Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) requests applications for their 2008 programme in Journalism and Democracy to be held in Kalmar and Stockholm during 5 May – 23 May. The programme is set up as a process-oriented workshop consisting of lectures, discussions, group sessions, study visits, research and presentations both written and oral. Participants from Zimbabwe are particularly encouraged to apply. This is a fully funded programme. the deadline for applications is February 15, 2008.

UNIVERSITY OF DAR ES SALAAM ACADEMIC STAFF ASSEMBLY (UDASA)

STATEMENT ON THE GRAVE ELECTION AND POST-ELECTION SITUATION IN KENYA

As an association of academics with the social responsibility of pursuing truth and being obliged to take up issues of great concern to citizens of countries in which we work, UDASA wishes to register our grave concern about loss of live and the wanton destruction of people’s property arising from the sad events that have been unfolding since the hurried inauguration of Mr. Mwai Kibaki as the President, for a second term, of the Republic of Kenya. As intellectuals we have made our modest contribution to the building and consolidation of democratic institutions and traditions in Tanzania and, more generally, in East Africa. General Elections are the principal means by which citizens may exercise their hard-worn sovereignty.

On the 27th of December 2007, General Elections were conducted in Kenya. On the 30th of December, 2007, the Chairman of the Electoral Commission of Kenya, Mr. Samuel Kivuitu announced that Mr. Mwai Kibaki, the leader of the Party for National Unity (PNU) that had gained 33 seats in the 210 seat Kenyan Parliament against 95 seats gained by the party of his main rival, the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM), was the winner of the Presidential race in that General Election.

Immediately, thereafter, Kenya has been plunged into violence triggered by outbursts of anger and resentment against supporters of PNU and those ethnically associated with Mr. Kibaki who ODM and its supporters accuse of rigging the tallying of the final count of the General Election results and thus stealing victory in the Presidential race from Mr. Raila Oginga of ODM. More than 300 people are said to have died so far and thousands have been internally displaced. Some Kenyans are said to be already fleeing to neighbouring countries as refugees. All the General Election observers, both local and international are in agreement that there were undue delays in having the constituency election tallies submitted to the Electoral Commission headquarters. There is also consensus now that the results that the Chairman of ECK announced on the 30th December 2007 on the basis of which Mr. Kibaki took the oath as the winner of the Presidential race were not credible tallies of the General Election results where the Presidential race is concerned. The ECK Chairman himself has subsequently made the surprising admission that he himself did not know who won the Presidential race in spite being the one, who announced that Mr. Kibaki won the election on the 30th December, 2007.

Popular displeasure has been unleashed. This displeasure has in some cases taken a very violent turn that has expressed itself in ugly scenes of the destruction of people and property. Political passions have been aroused and in heat of the raised political passions ethnic bigotry has been aroused and made to thrive. Some citizens now have taken to thinking that an injustice had been committed against a political leader or groups of political leaders they considered to be of their kind. Other citizen also now being encouraged to believe that an advantage, however unfair, had been gained by a political leader or group of leaders considered to be of their kind. Seeds of ethnic cleansing are being sowed among residences with mixed ethnic backgrounds coinciding with rival political camps.

UDASA believes that it is time to call on all concerned to sit down and discuss the underlying issues that are the source of the unfolding conflict. The tallying of the election results needs to be revisited. Furthermore, a wider debate needs to be initiated on issues such as the composition and role of election commissions.

Dr. D.L. Nyaoro Chairperson

Monday 14th January 2008
Mr. Sternford Moyo President,
Southern African Development Community Lawyers' Association Harare, ZIMBABWE

Dear Sternford,

Thank you very much for the SADC LA Statement, which, I am sure, the people of Kenya and Eastern Africa will appreciate. It offers much needed solidarity in these trying times. I will ensure that I circulate it widely within the region's media and legal and human rights fraternity.

The AU Summit meets starting next week in Addis Ababa. In our view, it is imperative that the African States/ Governments: -

1) Continue with their laudable first step of refusing to acknowledge the announced, contentious elections results or congratulate the (illegally)
declared President of Kenya.

2) Ensure that they do NOT allow the (illegal) government of Kenya to participate, in any way, at the said AU meeting.

3) Take the next step, as provided for by the Constitutive Act of the African Union, to suspend a government that has assumed power through violation of its own Constitution and laws. A civilian coup, just like a military coup, is still a coup and therefore a violation of the country's Constitution as well as its obligations under international law.

