Kenya's opposition refuses to negotiate

Kenya's opposition refuses to negotiate despite the fact that they represent 44% of the voters.

 

The election Final results

PNU Mwai Kibaki 4,584,721 46%

ODM Raila Odinga 4,352,993 44%

ODM-K Kalonzo Musyoka 879,903 9%

See election Final results

 

 

Kenya's opposition brushes aside President's offer

Posted 11 hours 49 minutes ago
Updated 11 hours 50 minutes ago

Kenya's President Mwai Kibaki said on Saturday he was ready to form a national unity government to end Kenya's bloody turmoil but the opposition brushed the offer aside, saying he must step down and negotiate.

After a week of political violence and tribal clashes since the disputed December 27 election, Mr Kibaki said he would accept a unity government "that would not only unite Kenyans but would also help in the healing and reconciliation process".

But the opposition said the offer changed nothing and only internationally mediated talks would end a crisis that has killed at least 300 people and forced 250,000 from their homes.

"My position has not changed. We want a negotiated settlement. Our starting point is that Kibaki is there illegally. He should not come to the negotiating table as the president," opposition leader Raila Odinga told reporters.

Mr Kibaki's office issued his offer after he met the top US Africa diplomat, Jendayi Frazer. President George W Bush sent Ms Frazer to Nairobi on Friday to try to help end the crisis.

Mr Odinga, who had appeared on course to win the vote until Mr Kibaki was handed a narrow victory last Sunday, says the election was rigged and his rival is an illegal president.

He appeared to have ruled out a national unity government even before Mr Kibaki's statement.

"We know how governments of national unity operate. We have been there before with Kibaki. That is a way to cheat Kenyans of their rights," Mr Odinga said after meeting Ms Frazer earlier.

Mr Odinga helped Mr Kibaki win power in a 2002 election but says the president broke a promise to award him a new prime minister's position after the victory.

Their rivalry dates from then and the distrust is one of the obstacles to a deal to end the current violence.

Mr Kibaki's office said Ms Frazer had "commended President Kibaki for reaching out to the opposition in order to stop the violence and called on all parties involved to embrace dialogue as a way out of the current situation."

It quoted Ms Frazer as saying Mr Kibaki had shown "commitment to ending the political impasse" by extending an "olive branch to the opposition".

- Reuters

Kenya's opposition brushes aside President's offer - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

 

The election Final results

PNU Mwai Kibaki 4,584,721 46%

ODM Raila Odinga 4,352,993 44%

ODM-K Kalonzo Musyoka 879,903 9%

See election Final results

Background:

A presidential election was held as part of the Kenyan general election on December 27, 2007; parliamentary elections were held on the same date.^[1] Incumbent President Mwai Kibaki was declared the winner and sworn in on December 30, despite opposition leader Raila Odinga's claims of victory.^[2][3][4]

The election was strongly marked by tribalism, with Kibaki a member of the traditionally dominant Kikuyu ethnic group and Odinga a member of the Luo ethnic group. Following the announcement of Kibaki's victory, tribe-based rioting broke out.^[5]

Presidential candidates

Mwai Kibaki, the incumbent president, sought a second term as the candidate of the Party of National Unity. His main challengers were Raila Odinga of Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) and Kalonzo Musyoka of ODM-Kenya.^[6]

Kenneth Matiba of Saba Saba Asili joined the race after a 10-year political hiatus. Other candidates were Joseph Ngacha Karani (Kenya Patriotic Trust), Nixon Jeremiah Kukubo (Republican Party of Kenya), Pius Muiru (Kenya Peoples’ Party), David Waweru Ng’ethe (Chama Cha Umma) and Nazlin Omar (Workers Congress Party).^[7]

Timeline and preparations

Incumbent president Mwai Kibaki declared on January 26, 2007 his intentions of running for re-election.^[8] At the time ODM-Kenya coalition was expected to field the strongest challenger for Kibaki. The main parties affiliated to ODM-Kenya were LDP and KANU.^[9] At the 2002 elections LDP was part of the NARC movement backing Kibaki, but were dismissed from the cabinet after 2005 constitutional referendum.^[10] KANU, on the other hand is a former ruling party, but the former president Daniel Arap Moi was among its faction opposing its involvement with the ODM-Kenya coalition.^[11] KANU and LDP had originally teamed up for the 2005 referendum, under the banner Orange Democratic Movement.^[12]

