Kenya’s Post Poll Violence: Africa’s Elders Seize a Leading Role

Posted on 16 August 2008. Filed under: Governance, Insecurity, Politics, Refugees/ IDPs |

In January, one of Africa’s most stable democracies was violently ripping itself apart. How was it saved? In a four-part special report, the key players tell what happened.

REBUILDING AFTER VIOLENCE: In January, one of Africa’s most stable democracies was violently ripping itself apart. How was it saved? In a special report, the key players tell what happened. In Eldoret, Kenya, the town most riven by violence earlier this year, local leaders in May discuss their differences. Chief mediator Kofi Annan is shown here on Jan. 22.

By Scott Baldauf | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor
NAIROBI, KENYA – Kenya’s peace talks have barely begun. But the atmosphere in the Orchid Room of the Serena Hotel is already toxic.

“You stole the election,” shouts William Ruto, a fiery, big-framed politician.

“We didn’t steal it,” shoots back the Kenyan government’s negotiating team leader, Martha Karua. She’s the Margaret Thatcher, the “Iron Lady,” of Kenyan politics. She’s not giving an inch.

In fact, Ms. Karua will be the most intractable of those seated at the table over the coming days and weeks. “We won it fair and square.” says Karua.

But there’s another African woman present, an authority figure beyond reproach, who brusquely cuts Karua off: “If that is the case, then why the violence?”

Graça Machel, the wife of former South African president Nelson Mandela, presses the point home. “Why the swearing-in ceremony at the State House at night? You have to acknowledge that you have a problem.”

A problem, indeed.

One of Africa’s most stable democracies was ripping itself apart. In the month following Kenya’s closely contested presidential elections, more than 700 people had died in the ethnic-political conflict. The media were starting to compare the spreading violence to the genocide that occurred in Rwanda in 1994.

Just days before the peace talks began, Ms. Machel had personally visited camps for refugees of the violence in the Rift Valley, where a church had been deliberately torched with some 30 women and children inside. After hearing one grandmother’s tale of tragedy, Machel and the woman hugged and cried, their foreheads touching.

So, when Machel addresses all the Kenyan negotiators on Jan. 29, her voice now rising with emotion, the room falls silent.

“Your country is bleeding,” she tells them. “You need to act.”

• • •

In the next five weeks, led by former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and a team of African statesmen and women, known as The Panel of Eminent African Personalities, they achieve what few thought was possible: a cessation of fighting and a power-sharing deal to put Kenya back together again.

Machel’s presence, along with Mr. Annan, and former Tanzanian president Benjamin Mkapa, would provide important ballast. Machel and Annan are part of The Elders, a dozen experienced leaders from around the world, set up in 2007 by Mr. Mandela and others to address global problems.

At a time when Kenya’s angry “young turks” were whipping up the emotions that fed violence, these African elders had the calming influence of a stern grandparent, in front of whom one doesn’t misbehave.

“I came in at a time when there was so much mistrust,” recalls Annan in an interview later. “The two blocks had dug in. One felt they had won the elections fair and square, the other maintained ‘you stole it.’ ”

“With that sort of attitude, getting them to come together, and getting them to begin to think of coming together, and … thinking in terms that we are all Kenyans and we are one Kenya, and we need to work together to put it back together, was not an easy task,” he says with a large dose of understatement.

Today, five months later, an uneasy alliance is holding. Even Annan predicted it would take at least a year to get a fully operational government of national unity, especially given the ugly underlying issues of class, ethnicity, and wealth which had set off the crisis. But the fact that Kenya has a government at all shows that international pressure and African-led mediation can work, say experts.

To understand how peace came to Kenya, the Monitor conducted interviews with many of the key Kenyan players on both mediation teams, along with the African statesmen who steered it toward success. This story is based on their memories of the events inside the negotiation room, along with Monitor reporting of the violence that continued to brew outside – a daily reminder to everyone in Kenya of the potential costs of failure.

By the time Annan and his team arrived on Jan. 22, it was not clear how much of Kenya would be left to save. Starting on Saturday evening Dec. 29, when President Mwai Kibaki was declared victor by the Electoral Commission of Kenya and sworn into office an hour later, violence had spread swiftly across areas where the opposition’s support was strongest.

Hardest hit was the Rift Valley, the country’s breadbasket, where people of all ethnicities came to farm the lands that the white British colonialists had treasured. The violence was brutal, ethnic, and personal. Young men – urged on by inflammatory FM radio stations broadcasting in the Kalenjin language – rampaged from village to village, carrying iron rods, machetes, axes, and even bows with poisoned arrows. Their targets were members of the dominant Kikuyu tribe, President Kibaki’s ethnic group. Some were given warnings to leave, others were slaughtered in their homes – or in their church.

