The rivals make concessions

some hope?

NAIROBI, Kenya - Kenya's president and his chief rival made key concessions Monday to end their election dispute, calling off protests and agreeing to talks under pressure from the United States as the death toll from a week of violence neared 500.

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The top American envoy to Africa said the vote count at the heart of the dispute was tampered with and both sides could have been involved.

The Dec. 27 election returned President Mwai Kibaki to power for another five-year term, with his rabble-rousing opponent, Raila Odinga, coming in a close second. But even Kenyan electoral commission chairman Samuel Kivuiti, who declared Kibaki the winner, subsequently said he is not sure Kibaki won.

"Yes, there was rigging," the U.S. envoy, Jendayi Frazer, told The Associated Press in an interview in Nairobi, where she has been meeting with Kibaki and Odinga for the past three days. "I mean there were problems with the vote counting process," she added. "Both the parties could have rigged."

She said she did not want to blame either Kibaki or Odinga.

Kenya is crucial to the United States' war on terrorism. It has turned over dozens of people to the U.S. and Ethiopia as suspected terrorists, allows American forces to operate from Kenyan bases and conducts joint exercises with U.S. troops in the region.

The U.S. also is a major donor to Kenya, long seen as a stable democracy in a region that includes war-ravaged Somalia and Sudan. Aid amounts to roughly $1 billion a year, said embassy spokesman T.J. Dowling.

Frazer said the violence "hasn't shaken our confidence in Kenya as a regional hub."

U.S. intervention appears to be having an effect on the crisis, with both sides softening their tones since Frazer's arrival over the weekend.

On Monday, Kibaki invited Odinga to a meeting at his official residence Friday to discuss how to end the turmoil, the president's news service said. Just hours earlier, Odinga called off nationwide rallies amid fears they would spark new bloodshed.

Odinga's spokesman, Salim Lone, said Odinga will meet with Kibaki as long as it is part of a mediation process with African Union chairman John Kufuor, the president of Ghana. Kufuor's trip to Kenya has been delayed repeatedly as the government rejected outside mediation. But he is now expected to begin talks in Nairobi as early as Wednesday.

Frazer had won an offer from Kibaki to form a unity government over the weekend. Odinga then said he was willing to drop demands that Kibaki resign and was willing to discuss sharing power, but only through a mediator empowered to negotiate an agreement that the international community would guarantee.

It would be nearly impossible for Kibaki to govern without opposition support. In parliamentary elections held the same day as the presidential vote, Odinga's party won 95 of 210 seats, and half of Kibaki's Cabinet lost their seats. It was a sign of people's anger over pervasive corruption and nepotism that favored Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe, long dominant in politics and the economy.

The post-election chaos has been one of the darkest times since Kenya's independence from Britain in 1963. Much of the fighting has degenerated into riots pitting other tribes against Kibaki's Kikuyu.

An official in neighboring Uganda said over the weekend, 30 fleeing Kenyans were thrown into the border river by Kenyan attackers, and were presumed drowned. Two Ugandan truck drivers carrying the group said they were stopped Saturday at a roadblock mounted by vigilantes who identified the refugees as Kikuyus and threw them into the deep, swift-flowing Kipkaren River, said Himbaza Hashaka, a Ugandan border official. The drivers said none survived, Hashaka said.

On Monday, the government put the death toll in election violence at 486 with some 255,000 people displaced from their homes. The toll, which did not include the drownings at the border, was compiled by a special committee of humanitarian services set up by the government which extensively toured areas most affected by riots.

The body of Olympian Lucas Sang was found in western Kenya New Year's Eve with a deep gash to the back of his head and severe burns, said close friend Moses Tanui, a former world 10,000-meter champion. Sang, who was in his 50s, was a 400-meter runner who made the quarter finals of the men's race in 1988 and the same year ran in the finals as a member of the 4x400m relay. Sang was a member of the Kalenjin tribe that has clashed with Kikuyus.

___

Associated Press writers Michelle Faul, Katharine Houreld, Tom Odula and Malkhadir M. Muhumed in Nairobi; Todd Pitman in Eldoret; Tom Maliti in Mombasa and Godfrey Olukya in Kampala, Uganda contributed to this report.

Kenyan rivals make concessions - Yahoo! News

By ELIZABETH A. KENNEDY, Associated Press Writer Mon Jan 7, 4:02 PM ET

 

Kenya opposition halts rallies

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1,000 killed in Kenya

By Alistair Thomson and Daniel Wallis

NAIROBI (Reuters) - Riots and post-election violence in Kenya may have killed up to 1,000 people, the opposition said on Monday as it halted protests and President Mwai Kibaki invited his main rival to talks.

The east African country has been hit by a wave of demonstrations and tribal clashes since Kibaki's disputed win in December 27 polls over opposition challenger Raila Odinga.

The government raised its death toll to nearly 500 and 255,000 displaced Monday. But Odinga told Reuters that "closer to a thousand" people might have died.

Aid workers say the toll could go higher after one of Kenya's worst crises since independence from Britain in 1963.

Kibaki's office said he had invited Odinga and several religious leaders to talks Friday on how to stop the violence, consolidate peace and forge "national reconciliation."

Odinga's aides could not immediately be reached for comment.

As international mediation efforts were stepped up, the head of the African Union, John Kufuor, was due to arrive in Nairobi Tuesday, and Odinga said the Ghanaian president could begin chairing talks as early as Wednesday.

World powers have been horrified by the sudden outbreak of bloodshed in a country once seen as one of the continent's most stable democracies and promising economies.  Continued...

Up to 1,000 killed in Kenya crisis: Odinga | Reuters

 

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Kibaki to meet Raila asap.

