into such categories.