ODM-Kenya split in two in August 2007, with one faction (ODM-Kenya) led by Kalonzo Musyoka, while others joined the original ODM. KANU left the coalition. Former president Daniel Arap Moi announced his support for the re-election of Kibaki, his former political enemy, in late August,^[13] and Uhuru Kenyatta followed the suit and announced his support for Kibaki in mid-September. Kenyatta had earlier vied for presidential candidacy on the ODM ticket before he and his party KANU had ditched the coalition. KANU will field its own parliamentary candidates.^[14]

Several ODM members vied for presidency, including Kalonzo Musyoka, Raila Odinga, Uhuru Kenyatta, William Ruto, Najib Balala, Musalia Mudavadi and Joseph Nyagah.^[15] Following the August 2007 split, the ODM-K elected Musyoka as its candidate on August 31^[16][17] and the ODM elected Odinga as its candidate on September 1.^[18]

On September 16, 2007, Kibaki announced that he would stand as the candidate of a new alliance called the Party of National Unity, which will include a number of parties, including KANU,^[19][20] DP, Narc-Kenya, Ford-Kenya, Ford People, and Shirikisho among others.^[20] He began his presidential campaign on September 30 at Nyayo Stadium in Nairobi.^[21]

Odinga launched his campaign in Uhuru Park on October 6.^[22][23] On the same day, three ODM supporters were shot (one of them fatally), allegedly by bodyguards of Stanley Livondo, who is running as the PNU candidate for Odinga's seat in parliament. Livondo was arrested, along with two of his bodyguards and released later.^[23]

In October, Odinga led Kibaki in opinion polls. Two cabinet ministers, first Health Minister Charity Ngilu and then Regional Cooperation Minister John Koech, backed Odinga in October; Kibaki dismissed Ngilu from the cabinet.^[24]

Pius Muiru, a bishop and the leader of Kenya Peoples Party (KPP), officially launched his bid for the presidency on October 21, 2007 at Kamukunji grounds.^[25]

Parliament was dissolved on Monday October 22nd, paving way for the Electoral Commission of Kenya (ECK) to announce the election date.^[26] The date was officially announced on October 26, 2007 by the ECK, stating the elections would be held on Thursday December 27, 2007.^[27]

Opinion polls in late October put Odinga at 50% support, Kibaki at 39%, and Musyoka at 8%.^[28] The poll released in early November put Odinga at 45%, Kibaki at 41% and Musyoka at 11%, while on November 23 a poll placed Odinga and Kibaki at about the same level, with 43.6% and 43.3% support respectively.^[29]

Presidential candidates presented their nomination papers on the November 14th and 15th to the ECK and 9 candidates were cleared to be on the ballot in December.^[30]

Kenya stalemate over

 

NAIROBI, Kenya (CNN) -- Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki appeared to offer a way out of a stalemate with the opposition over disputed elections, announcing Saturday he was ready to form a government of national unity, a government spokesman said.

Internally displaced Kenyans gather at St. John's cathedral in Eldoret, Kenya, on Friday.

more photos »

Opposition leader Raila Odinga immediately responded to the announcement, telling a press conference that he was ready to negotiate with the president without preconditions.

Odinga's Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) had earlier insisted Kibaki must resign before talks could take place.

The apparent olive branch came as new figures revealed the humanitarian cost of a week-long spate of violence.

According to the United Nations, some 250,000 Kenyans are now estimated to have been displaced by rioting and looting that accompanied the result of the Dec. 27 election.

The U.N. said that in total, between 400,000 and 500,000 people had been affected by the unrest. Around 300 people are reported to have died. Watch a report from the front lines »

The humanitarian crisis came after rioters went on the rampage following Kibaki's narrow victory, which was disputed by Odinga's party. The ODM accused the president of election fraud.

The violence that has plagued Kenya in the last week appeared to have abated Saturday, with CNN's Kim Norgaard saying Nairobi was quiet as inhabitants went about their normal business.

In the western town of Kisumu, the scene of some of the worst unrest, the police lifted a curfew imposed earlier this week, aid workers in the town told CNN.

Kenyan police said that more than 1,000 arrests had been made in connection with post-election unrest.

In a statement released Saturday police said that 451 of those arrested had already been charged and a further 70 are still in police custody.

The charges are for offenses including arson, unlawful assembly, robbery and murder, the statement said. The highest number of arrests took place in the coastal region, it added.

The offer of a unity government followed talks Saturday between the Kenyan president and U.S. diplomat Jendayi Frazer, who flew in a day earlier to try to broker a solution to the crisis.

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Alfred Mutua, the Kenyan government spokesman, did not say if the offer meant the president was prepared to enter into a power-sharing arrangement with Odinga.

