President Mwai Kibaki’s government accused rival Raila Odinga’s backers on Wednesday of responsibility for an explosion of tribal violence over a disputed presidential poll that has plunged Kenya into turmoil. ”Supporters of Raila Odinga are involved in ethnic cleansing,” said spokesperson Alfred Mutua.
The bitter dispute over the Kenyan presidency could have long-lasting economic repercussions, observers warn, fearing that financial turmoil could quickly derail an, until now, booming economy. Considered an investor-friendly haven of relative stability on its way to becoming an ”African Tiger”, Kenya is experiencing its worst political unrest in 25 years.
Tens of thousands of people have been forced to flee their homes amid brutal post-election violence in Kenya that had claimed at least 300 lives by Wednesday and threatens to descend into full-scale tribal conflict. On Tuesday, at least 35 children and adults sheltering in a church near the western town of Eldoret were burnt alive by an angry mob.
Police raids, arson and tribal attacks over the last 24 hours have claimed more than 100 lives in Kenya, police and officials said on Tuesday, bringing the toll for five days of post-election bloodshed to 299. ”At least 30 have burned to death inside a church in the Kiamba area,” a police commander said.
Brutal unrest across Kenya over President Mwai Kibaki’s re-election left about 150 people dead on Monday — some hacked to death — taking the overall toll to at least 185 killed in four days. Police opened fire on some protesters and looters and many people were killed with machetes as ethnic tensions mounted.
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/ 31 December 2007
Close to 130 people were killed in Nairobi and in western Kenya overnight during clashes that erupted following President Mwai Kibaki’s re-election, police said on Monday. The deaths brought the confirmed toll from poll-related violence since Thursday’s ballot to 149.
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/ 31 December 2007
An eruption of fresh violence triggered by Kenya’s disputed presidential ballot left more than 100 dead on Monday, after defeated opposition candidate Raila Odinga rejected Mwai Kibaki’s re-election. Further clashes were feared as Odinga planned to hold his own alternative inauguration at a mass rally later on Monday.
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/ 31 December 2007
Defeated opposition candidate Raila Odinga is set to press his claims of vote fraud on Monday at a Nairobi rally to declare him Kenya’s ”People’s President” despite threats of arrest. Mwai Kibaki was sworn in for a second term as Kenyan president on Sunday after being officially declared the winner.
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/ 30 December 2007
Kenya’s President Mwai Kibaki won a second five-year term on Sunday in a disputed election victory that triggered deadly riots by tens of thousands of opposition supporters. As smoke billowed from protests in Nairobi slums, Kibaki was sworn in on the lawn of State House just an hour after the result was announced.
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/ 30 December 2007
Kenyans waited for the result of their closest-ever presidential election on Sunday, fearing more unrest after a chaotic vote count marred by widespread ethnic violence over accusations of rigging. Several people were killed in tribal disturbances on Saturday across the East African nation, usually seen as an island of relative stability in a volatile region.
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/ 29 December 2007
Kenya’s opposition claimed victory on Saturday in a presidential vote after official figures gave their candidate a four-percentage point lead over President Mwai Kibaki on three-quarters of the count. Delays announcing the results ignited deep ethnic tensions as youths wielding machetes fought, looted and burned homes in opposition strongholds.
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/ 29 December 2007
Ethiopia’s Ogaden rebels on Saturday denied claims they had suffered heavy losses at the hands of the government forces. On Friday, the Ethiopian army said it had ”annihilated the remnants of the Ogaden National Liberation Front that were engaged in disrupting the peace and stability of the Somali region”.
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/ 29 December 2007
Kenya’s opposition challenger, Raila Odinga, led on Saturday in the race to govern East Africa’s largest economy but tempers flared over the slow pace of vote tallying in the incumbent’s strongholds. In a third day of ballot counting, Odinga, heir of a wealthy nationalist hero, led President Mwai Kibaki.
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/ 28 December 2007
Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki trailed his main rival on Friday in the race to lead East Africa’s biggest economy for the next five years, according to early tallies by local media. Partial results from three main television stations all gave opposition challenger Raila Odinga a strong lead over his former ally.
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/ 28 December 2007
Early forecasts showed Kenya’s President Mwai Kibaki in a close fight on Friday with his main challenger after an election diplomats praised as smooth, despite sporadic violence and rigging claims by both sides. An exit poll gave Kibaki the lead, but partial tallies compiled by three local broadcasters put his rival, Raila Odinga, ahead in the race.
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/ 27 December 2007
Queues several kilometres long snaked around Africa’s largest slum on Thursday as Kenyans across the country and the class divide turned out en masse to vote in a close presidential election. In all of the East African nation’s previous polls, there was either only one candidate to vote for or only one with a realistic chance of winning.