A gang of youths set ablaze the Kenya Assemblies of God Pentecostal Church in Eldoret on Jan. 1. At least 30 people were inside, taking shelter from the tribal clashes. Kenya’s leading newspaper, the Daily Nation, reported that the country is on “the verge of a complete meltdown.”

Over the next three weeks the death toll would rise to 650.

Annan’s arrival doesn’t stop the violence right away. But the lifelong diplomat wastes little time. Within two days, he convinces the two sides to negotiate with each other with no preconditions. On the evening of Jan. 24, on national TV, millions of Kenyans see the two opponents, President Kibaki and Raila Odinga, shaking hands and sipping tea.

Over the next two days, as Kibaki and Mr. Odinga assemble their mediation teams, Annan and his team hop into Kenyan military helicopters and tour the Rift Valley’s worst affected areas to assess the humanitarian needs. A spasm of violence over the weekend – including 60 murders and the assassination of a newly elected ODM legislator Melitus Mugabe Were – prompts Annan to send the mediators home to calm their grieving communities.

• • •

For his part, Mr. Odinga, the opposition leader, chooses a team of four fiery politicians, led by William Ruto. Only one among them, James Orengo, is an attorney, but the other three represent a cross section of the opposition movement’s main power bases, mostly from the Rift Valley. While the ODM party had been confrontational on the streets, in the mediation board room, they would show a more professional side, referring to their counterparts as “my learned friend” or “the honorable gentleman.”

President Kibaki, on the other hand, loads his team with lawyers, chief among them his justice minister, Martha Karua. His team would defend the election results based on the Constitution, the rule of law.

The members of each team know their opponents intimately. The relations between these two sides are so entangled that one member of the president’s team, Mutula Kilonzo, would take time out from the peace talks to argue a civil case in court for one of the opposition team members, Sally Kosgei.

Together, these eight men and women were Kenya’s brightest and most ambitious. And over the next five weeks, their debates on arcane points of constitutional law would form the sophisticated counterpoint to the images of vicious street fighting that were redefining Kenya in the eyes of world.

This article has been republished with permission from the on-line edition of the Christian Science Monitor

Kenya IDPs: Urban Displaced Still Looking for a Home

Posted on 11 March 2008. Filed under: Governance, Insecurity, Politics, Refugees/ IDPs |

Photo: Allan Gichigi/IRIN

Elizabeth Mueni holds her baby in her tent at the Dagoretti district officer’s office

NAIROBI, 10 March 2008 (IRIN) – Kenya may have inched closer to a grand coalition with the opening of parliament, but little has changed for the hundreds of people still displaced in the capital, Nairobi.

“My baby is 10 days old, I remain under this tarpaulin tent not knowing what the future holds,” Elizabeth Mueni, one of 263 IDPs camping at the Dagoretti district officer’s (DO) compound, told IRIN.

“I wish I could get some money to rent a house and restart my vegetable-selling business; the windy conditions here are risky for my baby,” she said.

Mueni, like most of the thousands of internally displaced persons (IDPs) in Kenya’s urban areas, lived in rental accommodation. Their houses, mainly in slum areas, were either destroyed during post-election violence in January and February or have since been let out to other tenants.

As a result, the IDPs cannot go back to their homes even if they wanted to. Even those who owned homes cannot return because their houses were vandalised, destroyed or occupied illegally.

After the signing of a power-sharing deal on 28 February between the country’s key political players, ending two months of post-election violence, focus has shifted to the resettlement of IDPs. But Mueni and hundreds like her in Nairobi have yet to find a home.

Government officials say efforts are under way to resettle most of the IDPs.

Photo: Allan Gichigi/IRIN

Cornelius Wamalwa, the district officer for Dagoretti

“The displaced people who had homes are going to show us where they lived and we’ll ensure they go back there and aid agencies are helping by paying a few months’ rent for those who cannot go back,” said Cornelius Wamalwa, the district officer (DO) for Dagoretti. “We have also started peace initiatives to ensure that reconciliation takes root.”

He said fear was the main reason behind the IDPs’ reluctance to go back home.

“Many are afraid, they need a security guarantee before they can go back; we are working on this,” he said. “Moreover, the government has a compensation plan, which includes rebuilding homes for those who can identify where their houses were and relocation for those who cannot.”

Most of the IDPs at the Dagoretti DO’s office and those at the Kibera DO’s office lived in the vast Kibera slum while those at the Huruma chief’s camp lived in the nearby Mathare slum. Kibera and Mathare are the country’s largest informal settlements, where most landlords do not have titles to their property as most of the land is government-owned.