Mutua said the president was ready to work with "like minded parties."

"We do want a strong opposition, otherwise we would have a one-party state," Mutua added.

Reacting to the news, Odinga told a press conference that he would be happy to sit down and negotiate with Kibaki.

Pressed by CNN as to whether he would willingly serve in a coalition government with the incumbent leader, he said it was a matter for the negotiating table.

The Kenyan Red Cross, meanwhile, is appealing for $15.4 billion in aid for those forced from their homes by the crisis.

Kenyan Red Cross spokesman Anthony Mwangi said the biggest concern was getting food to those in remote areas.

The World Food Program said it would shortly provide food through the Kenya Red Cross for 100,000 people displaced in the northern Rift Valley.

The U.N. food agency said the movement of food through western Kenya and the rest of the region -- including Uganda, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) -- ground to a halt for days due to the unrest. E-mail to a friend

CNN's Kim Norgaard and Paula Newton in Nairobi contributed to this report.

Copyright 2008 CNN. All rights reserved.This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed. Associated Press contributed to this report.

All About Mwai Kibaki • Kenya • Raila Odinga

Despair reigns in Kenya 3:04
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• Peacemaker Tutu slams Kenya elite

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more CNN videos »

The story

Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki appeared to offer a way out of a stalemate with the opposition over disputed elections, announcing Saturday he was ready to form a government of national unity, a government spokesman said.

Opposition leader Raila Odinga immediately responded to the announcement, telling a press conference that he was ready to negotiate with the president without preconditions.

Odinga's Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) had earlier insisted Kibaki must resign before talks could take place.

Kibaki calls for unity government.

Jan. 05 - Kenya's President says he is willing to form a unity government to end the conflict over last week's disputed election.

The apparent olive branch came in a statement from President Mwai Kibaki's office but his main opposition rivals are reiterating their demands for his resignation and a re-run of the disputed ballot that saw Kibaki narrowly hold on to power.

Paul Chapman reports.

Kibaki ready for unity government | Video | Reuters.com

 

Kenyan Leader Makes Unity Offer

By SARAH CHILDRESS
January 5, 2008 10:37 a.m.

NAIROBI, Kenya -- After a week of political stalemate and bloodshed, Kenyan president Mwai Kibaki said Saturday that he was prepared to form a government of national unity with the opposition, easing tensions between the two side and potentially setting the stage for negotiations to end violence that has so far killed at least 300 people and displaced as many as 250,000.

The statement, which was released shortly after Mr. Kibaki met with Jendayi Frazer, America's top diplomat for Africa, suggested a power-sharing agreement between the president and his challenger, Raila Odinga, who claims that Mr. Kibaki stole presidential elections late last month.

"The president said he was ready to form a government of national unity that would not only unite Kenyans but would also help in the healing and reconciliation process," the statement said.

Kenya, once considered a safe haven in a region wracked by civil war, dissolved into ethnic clashes shortly after Mr. Kibaki was hastily sworn in Dec. 30 after a presidential election criticized by international observers. Supporters of Mr. Odinga, an ethnic Luo, and Kikuyus, Mr. Kibaki's tribe, clashed in sometimes-horrific violence in the days after the election.

Kenya has become an important ally to the U.S. Mr. Kibaki has worked closely with the Americans to fight extremists, and Washington has invested millions in training and equipment for Kenyan forces. As the largest economy and most stable country in East Africa, Kenya has also played an important role as a peacekeeper in the region.

Mr. Kibaki responded to the election protests by filling the streets of Nairobi, the capital city, with police clad in olive-drab body armor, and sending reinforcements into the western part of the country, an Odinga stronghold.

Representatives from the European Union, the United Kingdom, the U.S. and several African countries pled with both sides for reconciliation in recent days. But while both sides called for peace, they also blamed the violence solely on their rival's supporters, and until Saturday, showed little willingness to compromise with each other.

Mr. Odinga had recently agreed to a neutral mediator such as the head of the African Union, Ghanaian President John Kufuor, and held meetings with Archbishop Desmond Tutu and others. But Mr. Kibaki's government had said it wouldn't negotiate with those who instigated violence, and suggested he would only consider a recount if a court ordered it, an unlikely outcome.

Mr. Odinga stopped short Saturday of embracing the idea of a power-sharing agreement. But crucially he didn't rule it out, either. Asked at a press briefing Saturday whether he would agree to a national unity government, Mr. Odinga said, "Let them put that on the table when we negotiate."