ELDORET, Kenya — For the first time since Kenya exploded into election-related violence that killed more than 400 people and dented this country’s image of stability, the president and the top opposition leader have agreed to meet, both sides said on Monday.

Mwai Kibaki, Kenya’s president, who won re-election last week after a deeply flawed vote count, invited Raila Odinga, the top opposition leader, who said he was cheated out of victory, to talks on Friday. Mr. Odinga indicated he would go, if certain conditions were met.

The meeting was announced as other progress came on the political front, with the chairman of the African Union expected to arrive in Kenya this week and Mr. Odinga agreeing to call off huge protest rallies scheduled for Tuesday. Many had feared that the demonstrations would degenerate into bloodshed.

Salim Lone, a spokesman for Mr. Odinga, said, “We will be happy to participate if this meeting is part of the process that will be put in place by John Kufuor,” the leader of the African Union and the president of Ghana, who is expected to arrive in Kenya on Tuesday or Wednesday.

He said the rallies were canceled because “we wanted to create a conducive environment for negotiations.”

“We wanted to show that we are serious,” Mr. Lone said.

On Monday, a Kenyan government committee raised the death toll from the election violence to 486, though the opposition said it was closer to 1,000.

Jendayi Frazer, the American assistant secretary of state for African affairs, who has been in Kenya for the past three days trying to broker a truce between the government and the opposition, said the vote count from Kenya’s election was rigged, but both parties could have been involved. Election observers have said there was widespread evidence of irregularities during vote tabulations, which gave Mr. Kibaki a suspiciously thin margin of victory at the 11th hour of the counting process.

“The people of Kenya were cheated,” Ms. Frazer said.

The only way out of this crisis now, she said, was for the government and the opposition to meet and solve the problem together.

The opposition has been pushing for an outside mediator to broker negotiations because it says it does not trust the government. The government initially refused, saying the crisis was a Kenyan problem that it could handle internally.

The government relented this weekend, though Alfred Mutua, a government spokesman, said Mr. Kufuor is not coming as a mediator.

“This is a fact-finding tour,” he said.

Here in Eldoret, in the epicenter of Kenya’s post-election violence, those facts are rather disturbing.

More than 140 people were killed here in a burst of ethnic violence, most by machete, blunt objects or fire.

A woman in the main hospital is covered with oozing burns except for one spot on her chest. This is where she was carrying her baby.

She said she was inside a church last week after a mob set it on fire. As she tried to escape, she tripped on a burning mattress. She fell and her 2-year-old daughter burned to death in front of her.

The woman, 36, who now has six children and wanted to be identified only as Mary, cannot sit up without wincing.

It is hard to tell what hurts more, the guilt or the pain.

“May God forgive me,” she said.

Kenyan Leader and Opponent to Meet - New York Times  By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN

 

Kibaki invites his main rival for talks in Kenya

The Associated Press

Monday, January 7, 2008

NAIROBI: The Kenyan president invited his chief rival to his official residence for talks Monday to discuss ending the political and ethnic violence that has already killed about 500 people.

Hours before the invitation was announced by the office of President Mwai Kibaki, the main opposition leader, Raila Odinga, called off mass nationwide rallies to protest Kibaki's disputed re-election Dec. 27, saying he wanted to give mediation a chance.

The signs of softening by both sides came after three days of talks with the top U.S. diplomat for Africa. The Ghanaian president, John Kufuor, who is currently chairman of the African Union, was scheduled to begin mediating as early as Wednesday.

Meanwhile, there were new reports from the countryside of killings linked to the disputed election results. An official in neighboring Uganda said Monday that 30 people trying to flee western Kenya had been thrown into the border river by attackers and were presumed drowned.

The Ugandan border official, Himbaza Hashaka, said two Ugandan drivers of the truck in which the group was traveling reported that they had been stopped Saturday at a roadblock mounted by vigilantes who identified those trying to flee as members of Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe and threw them into the deep, swift-flowing Kipkaren River. He said the drivers reported that none had survived.

A statement earlier Monday from the Ministry of Special Programs put the death toll at 486, with about 255,000 people displaced from their homes.

Odinga called off protests after meeting with Jendayi Frazer, U.S. assistant secretary of state for African affairs, and after the Kibaki government said the planned Tuesday demonstrations were illegal and could provoke violence.

Frazer said Monday that the December vote had been rigged, but she stopped short of directly blaming either Kibaki or Odinga. The Kenyan electoral commission chairman, Samuel Kivuiti, has said he is not sure that Kibaki won the vote, though he officially declared Kibaki the winner.

"Yes, there was rigging," Frazer said in an interview. "I mean there were problems with the vote counting process."

"Both the parties could have rigged," she said.

The combination of diplomacy and plain speaking may be particularly effective coming from the United States, one of Kenya's major donors. Overall aid amounts to about a billion dollars annually, according to a U.S. Embassy spokesman in Nairobi, T.J. Dowling. Remittances and bilateral private trade between the countries account for an additional billion dollars, he said.

Frazer had won an offer from Kibaki to form a unity government over the weekend. Odinga then said he was willing to drop demands that Kibaki resign and was willing to discuss sharing power, but only through a mediator empowered to negotiate an agreement that the international community would guarantee.

The opposition also has proposed that an interim government be set up to hold new presidential elections. But Kibaki has said that only a court could order fresh elections - an unlikely event since he has packed the judiciary with his allies.

It would be nearly impossible for Kibaki to govern without opposition support. In parliamentary elections held the same day as the presidential vote, Odinga's party won 95 of 210 legislative seats, and half of Kibaki's cabinet lost their seats.