“When the government closed the IDP camp, I went to the Jamhuri Showground where these families had been for many days and brought them here because they had no alternative,” Kepha Marube, the DO for Kibera, said. “I have arranged for an apartment to accommodate these families as we try to resettle those who can return to their homes and to integrate those who cannot. It is not an exercise that can be completed quickly, it will take time.”

But time is something the IDPs sleeping in the open do not have. Those in the apartment are sleeping 55 people to a room.

“Look at these women, their faces are pock-marked with mosquito bites, they sleep with their children on the cold floor without mosquito nets. How much longer can they withstand this?” Nathan Ndegwa Muraguri, one of the IDPs camping at the Kibera DO’s office, asked. “If you show interest in returning to your home, those illegally occupying it start vandalising it. What are we to do?”

Marube said his office had an inventory of houses in Kibera that were being occupied by illegal tenants.

“We are making efforts to contain the situation through dialogue and have engaged all those involved in attitude-changing training to get them to vacate these houses,” he said. “With time, we will get them out of the houses and later we will begin the legal process of prosecuting those who will have been found to have committed offences.”

Appeal for aid

Reginah Awinja Owino, a government official in charge of the IDPs at the Kibera DO’s office, said rooms had been found for most of the IDP families in an apartment nearby, but some of the families had declined to move there and were instead sleeping in the open at the DO’s office.

“We are trying to help these people; organisations such as the Kenya Red Cross and Care Kenya have been here to give donations but we do not have mosquito nets and mattresses to give to the IDPs,” Owino said.

Photo: Allan Gichigi/IRIN

A displaced woman and child outside a building in the Kibera district officer’s compound

She appealed to charities to provide mosquito nets and mattresses for the 73 IDP families under her jurisdiction. “We are also trying to get medical organisations to come and attend to these people as they are really suffering from the mosquitoes,” Owino said.

Elizabeth Muthoni, a mother of eight and one of the 55 IDPs housed in a room on Kibera’s Karanja Road area, said most of the displaced just wanted money to rent new homes and find some work.

“We do not like it here; we would like to go on with our lives but we lack the means. Three of my children are in school and I cannot even afford their uniforms; if I got some money I could resume my trade of selling second-hand shoes. Then I wouldn’t have to live like this,” she said.

In coming weeks, members of parliament are expected to debate bills concerning the establishment of a coalition that will help to expedite the resettlement of IDPs in urban and rural areas hit by the post-election violence.

The government and aid agencies estimate the crisis led to the deaths of at least 1,500 Kenyans and the displacement of hundreds of thousands more.

Kenya’s Militia: Armed and Dangerous

Posted on 23 February 2008. Filed under: Governance, Insecurity, Politics, Refugees/ IDPs |

Photo: Julius Mwelu/IRIN

Youths in Kibera slums carry crude weapons ready to fight youths from the rival side, Nairobi

NAIROBI, 22 February 2008 (IRIN) – Kenya is at risk of plunging into a new wave of violence, despite progress in negotiations to end a political crisis, because several armed groups are mobilising on all sides of the country’s ethno-political divisions, according to the International Crisis Group (ICG) think-tank.

Firearms are much less widely available in Kenya than in neighbouring countries. In the context of this article, “armed groups” include those using machetes, spears, poison arrows and clubs.

Almost two months into the crisis, low-level insecurity persists in some areas and the threat of further unrest is hampering the delivery of essential assistance to displaced people and others affected by the crisis. UN personnel, for example, must observe stringent precautions, including the use of armed police escorts, when travelling in the Rift Valley Province.

Informal gangs and militia are responsible for most of the estimated 1,000 dead in post-election violence, while attacks and threats have been used to deliberately drive away minority groups from their homes and workplaces.

The protection of civilians from harm and abuse is a key humanitarian concern, and as protection expert Liam Mahoney writes in Proactive Presence (2006), “A good protection analysis also needs information on abusers.”

“Extremists and militia are preparing for new confrontation on both camps and ODM [the opposition] believes that if international mediation fails, its only protection against repression and hope for a settlement will be its capacity to raise the stakes through violence,” ICG stated in a report, Kenya in Crisis, released on 21 February.

Photo: Julius Mwelu/IRIN

Women gather to await distribution of clothes at the Nairobi Showground camp for displaced people

The government quickly dismissed ICG’s conclusions. Foreign Affairs Minister Moses Wetangula told KTN television that the government “had put in place very clear machinery to combatting any eruption in breaches of peace”.