At the briefing he said that there were only two options: Mr. Kibaki, whom he called a "thief sitting in the State House," should step down as president; or the elections must be rerun. Any negotiations, he said, would have to be conducted through an international mediator.

Still, Mr. Kibaki's concession brought fresh hope to Kenyans, most of whom are exhausted and horrified by the violence. One local newspaper printed messages sent in by text from people begging Mr. Kibaki and Mr. Odinga to reconcile. Radio and television announcers broadcast the same message in interviews with ordinary Kenyans.

In Nairobi, many people have cautiously resumed their normal lives. Traffic is returning to the streets, restaurants stay open after dark and long lines at supermarkets have dwindled. The police, a ubiquitous presence just a few days earlier, no longer outnumber pedestrians along the roadside.

In western Kenya, aid groups struggled to provide water, food and other supplies to displaced, and hospitals were overwhelmed trying to provide medical care to those who had been hacked by mobs armed with machetes or shot by paramilitary police. Kisumu, which was embroiled in violence this week, yesterday had settled into a tense calm as families returned to search for the bodies of their missing relatives.

Mr. Odinga plans to hold a rally in Uhuru Park in Nairobi on Tuesday. The government banned the past two attempts to hold a meeting, chasing away demonstrators with tear gas and water cannons. Mr. Kibaki's government said Mr. Odinga aims to rekindle violence. Mr. Odinga said it's simply to thank his supporters.

 

NAIROBI, Kenya (CNN) -- Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki appeared to offer a way out of a stalemate with the opposition over disputed elections, announcing Saturday he was ready to form a government of national unity, a government spokesman said.

Internally displaced Kenyans gather at St. John's cathedral in Eldoret, Kenya, on Friday.

more photos »

Opposition leader Raila Odinga immediately responded to the announcement, telling a press conference that he was ready to negotiate with the president without preconditions.

Odinga's Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) had earlier insisted Kibaki must resign before talks could take place.

The apparent olive branch came as new figures revealed the humanitarian cost of a week-long spate of violence.

According to the United Nations, some 250,000 Kenyans are now estimated to have been displaced by rioting and looting that accompanied the result of the Dec. 27 election.

The U.N. said that in total, between 400,000 and 500,000 people had been affected by the unrest. Around 300 people are reported to have died. Watch a report from the front lines »

The humanitarian crisis came after rioters went on the rampage following Kibaki's narrow victory, which was disputed by Odinga's party. The ODM accused the president of election fraud.

The violence that has plagued Kenya in the last week appeared to have abated Saturday, with CNN's Kim Norgaard saying Nairobi was quiet as inhabitants went about their normal business.

In the western town of Kisumu, the scene of some of the worst unrest, the police lifted a curfew imposed earlier this week, aid workers in the town told CNN.

Kenyan police said that more than 1,000 arrests had been made in connection with post-election unrest.

In a statement released Saturday police said that 451 of those arrested had already been charged and a further 70 are still in police custody.

The charges are for offenses including arson, unlawful assembly, robbery and murder, the statement said. The highest number of arrests took place in the coastal region, it added.

The offer of a unity government followed talks Saturday between the Kenyan president and U.S. diplomat Jendayi Frazer, who flew in a day earlier to try to broker a solution to the crisis.

Don't Miss

• Peacemaker Tutu slams Kenya elite
• Tribal bonds color Kenyan politics
• i-Report: Escaping Kenya violence

Alfred Mutua, the Kenyan government spokesman, did not say if the offer meant the president was prepared to enter into a power-sharing arrangement with Odinga.

Mutua said the president was ready to work with "like minded parties."

"We do want a strong opposition, otherwise we would have a one-party state," Mutua added.

Reacting to the news, Odinga told a press conference that he would be happy to sit down and negotiate with Kibaki.

Pressed by CNN as to whether he would willingly serve in a coalition government with the incumbent leader, he said it was a matter for the negotiating table.

The Kenyan Red Cross, meanwhile, is appealing for $15.4 billion in aid for those forced from their homes by the crisis.

Kenyan Red Cross spokesman Anthony Mwangi said the biggest concern was getting food to those in remote areas.

The World Food Program said it would shortly provide food through the Kenya Red Cross for 100,000 people displaced in the northern Rift Valley.

The U.N. food agency said the movement of food through western Kenya and the rest of the region -- including Uganda, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) -- ground to a halt for days due to the unrest .

CNN's Kim Norgaard and Paula Newton in Nairobi contributed to this report.

Kibaki calls for unity government.