Such action by African governments is not new. Both ECOWAS and the AU acted resolutely in the case of Togo, when the younger Eyadema attempted to unconstitutionally ascend to the Presidency upon the death of his father. We rely on SADC LA and all other proactive African civil society to push this agenda at the AU Summit. We have faith that African civil society can again be as resolute, dynamic and effective as they were when, in previous AU pre-Summit campaigns, they successfully pushed for a Special Court to try Hissen Habre and also successfully opposed the AU Chairmanship candidature of President Omar el Bashir of Sudan.

Inevitably for us in Africa, Aluta Continua!

Yours Sincerely,

Don Deya

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For over a week now, post election violence in Kenya has dominated the news. A country formerly seen as one of the most stable in Africa has turned overnight into chaos, violence and ethnic clashes that are being compared to the nightmare of Rwanda 13 years ago. What happened ?

The most frequently used headlines for the election-related violence has been “tribal killings” between the dominant Kikuyu and the Luo. The New York Times and the San Francisco Chronicle have used words like “savage” in the front page and described the Mungiki ethnic group as “blood drinking” in last week’s articles.

In framing the conflict this way, the media not only misleads and oversimplifies the problem, worse, it affirms existing stereotypes that all of Africa’s problems can be reduced to savage tribal violence. The implication is that still, fifty years after independence, most African institutions lack the “sophisticated political and economic contentions” of other countries in the West. It becomes obvious in such scenarios to consider “humanitarian” intervention to bring in much needed civilization.

What the Kenyan election controversy has uncovered is that it much more to do with economics than with ethnic rivalry. Kenyan author Ngugi wa Thiong’o, in a recent article on the subject stated “They don’t seem to recognize sufficiently that Kenya like Africa as a whole has only two tribes: the haves and the have-nots.”

Much of the violence is concentrated in well known slum areas like Kibera and Mathare in the capital Nairobi. At around this time last year, we were in Nairobi for the World Social Forum. What we observed in the city were the obvious contradictions that can be seen in many African cities – well paved roads, fancy hotels and banks not unlike those in London or New York. But, spread throughout the city were the poor. In pockets within the city were the slums where the poorest of the poor reside in conditions unimaginable for human survival. It is in such areas that the violence is concentrated; people who have nothing to fear and nothing to lose.

When violence erupts so suddenly, the immediate response of the most vulnerable is to leave their homes and flee. Already there are reports of Kenyans leaving for neighboring Uganda in the thousands. What is alarming in this case is that there are already in Kenya millions of refugees from Ethiopia, Eritrea, Somalia, Sudan and Uganda. Kenya has provided safe sanctuary and passage to millions of refugees escaping conflicts in the Horn of Africa.

The Horn of Africa (Ethiopia, Eritrea, Djibouti, Somalia & Sudan) is the most volatile region in the continent. Assistant Sec. for African Affairs Dr. Jendayi Frazier stated in a talk in San Francisco that she spends 70% of her focus on issues related to the five countries in Horn. The violence in Kenya, if not abated soon, has the potential to engulf an existing volatile situation into further chaos.

Nothing short of an independent investigation into charges of election rigging will begin to restore confidence of Kenyans. It is the first step toward long term cessation of violence and hostility that can then lead to political stability. It is important that both candidates exhibit the necessary leadership in resolving a crisis.

The worst proposal to “solve” yet another problem in Africa is the consideration of a military alternative, as in AfriCOM (an Africa Command center) which the State Department announced a year ago.

Expected to go into full operation in September of this year, AfriCom is being promoted as “security” measure to end conflicts and provide humanitarian assistance to Africa’s hotspots. The current violence in Kenya will, no doubt, be used as yet another reason why the US should speed up the operational phase of AfriCom.

As we have seen in the case of Iraq, military responses to deeper economic and political problems are no solution at all. They in fact exasperate and further divide communities along religious, ethnic and economic lines.

Let Kenyan leaders step in to propose solutions to the elections.

My dear family;

I have no problem signing a petition to end the violence in Kenya. But I must ask a question of you. As a Black African American man, born of my Black African American parents, grandparents and so on here in America, where was the country of Kenya, Nigeria, Liberia, Senegal, etc., when our people, your people were here in America, enduring the harshness of slavery and the racist backlashes we had to endure? did you not know we were here? did you not here our cries, feel our pain? did you try to come get us? I am making a point that we are one. Yet some of the Black Africans snub their noses at us Black African Americans! This must stop. As Salaam Alaikum

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