MedLawPlus.com®
|
- The Ethnic Battle in Kenya
 As my wife is Kenyan, friends and family have asked for thoughts on the situation there. This article from the Associated Press does the best job I've seen of encapsulating the situation as I understand it. In a nutshell. The President is Kibaki who is a member of the dominant Kikuyu tribe. All observers pretty much agree that Kibaki stole last month's presidential election from challenger Raila Odinga who is of the Luo tribe. This is not to say the election was a landside for Odinga. The president retained substantial support in the country. Shortly thereafter, all hell broke loose in Western Kenya, traditional home of the Luo and, their allies, the Kalenjin of the Rift Valley. The Luo and Kalenjin took out their political loss on the Kikuyu living among them by burning their homes, businesses and even killing them. Were they incited to violence by political leaders of these tribes? No one seems to know. Kikuyus then retaliated. Kibaki has called for a national unity government. Odinga, so far, demands to be named the president and is not willing to accept a lesser post in the government. In the meantime, the tourism industry, the lifeblood of Kenya, is crippled. Further, travel on the roads in rural areas of Kenya is dangerous as the local thugs have taken the unrest as an opportunity to commit violence. Thus, crops are not moving from the farming areas into the cities. As with all political wars, it's the people who suffer (to what end?). It's a mess but this is NOT another Rwanda. Over 1 million people were killed there in tribal violence. The numbers are in the hundreds in Kenya. Let us pray cooler heads prevail and peace returns. Even so, the scars from these days will take a generation to heal. But I'm just a mzungu, what do I know? 01/22/2008. Add Comment Permalink
Current Odds & Ends Entries | Archive Odds & Ends Entries
|
|
|