Jan. 05 - Kenya's President says he is willing to form a unity government to end the conflict over last week's disputed election.

The apparent olive branch came in a statement from President Mwai Kibaki's office but his main opposition rivals are reiterating their demands for his resignation and a re-run of the disputed ballot that saw Kibaki narrowly hold on to power.

Paul Chapman reports.

Kibaki ready for unity government | Video | Reuters.com

 

Kenyan Leader Makes Unity Offer

By SARAH CHILDRESS
January 5, 2008 10:37 a.m.

NAIROBI, Kenya -- After a week of political stalemate and bloodshed, Kenyan president Mwai Kibaki said Saturday that he was prepared to form a government of national unity with the opposition, easing tensions between the two side and potentially setting the stage for negotiations to end violence that has so far killed at least 300 people and displaced as many as 250,000.

The statement, which was released shortly after Mr. Kibaki met with Jendayi Frazer, America's top diplomat for Africa, suggested a power-sharing agreement between the president and his challenger, Raila Odinga, who claims that Mr. Kibaki stole presidential elections late last month.

"The president said he was ready to form a government of national unity that would not only unite Kenyans but would also help in the healing and reconciliation process," the statement said.

Kenya, once considered a safe haven in a region wracked by civil war, dissolved into ethnic clashes shortly after Mr. Kibaki was hastily sworn in Dec. 30 after a presidential election criticized by international observers. Supporters of Mr. Odinga, an ethnic Luo, and Kikuyus, Mr. Kibaki's tribe, clashed in sometimes-horrific violence in the days after the election.

Kenya has become an important ally to the U.S. Mr. Kibaki has worked closely with the Americans to fight extremists, and Washington has invested millions in training and equipment for Kenyan forces. As the largest economy and most stable country in East Africa, Kenya has also played an important role as a peacekeeper in the region.

Mr. Kibaki responded to the election protests by filling the streets of Nairobi, the capital city, with police clad in olive-drab body armor, and sending reinforcements into the western part of the country, an Odinga stronghold.

Representatives from the European Union, the United Kingdom, the U.S. and several African countries pled with both sides for reconciliation in recent days. But while both sides called for peace, they also blamed the violence solely on their rival's supporters, and until Saturday, showed little willingness to compromise with each other.

Mr. Odinga had recently agreed to a neutral mediator such as the head of the African Union, Ghanaian President John Kufuor, and held meetings with Archbishop Desmond Tutu and others. But Mr. Kibaki's government had said it wouldn't negotiate with those who instigated violence, and suggested he would only consider a recount if a court ordered it, an unlikely outcome.

Mr. Odinga stopped short Saturday of embracing the idea of a power-sharing agreement. But crucially he didn't rule it out, either. Asked at a press briefing Saturday whether he would agree to a national unity government, Mr. Odinga said, "Let them put that on the table when we negotiate."

At the briefing he said that there were only two options: Mr. Kibaki, whom he called a "thief sitting in the State House," should step down as president; or the elections must be rerun. Any negotiations, he said, would have to be conducted through an international mediator.

Still, Mr. Kibaki's concession brought fresh hope to Kenyans, most of whom are exhausted and horrified by the violence. One local newspaper printed messages sent in by text from people begging Mr. Kibaki and Mr. Odinga to reconcile. Radio and television announcers broadcast the same message in interviews with ordinary Kenyans.

In Nairobi, many people have cautiously resumed their normal lives. Traffic is returning to the streets, restaurants stay open after dark and long lines at supermarkets have dwindled. The police, a ubiquitous presence just a few days earlier, no longer outnumber pedestrians along the roadside.

In western Kenya, aid groups struggled to provide water, food and other supplies to displaced, and hospitals were overwhelmed trying to provide medical care to those who had been hacked by mobs armed with machetes or shot by paramilitary police. Kisumu, which was embroiled in violence this week, yesterday had settled into a tense calm as families returned to search for the bodies of their missing relatives.

Mr. Odinga plans to hold a rally in Uhuru Park in Nairobi on Tuesday. The government banned the past two attempts to hold a meeting, chasing away demonstrators with tear gas and water cannons. Mr. Kibaki's government said Mr. Odinga aims to rekindle violence. Mr. Odinga said it's simply to thank his supporters.

 

NAIROBI, Kenya (CNN) -- Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki appeared to offer a way out of a stalemate with the opposition over disputed elections, announcing Saturday he was ready to form a government of national unity, a government spokesman said.