While it is common for young men from many ethnic groups in Kenya to undergo initiation rituals and induction into legitimate peer groups armed with a variety of weapons (but rarely firearms), the politicisation of these groups has increased dramatically since the 27 December election deepened ethnic divisions, observers note.

What follows is a brief overview of available information on some of the armed groups active in Kenya, based in part on the ICG report. Much is difficult to confirm, but our summary is also based on local media reports, interviews with slum residents, political observers, academics, village elders and religious leaders.

Mungiki

A secretive, outlawed and quasi-religious group dating back to the 1980s, whose exclusively Kikuyu male membership is drawn mainly from Central Province. Mungiki (“multitude” in Kikuyu) claims ideological links with the anti-colonial Mau-Mau movement. While rooted in the Central Province, Mungiki has a strong presence in the slums of Nairobi, where it controls and charges for access to basic services such as electricity, water and sanitation. It is alleged to have close links to senior Kikuyu politicians.

Before the current crisis, tenants moving in or out of some slums had to pay Mungiki Ksh150 (just over US$2), which soared to Ksh2,000 ($28.50) once violence broke out. The group also operates protection rackets, including in the public transport sector, confiscating the property of small businesses that refuse to pay a daily “fee”.
Mungiki also holds “trials” for people who violate its strict rules of dress or behaviour, detaining, maiming and even killing those it finds guilty.

Security forces conducted a major crackdown on Mungiki in mid-2007, arresting and killing many of its members. But immediately after the 30 December 2007 announcement that the incumbent Mwai Kibaki, a Kikuyu, had won the presidential election, the group made it plain it was far from extinct, killing and mutilating members of pro-opposition ethnic groups.

And when a second wave of violence broke out in late January, Mungiki organised “the systematic, brutal killings of women and children so as to expel Luo and Kalenjin from Kikuyu-dominated areas” in the Rift Valley towns of Naivasha and Nakuru, according to ICG.

Mungiki also holds ‘trials’ for people who violate its strict rules of dress or behaviour

“Mungiki now casts itself as the defender of the beleaguered Kikuyu in the Rift Valley,” ICG stated in its report.

“Its handlers and supporters, who are said to include some senior members of the Kikuyu elite, want to make it an effective counterweight to the Kalenjin warriors [see below], and there are reports it is accumulating weapons, including guns. The sect is also bringing young men from Central Province for oathing and then transferring them to the Rift Valley for operations,” the ICG report stated.

Weapons used by Mungiki include machetes, knives and clubs.

Kalenjin warriors

Well-organised community defence training forms an integral part of the graduated progress from childhood to adulthood in the seven ethnic groups collectively known as Kalenjin. A specific name is used for each stage of this progress. Young men in these ethnic groups, where tradition demands a strict respect of hierarchy and obedience to elders, also undergo circumcision as a rite of passage. As a result, young Kalenjin men develop a certain esprit de corps with their age mates, a trait that facilitates mobilisation.

“We have heard of at least two [Kalenjin] groups, one calling itself the People’s Liberation Army and the other one calling itself the Group of 41,” Wafula Okumu, of the South African-based Institute of Security Studies (ISS), told IRIN.

Such groups were particularly active in Uasin Gishu district, which includes the town of Eldoret, where they have been accused of fomenting much of the violence.

He said the Group of 41 was reported to be well-organised and commanded, “probably by people with a military background”, added Okumu, who is analysing state violence and radicalisation of armed groups after the elections.

He explained that this group’s name refers to the 41 non-Kikuyu communities in Kenya – a sort of “us versus them”.

Okumu said the People’s Liberation Army’s agenda was reported to be “liberating” land owned by Kikuyus in the region.

According to ICG, the young men behind the violence in Eldoret “usually took orders from the elders of their settlements, who still wield considerable influence over some sectors of rural communities”.

Photo: Julius Mwelu/IRIN

A building burnt by arsonists during the post-election violence in Kisumu city, Kenya

The weapons of choice for the Kalenjin warriors are spears, bows and poisoned arrows, machetes and clubs.

Sabaot Land Defence Force

The Sabaot Land Defence Force has been blamed for most of the violence that has rocked the western district of Mt Elgon in the past two years. It was formed after claims of injustice over land allocation in a settlement scheme in the district.

The Mt Elgon conflict involves two main clans of the dominant Sabaot community – the majority Soy clan and the minority Ndorobo clan – and revolves around disputed government allocation of land to squatters in a settlement scheme known as Chebyuk. The district has an estimated population of 150,000; government officials estimate 45,000 people have been displaced and 132 killed since 2006.

