Kenyans voted on Wednesday for five parliamentary seats that will decide who holds the majority, a test of stability in the East African nation.
Zimbabwe’s opposition presidential candidate resumed campaigning on Thursday, the morning after he spent nine hours in police detention.
African leaders revelled in their continent’s economic growth at the World Economic Forum on Africa on Wednesday.
Kenya’s prime minister openly dissented with the president on Tuesday in a row over amnesty for post-election crimes. President Mwai Kibaki’s government and Prime Minister Raila Odinga’s opposition came together in April to form a ”Grand Coalition” after violence that killed at least 1 300.
Kenya must stop forcibly returning internal refugees displaced by post-election violence that saw hundreds of thousands flee their homes, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said on Friday. More than 1Â 200 people were killed and 300Â 000 left their homes after ethnic clashes hit swathes of the country following a disputed election in December.
Kenya’s inflation rate rose to 26,6% in April, up almost 5% from the previous month, the government announced on Friday, blaming rising food and oil prices. "Month-to-month overall inflation rate increased from 21,8% in March 2008 to 26,7% in April 2008," said a statement from the government’s Central Bureau of Statistics.
Kenyan authorities should prosecute murderous militias implicated in the country’s devastating post-election violence, but also address any ”genuine grievances” they may have, former United Nations leader Kofi Annan said on Saturday.
Police fired tear gas at women members of a feared Kenyan gang on Friday as they tried to deliver a petition to Prime Minister Raila Odinga. About 50 women, many of them elderly or with children on their backs, assembled at Odinga’s party headquarters, asking to speak with him about alleged illegal police killings of gang members.
Kenya swore in a power-sharing government on Thursday to soothe fury over a disputed election that plunged the East African country into a bloody crisis. ”Our people are now in the process of reconciliation,” President Mwai Kibaki said at the ceremony, nearly four months after the December 27 poll that triggered extreme violence.
Former United Nations chief Kofi Annan on Wednesday urged Kenyans to support the new coalition government, saying the deeply divided country had a long way to go after a post-election crisis. Annan mediated a power-sharing accord that curbed months of violence following disputed elections.
Newly appointed Kenyan Prime Minister Raila Odinga on Monday urged the new government, comprising former rivals, to work together to enhance reconciliation in the deeply divided nation. ”The process of reconciliation has begun and the Cabinet must speak in one voice,” Odinga told reporters.
Kenya’s president unveiled a power-sharing government on Sunday, with opposition leader Raila Odinga as Prime Minister, aimed at ending a long-running political crisis sparked by contested elections. ”Let us put politics aside and get to work,” President Mwai Kibaki said in a televised speech announcing the Cabinet line-up.
Kenya President Mwai Kibaki and would-be prime minister Raila Odinga on Saturday reached a coalition government agreement and a new Cabinet will be announced on Sunday, political and diplomatic sources said. The agreement was struck after Kibaki and Odinga held closed-door talks in Sagana State Lodge in central Kenya.
Pressure mounted on Thursday on Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki and prime minister-designate Raila Odinga to resume coalition talks amid warnings that a delay was fomenting violence. The pair met last on Sunday and failed to agree on a unity government, a key step in implementing a power-sharing deal.
Kenyan leaders were on Wednesday under pressure to resume talks on forming a coalition government in a bid to end a devastating political crisis, a day after hundreds demonstrated to demand a new Cabinet. The much-delayed unveiling of a national-unity government is a key step in implementing a power-sharing deal aimed at quelling deadly violence.
Kenya opposition leader Raila Odinga refused to meet President Mwai Kibaki for coalition government talks on Monday, deepening a stalemate on the naming of a new Cabinet. The coalition Cabinet is a key part of a February 28 deal that curbed weeks of deadly clashes set off by Kibaki’s disputed re-election in December.
They were the pride of Kenya, but the country’s athletics community could not escape the worst of the post-election tribal violence after disputed December polls. While two runners perished in the Rift Valley crucible of hate, there have also been allegations that stars past and present helped fund the New Year spree of inter-ethnic killings.