Internally displaced Kenyans gather at St. John's cathedral in Eldoret, Kenya, on Friday.

more photos »

Opposition leader Raila Odinga immediately responded to the announcement, telling a press conference that he was ready to negotiate with the president without preconditions.

Odinga's Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) had earlier insisted Kibaki must resign before talks could take place.

The apparent olive branch came as new figures revealed the humanitarian cost of a week-long spate of violence.

According to the United Nations, some 250,000 Kenyans are now estimated to have been displaced by rioting and looting that accompanied the result of the Dec. 27 election.

The U.N. said that in total, between 400,000 and 500,000 people had been affected by the unrest. Around 300 people are reported to have died. Watch a report from the front lines »

The humanitarian crisis came after rioters went on the rampage following Kibaki's narrow victory, which was disputed by Odinga's party. The ODM accused the president of election fraud.

The violence that has plagued Kenya in the last week appeared to have abated Saturday, with CNN's Kim Norgaard saying Nairobi was quiet as inhabitants went about their normal business.

In the western town of Kisumu, the scene of some of the worst unrest, the police lifted a curfew imposed earlier this week, aid workers in the town told CNN.

Kenyan police said that more than 1,000 arrests had been made in connection with post-election unrest.

In a statement released Saturday police said that 451 of those arrested had already been charged and a further 70 are still in police custody.

The charges are for offenses including arson, unlawful assembly, robbery and murder, the statement said. The highest number of arrests took place in the coastal region, it added.

The offer of a unity government followed talks Saturday between the Kenyan president and U.S. diplomat Jendayi Frazer, who flew in a day earlier to try to broker a solution to the crisis.

Don't Miss

• Peacemaker Tutu slams Kenya elite
• Tribal bonds color Kenyan politics
• i-Report: Escaping Kenya violence

Alfred Mutua, the Kenyan government spokesman, did not say if the offer meant the president was prepared to enter into a power-sharing arrangement with Odinga.

Mutua said the president was ready to work with "like minded parties."

"We do want a strong opposition, otherwise we would have a one-party state," Mutua added.

Reacting to the news, Odinga told a press conference that he would be happy to sit down and negotiate with Kibaki.

Pressed by CNN as to whether he would willingly serve in a coalition government with the incumbent leader, he said it was a matter for the negotiating table.

The Kenyan Red Cross, meanwhile, is appealing for $15.4 billion in aid for those forced from their homes by the crisis.

Kenyan Red Cross spokesman Anthony Mwangi said the biggest concern was getting food to those in remote areas.

The World Food Program said it would shortly provide food through the Kenya Red Cross for 100,000 people displaced in the northern Rift Valley.

The U.N. food agency said the movement of food through western Kenya and the rest of the region -- including Uganda, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) -- ground to a halt for days due to the unrest .

CNN's Kim Norgaard and Paula Newton in Nairobi contributed to this report.

Kibaki offers unity government

NAIROBI, Kenya - Kenya's president is ready to form "a government of national unity" to help resolve disputed elections that caused deadly riots, the government said Saturday as police and residents battled with guns and machetes in a Nairobi slum.

At least one man was shot dead, witnesses said.

President Mwai Kibaki made the statement to Jendayi Frazer, the leading U.S. diplomat for Africa, according to the director of the presidential news service, Isaiya Kabira.

Kabira offered no details and would not say whether it was a formal offer to Raila Odinga, the opposition leader who accuses Kibaki of stealing the Dec. 27 vote described by international observers as deeply flawed.

Britain, the former colonial power in Kenya, appealed Friday to leaders in the East African country to consider sharing power.

Frazer, who met with Odinga earlier Saturday, would meet with the opposition leader again, Kabira said.

Odinga told a news conference he had not received any formal offer from the government, but added, "Let them put that on the table when we are negotiating."

He declined to give a response, but his spokesman, Salim Lone, told The Associated Press that Odinga would rather not share power.

"Raila has said a number of times that he is not happy with (the idea of) a government of national unity, he has said he would rather remain in the opposition," Lone said.

Odinga spoke at the news conference before he met for a second time with Frazer on Saturday. Aides would not say whether Frazer gave Odinga a message from Kibaki. Lone would only say that Odinga repeated his demand for a new election.

In parliamentary balloting, Odinga's party won 95 of 122 legislative seats and half of Kibaki's Cabinet lost their seats, making it almost impossible for Kibaki to govern without opposition cooperation.

There was no immediate statement from Frazer on her 90-minute meeting with Kibaki or her talks with Odinga.