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/ 27 December 2007
Guarded by police, Kenyans voted on Thursday in a presidential election preceded by violence, tainted by allegations of rigging and likely to be the closest in more than four decades since independence from Britain. President Mwai Kibaki (76) having unseated the country’s 24-year ruling party in 2002, himself faces the possibility of losing power.
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/ 26 December 2007
Two heavyweights of Kenya’s post-independence politics square off in a presidential vote on Thursday after a campaign that has overshadowed Christmas and seen the opposition holding a small lead in opinion polls. The closeness of the vote has raised fears that fraud and intimidation may be used to try to swing results.
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/ 25 December 2007
Kenyan police fired teargas to disperse stone-throwing supporters of the country’s main presidential contenders on Monday after the candidates made a final push to win votes in a race deemed too close to call. Scuffles briefly flared shortly after President Mwai Kibaki and his opposition challenger, Raila Odinga, addressed huge rallies in the capital.
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/ 24 December 2007
Two heavyweights of Kenya’s post-independence politics square off in a presidential vote on Thursday whose run-up has seen the opposition hold a small lead in opinion polls over President Mwai Kibaki. But the closeness of the vote has raised fears fraud and intimidation may be used to try to swing the result.
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/ 21 December 2007
The European Union’s chief election observer on Friday condemned violence that has marred the lead-up to Kenya’s elections, left at least 70 people dead since July and risks disenfranchising 20 000 people. Alexander Graf Lambsdorff was visiting the epicentre of tribal clashes that have been ongoing for months.
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/ 20 December 2007
A Kenyan Court of Appeal dismissed a suit seeking to stop the flotation of the country’s leading mobile operator Safaricom on Thursday, clearing the way for the government to go ahead with the offer. Three opposition legislators had sought to block the country’s biggest initial public offering, saying it had not been done transparently.
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/ 19 December 2007
Civilians fleeing violence in east Democratic Republic of Congo are facing a shortage of medical care as disease outbreaks begin to plague the troubled region, the charity Médecins sans Frontières said on Wednesday. Fighting between government troops and forces loyal to renegade general Laurent Nkunda have pushed civilians from their homes several times in ongoing flare-ups.
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/ 17 December 2007
Suspected Somali pirates attacked an Italian-owned cargo ship on Monday as it headed for Kenya’s Mombasa port through one of the world’s most dangerous waterways. The MV Jolly T was attacked by gunmen believed to be pirates off the shore of Somalia after bringing general cargo through the Suez canal.
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/ 17 December 2007
Kenya’s presidential race entered its final stretch on Monday, with the economy, corruption and tribalism looming large in ageing incumbent Mwai Kibaki’s bid to secure a second term. The last batch of opinion polls before the December 27 vote gave flamboyant opposition candidate Raila Odinga a slight edge on Kibaki.
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/ 17 December 2007
The International Organisation for Migration has launched a campaign to raise awareness of human trafficking in Tanzania, a country increasingly becoming a transit point. The three-month campaign dubbed ”Uwe sauti Yao” (Be their voice) was launched on Sunday at a hip-hop rally in the capital Dar es Salaam.
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/ 16 December 2007
The military wing of Somalia’s Islamist movement plans to intensify its offensive against government troops and their Ethiopian allies, a senior commander said on Sunday. Muktar Ali Robow said al-Shabab had killed nearly 500 Ethiopian soldiers and would fight until foreign troops left the Horn of Africa country.
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/ 15 December 2007
Crops rot in the fields, farms and schools are abandoned, the black hulks of burned houses dot the landscape. Hundreds of civilians have been killed and many women raped. On a dirt road climbing up through green countryside, a heavily armed patrol of police troops stares nervously into the thick bush, wary of a militia ambush.
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/ 14 December 2007
During a work break, Dennis Ouma Ochieng sips his soda and declares the one thing that will decide his choice in Kenya’s upcoming presidential election: tribe. Ochieng, a Luo, will vote later this month for another Luo, Raila Odinga. And not because he thinks Odinga will do a better job than incumbent Mwai Kibaki, a Kikuyu.
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/ 13 December 2007
Kenya’s First Lady, Lucy Kibaki, on Wednesday slapped an official who confused her name with that of a woman who has been reported as being the president’s second wife, a report said. Lucy Muthoni Kibaki slapped an undersecretary in the Office of the President during a presidential awards ceremony, independent NTV reported.
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/ 12 December 2007
Somali pirates who seized a Japanese chemical tanker in October and were demanding a -million ransom have left the vessel without hurting any of its crew, a United States military spokesperson said on Wednesday. The Panama-registered Golden Nori was carrying benzene from Singapore to Israel when it was hijacked on October 28.
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/ 11 December 2007
A Kenyan pilot who survived more than a week eating leaves and drinking his urine after crashing in dense forest says he will continue flying, despite cheating death in his second accident in two years. Captain Solomon Nyanjui was feared dead after his helicopter went missing during a November 15 flight from Isiolo to Nairobi.