PrintUnfortunately, since I wrote on the situation in Kenya last month, the prospects have not improved and the country appears to be headed off a cliff.
A series of mediators have failed to achieve any productive talks between the two parties. Neither South African Bishop Desmond Tutu nor the U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Africa Jendayi Frazier could even bring the two parties together to meet in the same room. Former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan managed to arrange a largely meaningless joint meeting between opposition leader Raila Odinga and President Mwai Kibaki, at the end of which Kibaki used his closing statement to assert his legitimacy as the “duly elected president of Kenya.” This was followed by howls of protest from Odinga’s camp; Odinga then issued a statement rejecting any political compromise and demanding a new election. Meanwhile, Kenya burns and the mediation continues.
After hijacking the presidential election in late December, Kibaki has gone on to fill most of the major cabinet posts with his political cronies and has co-opted the head of the number-three political party into becoming his vice president. Not everything has gone Kibaki’s way, as Odinga and his followers have captured the important post of Speaker in Kenya’s unicameral parliament. While this was a significant victory for the opposition, in a savvy political move, Kibaki “prorogued,” parliament the same afternoon. While this is normally an administrative tool to allow a new parliament to reorganize and carry over pending legislation, Kibaki is technically not required to recall parliament for twelve more months. If Kibaki sticks to his guns, the opposition has lost a powerful platform for keeping its grievances in the political dialogue.
Odinga has shown no interest in backing down from his stated position that he won the December presidential election, and has so far rejected serving as Kibaki’s prime minister. So far, the opposition has largely held together in a political sense. There have been no signs that Kibaki has been able to buy off senior members of the opposition, as has been the case many times in Kenya’s political past.
The countryside is now consumed with violence. The Rift Valley is a no-go zone for Kikuyus, who have responded by burning the Luo sections of Naivasha. Both sides have erected roadblocks on all the main east-west highways and ripped up the rail lines running from Mombassa to Uganda, Kenya’s inland neighbor. This has brought commercial shipping to a halt. Uganda is facing mounting prices and severe shortages as most of its trade passes through Kenya by rail or truck. The tourist trade, Kenya’s economic engine, has disappeared. Most major travel agencies have refused to make bookings until April and the Mombassa resort economy has collapsed. A collateral victim of the crash in the tourist trade has been Kenya’s flower and fresh produce industries, which until the election fiasco had been doing a booming trade to Europe. The cargo holds of the aircraft carrying tourists back to Europe had been filled with locally grown fresh flowers and produce, high quality items with a stiff premium attached during Europe’s winter months. With cancellation of most tourist flights, the airfreight business has crashed. In effect, all the main industries in Kenya have ground to a halt.
So far, the government’s response to the violence has been inept and ineffectual. While the GSU (General Service Unit) seems to be holding the lid on in Nairobi, the Kenyan police have been trigger-happy and overwhelmed in the rest of the country. The only reported intervention of the Kenyan Army, which occurred in Naivasha, was poorly done and ineffective until units of the GSU showed up to reinforce the Army. Clearly, neither Kibaki nor his advisers anticipated the level or the scale of th
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