Kabira read a government statement that quoted Frazer as saying that "by extending an olive branch to the opposition, President Kibaki had shown his commitment to ending the political impasse."

The statement said Kibaki was ready to work with all involved parties.

"The president said he was ready to form a government of national Unity that would not only unite Kenyans but would also help in the healing and reconciliation process," the statement said.

U.S. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Frazer's mission is designed to complement other international efforts, including one by South African Nobel peace laureate Desmond Tutu, toward a peaceful solution.

Some 300 people have been killed and the United Nations said 250,000 made homeless in violent protests and clashes since the vote. The turbulence has taken an ugly ethnic twist, with other tribes pitted against the president's Kikuyu people, and brought chaos to a country once considered an island of stability in violence-plagued East Africa.

Several shacks were set ablaze Saturday in Nairobi's sprawling Mathare slum, where residents attacked each other with machetes. One man said people from Odinga's Luo tribe were fighting a gang from Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe. Police opened fire and one man was shot in the head and killed, according to an AP Television News cameraman.

The police were quickly surrounded by an angry crowd and fled with three wounded people, including a man with half his leg hacked away.

Trouble has spread from Nairobi, the capital, to the western highlands and to the coast. In the coastal tourist city of Mombasa on Saturday, police fired tear gas in a bid to disperse protesters for a second day running.

"Kibaki must go!" the scores of demonstrators shouted.

Thousands in the capital's slums, meanwhile, have lined up for food after days of riots left them cut off and shortages have led to major price increases.

The U.N. World Food Program said it was scrambling to bring food to 100,000 displaced people in the Rift Valley. The agency said trucks were slowed because of insecurity.

French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner has said that the elections "were totally rigged," but did not provide evidence.

Attorney General Amos Wako has called for an independent investigation of the vote counting. The call from Wako, who is considered close to Kibaki, was a surprise and could reflect the seriousness of the rigging allegations.

But Odinga's spokesman, Lone, rejected the suggestion, saying his party had "no faith in any government institution."

The state-funded Kenya National Human Rights Commission and 22 other civil society organizations called Saturday for the entire electoral commission to resign for participating in "a forgery" of an election.

Kenyan president offers unity government - Yahoo! News By MALKHADIR M. MUHUMED, Associated Press Writer 9 minutes ago AFP

AP Photo: A police officer kicks a resident of the Kibera slum, Nairobi, Kenya, Saturday Jan. 5,...

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U.S. steering Kenya back from brink