“The SLDF is now the most powerful and best-armed militia group operating in the west,” ICG said. “Its hit-and-run attacks from the Mt Elgon forest are a major challenge for the authorities, who appear incapable of quelling the rebellion.

“The group is officially headed by a man called Wycliffe Matakwei Kirui Komon, but there is speculation the real leader is a newly elected ODM parliamentarian from the region, though he has denied any links,” ICG reported.

The SLDF is one of the few non-state groups in Kenya that possesses firearms. Unconfirmed reports suggest the group’s arsenal includes automatic rifles and rocket-propelled grenade launchers.

Chinkororo

Chinkororo, outlawed in the 1990s, is the Kisii equivalent of Kalenjin warriors, and represents the armed wing of the Abagusii community, which is found in several districts in the western ethnic Luo-dominated Nyanza Province.

Traditionally, Chinkororo was a community defence force, guarding territory against cattle rustlers and other perceived “enemies”. The Chinkororo also undertook retaliatory attacks whenever there were raids in Kisii areas. Since the post-election violence, elements of the Chinkororo have engaged in clashes with Kalenjin youths from the neighbouring Sotik district in the Rift Valley Province.

Weapons used by the Chinkororo include machetes, spears, clubs, bows and arrows.

Mulungunipa Forest Group

This little-known group is said to be based in the coastal district of Kwale. In June 2007, police launched a manhunt in the region for suspected members of an illegal group calling itself the Mombasa Republican Council. Days later, the police ambushed and arrested several suspects in the Mulungunipa Forest as they trained with the alleged intent of causing “chaos” at the coast. However, charges against the group were dropped after they had been held in remand prison for several months.

The youths arrested were armed with machetes and knives. The police later said they were looking for the brother of a then cabinet minister, who was the alleged ringleader of the youth in Mulungunipa forest. The suspect was described as a former soldier who had been sacked from the armed forces on disciplinary grounds.

Taliban

After Mungiki, the best-known urban armed group is the Taliban, mainly Luo and active in Mathare, Huruma, Baba Dogo, Kariobangi North and Kariobangi South quarters of Nairobi’s Eastlands district.

Members communicate and identify themselves via a system of secret hand signals. Like Mungiki, the group runs extortion rackets, notably on public transport operators.

“Taliban has no membership oath or cells throughout the country, but it does have squads in various slum locations,” ICG stated. “Its leader was jailed in 2002, after skirmishes with Mungiki over control of these illegal activities, especially levies on matatus [minibus taxis] using Juja Road.”

The weapons of the Taliban include slingshots and machetes.

Baghdad Boys

Vigilantes active in Kibera, Kenya’s largest slum, whose members are drawn mostly from the Luo community, and use slingshots and knives.

Kosovo

Another vigilante group based in Kibera, including members from the Luo and Luhya communities, using slingshots and knives

Jeshi la Mzee aka Kamjesh

Another slum-based gang specialising in extortion and protection rackets, targeting operators of public minibuses. Membership is mixed, comprising Kikuyu, Luo, Maasai, Kisii and the Luhya.

The Kenyan government banned 18 groups in 1992, including Mungiki and Taliban. The others were: Jeshi la Mzee, Jeshi la Embakasi [Nairobi area], Jeshi la King’ole, Baghdad Boys, Chinkororo, Amachuma, Banyamulenge, Dallas Muslim Youth, Runyenjes Footblall Club, Kaya Bombo Youth, Sakina Youth, Charo Shutu, Kuzacha, Kamjeshi, Jeshi la Nazir and Kosovo Boys. IRIN report: http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=30729

Other groups that have been referenced in recent years but details are scant include Kebago (Kisii) and Sungu Sungu (Nyanza Province).

See also: East African Standard: http://allafrica.com/stories/200705250974.html Kenya: Beholden to Proscribed Societies 26 May 2007

Kenya Violence: Pastor Chased Away By his own Congregation (Audio)

Posted on 22 February 2008. Filed under: Governance, Insecurity, Politics, Refugees/ IDPs |

Photo: Allan Gichigi/IRIN

Rev John Maina, whose home and business in Molo were burnt by members of his own church

MOLO, 19 February 2008 (IRIN) – Rev John Maina was chased out of his home in Molo, Rift Valley Province, in a wave of violence that rocked many areas of Kenya following the disputed elections in December 2007. He owned a butcher’s shop and several rental houses in Sirikwa, where he was born, and was pastor of his own church. Molo was affected by clashes in previous elections in 1992 and 1997, but this time the neighbour-on-neighbour violence was far worse.Rev Maina told IRIN Radio how he recognised members of his own church in the mob that came to burn down his house.

Listen to the audio