Kenya’s president and future prime minister said on Sunday they had made ”substantial progress” at talks to end an impasse over a power-sharing Cabinet and expected to clinch a deal on Monday. The two sides had planned to name the Cabinet on Sunday, but disagreement over the division of ministries scuttled that plan.
Kenya’s president and opposition leader met to break an impasse over the naming of a power-sharing Cabinet and the government said the ministerial line-up would be unveiled later on Sunday. The Cabinet is a critical part of a deal brokered in February to end the East African nation’s bloodiest political crisis.
Kenyan papers and political watchdogs on Friday criticised the size of a coalition Cabinet announced a day earlier, saying 40 ministers were a colossal waste of money in a country with widespread misery. Newspapers said the cost was unreasonable for Kenya, a nation where about 60% of the population lives on less than a day.
Kenya’s opposition on Wednesday accused the government of trying to spoil a power-sharing deal by seeking to vet new Cabinet ministers. President Mwai Kibaki and opposition chief Raila Odinga are at odds over the shape and size of a coalition Cabinet created under a pact to solve a post-election crisis that degenerated into ethnic violence.
Kenyan police on Tuesday fired tear gas at demonstrators protesting against the proposed size of a coalition government, as pressure mounted on the president and prime minister-designate to name a Cabinet. President Mwai Kibaki and future prime minister Raila Odinga signed a power-sharing deal last month but have been wrangling over who will get key ministries.
Seventeen people were killed in Kenya’s Rift Valley region over the past 36 hours, where cattle theft has fanned tribal animosity, bringing the toll to 25 in three days, police said on Thursday. Cattle raiders killed 12 villagers and police retaliated, killing five of the attackers in the Baringo district.
Kenyans on Wednesday hailed the passing of laws needed for a power-sharing deal to end a deadly post-election crisis but worried about bitter debates ahead as discussion turned to sharing out posts. The rare conciliatory mood among the country’s lawmakers elated many Kenyans. But there were few illusions about the difficult days ahead.
Kenya’s Parliament on Tuesday unanimously passed the first of two laws required to enact a power-sharing deal designed to end the country’s bloody post-election crisis. In a 200-0 vote, the legislature approved the constitutional amendment making positions in the Cabinet for a prime minister and two deputies.
World leaders had to accept some blame for the violence that rocked Kenya after a disputed December election, killing more than 1 000 people, the international Human Rights Watch group said on Monday. It accused police of causing ”hundreds” of deaths by using excessive force during the two-month crisis.
Kenya’s new Parliament sought on Tuesday to speed up legislation ratifying a fragile power-sharing deal intended to guarantee the peace after a post-election crisis that killed more than 1 000 people. Members of Parliament proposed procedures so that two Bills could be approved within a five-day limit.
Kenya’s fragile power-sharing deal to end a bloody post-election crisis suffered a setback on Monday as a row broke out over the role of prime minister in the proposed coalition government. President Mwai Kibaki and his rival, Raila Odinga, signed the pact last month to end political turmoil that left hundreds of people dead.
Kenya is determined to make a success of a power-sharing deal designed to end a bloody two-month political crisis that has claimed 1 500 lives, Foreign Minister Moses Wetangula said on Friday. Kenya plunged into its worst post-independence crisis after opposition leader Raila Odinga accused President Mwai Kibaki of rigging December elections.
President Mwai Kibaki commemorated on Thursday the 1Â 000 people killed during Kenya’s post-election crisis and urged Parliament to enshrine into law a power-sharing deal intended to keep the peace. Kibaki opened Kenya’s 10th Parliament with a minute’s silence first for two slain legislators then for all the victims of violence.
The Kenyan government sanctioned violence following last December’s disputed presidential elections, the BBC alleged on Wednesday, but Nairobi strongly denied the claims. The BBC quoted sources alleging that meetings were held at the official residence of President Mwai Kibaki between a banned militia group and high-ranking government figures.
Kenyan rivals were on Tuesday to push ahead with talks on a new deal to share power and tackle root causes of the strife, a day after more than a dozen people were killed in the volatile Rift Valley. The negotiations are focusing on reforms to address historical injustices that entail electoral, institutional, constitutional and judicial issues.