NAIROBI, Kenya — Mary Wambui sat dazed with grief under a tree on the outskirts of this embattled African capital, her pauper's hut looted by a gang of thugs, her sister recovering from rape in a local hospital and all her worldly possessions stuffed into a plastic bucket salvaged from the ashes of Kenya's recent spasm of election violence.
"Americans won't care about this," Wambui, 18, said, pressing a fist to her mouth as if to still her quavering voice. "They will just say we are hopeless, like another Somalia."
Many Americans might indeed be tempted to dismiss the recent television images of Nairobi's bleeding slums and flaming roadblocks as just one more baffling example of Africa's flirtation with chaos.
But alarmed U.S. diplomats and analysts know better. The unprecedented political violence that has rocked this once orderly country, pitting the supporters of re-elected President Mwai Kibaki against an enraged opposition that claims the vote was rigged, threatens to upend years of carefully erected American foreign policy across a vast, strategic and deeply troubled swath of Africa.
Bound painfully to the United States by the 1998 bombing of the U.S. Embassy in Nairobi by Al Qaeda affiliates—a terrorist attack that killed far more Kenyans than Americans—Kenya has become many things to its Washington ally: an outpost of peace and stability in an impoverished and violent region; a springboard from which to funnel billions of dollars in aid to nearly half the continent; and a quiet bulwark against the lawlessness of Africa's Horn, a tough neighborhood that security experts have begun calling the third major front in the war on terrorism, after Afghanistan and Iraq.
"This isn't an ordinary African political crisis," said J. Stephen Morrison, director of the Africa program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, a foreign affairs think tank in Washington. "The stakes are pretty big for the U.S. If they lose Kenya, I'm not sure what the Plan B is."
Not that Kenya is doomed to anarchy yet.
On Friday the nation seemed dazed after five days of mayhem that saw homes and churches torched, untold numbers of women raped and upward of 300 people slaughtered in political clashes that quickly devolved into ethnic vendettas.
In Nairobi, a trickle of cars and taxi vans began circulating on otherwise empty streets. A few shops cautiously yanked up their shutters. And hundreds of riot police were on patrol.
Raila Odinga, the fiery opposition leader who says he won the Dec. 27 election, warned that a new vote must be scheduled within 90 days or Kenya would slide deeper into bedlam. A government spokesman shrugged off that suggestion.
Foreign leaders and diplomats, meanwhile, were scrambling to keep the two leaders talking—and Kenya from toppling into a humanitarian and political catastrophe. Few delegations were pulling out more stops than the Americans.
"Kenya is an important counterterrorism partner," said National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe, adding that Washington was working hard to help what is arguably its closest African ally "get back on the non-violent, democratic path they had been on."
The stakes couldn't be higher. The U.S. relied on Kenyan airspace and armed border patrols a year ago when the Pentagon backed another regional ally, Ethiopia, in crushing a radical Islamist regime in neighboring Somalia. Kenya has acted also as a logistical corridor for a billion-dollar humanitarian aid effort, paid for largely by the U.S., in southern Sudan. And Kenyan intelligence agencies collaborate closely with their U.S. counterparts in monitoring Al Qaeda infiltration in the region.
The alliance only deepened after Al Qaeda operatives blew up an Israeli-owned hotel in Mombasa in 2002.
Such pro-American stances have paid off handsomely.
Total U.S. aid mushroomed more than tenfold over the past decade, from $29.5 million in 1997 to $390.5 million in 2006, the last year for which government figures are available. Much of that largesse comes in the form of food donations and anti-AIDS funding. American military assistance, however, has grown apace. In the five years before Sept. 11, it amounted to $3 million; in the five years after, it zoomed to $34.8 million.
Still, Washington's embrace of the Kibaki regime has caused some awkward and unexpected blow-back in the current crisis.
The eruption of postelection violence appears to have caught U.S. diplomats flat-footed, political analysts in both countries say, because Washington is too cozy with Kenya's often-corrupt ruling elite. An embarrassed State Department retracted a too-hasty congratulation to Kibaki after international monitors declared the vote-counting deeply suspect.
"The U.S. has in our view gone back to a Cold War paradigm where it supports any regime as long as it fights America's war on terrorism," said Maina Kiai, head of the Kenya National Commission on Human Rights. "The result is that the Americans have leverage with Kibaki but credibility almost nowhere else within Kenya."
The Nairobi-Washington alliance also has managed to alienate many of Kenya's minority Muslims.
Over the past year, Kibaki has been accused of permitting suspected Islamic extremists to be deported without trial to secret jails in Ethiopia—a local version of Washington's clandestine rendition program.
"Ninety percent of Muslims voted for the opposition in this election," said Said Athman, the director of Kenya's National Muslim Leaders Forum. "We feel that the current Kenyan government is a proxy of the United States. We view the U.S. as hostile towards us."
Yet the special relationship is likely to continue, unless Kenya utterly collapses.
"We have no other reliable, coherent partners in the region to contain trouble spots like Somalia and Sudan," said analyst Morrison. "Even if Odinga eventually takes power, the U.S. will work with him."
Which may or may not be a comfort to Wambui, the young slum refugee and victim of electoral violence, who was camping rough under the trees.
Americans may not be particularly moved by her faraway miseries. But at least Washington is watching anxiously.

By Paul Salopek ,Tribune foreign correspondent ,January 5, 2008

U.S. has big stake in steering Kenya back from brink -- chicagotribune.com

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Saturday, January 05, 2008

President Kibaki in talks with Archbishop Tutu, says he is ready for dialogue

President Mwai Kibaki with the visiting South African Archbishop, Desmond Tutu when he called on him at State House, Nairobi.

President Mwai Kibaki and Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa today called for an end to the post election violence in the country saying leaders from across the political divide must give dialogue a chance.
Posted: 1/4/2008
President warns perpetrators of violence, calls for dialogue
President Mwai Kibaki has assured wananchi that the Government is doing everything possible to ensure the security of all Kenyans and warned those who continue to violate the law that they will face its full force.
Posted: 1/3/2008
MPs meet President Kibaki, condemn violence
Eighty five newly elected members of Parliament today met with President Kibaki where they roundly condemned the acts of violence witnessed in parts of the country.
Posted: 1/2/2008
President condemns acts of violence, calls for peace and tolerance
President Mwai Kibaki has condemned acts of violence meted on innocent Kenyans in the last three days.
Posted: 1/1/2008
Let's embrace national unity and uphold peace, President urges Kenyans

 

President Mwai Kibaki addresses the nation during a televised new year address to the nation at State House, Nairobi.