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How the West failed Kenya
The conditions for the current wave of violence should have
been apparent even as the world lauded Kenya as a shining example
for Africa
Hany Besada and Edward Kariithi, Citizen Special
Saturday, February 02, 2008
The violent clashes, political turmoil and mayhem that have been
gripping Kenya over the past few weeks dispel any western-backed
notions regarding the country as a model democracy to be
replicated elsewhere on the continent.
Once the envy of its poverty-stricken neighbours, many of whom are
plagued by serious political instability, Kenya has long been
regarded as a bastion of peace, hope and progress in a region that
borders the Horn of Africa, often referred to as Africa's basket
case.
The crisis in East Africa's powerhouse has sent shock waves
throughout the region and beyond. With the recent senseless murder
of Mugabe Ware, an opposition MP, to add to the hundreds of dead,
250,000 people currently displaced and another half-a-million in
need of humanitarian assistance, Kenya is living through some of
its worst recorded political violence since its independence from
Great Britain in 1963.
Far from being regarded as the result of election fraud and an
issue of tribal grievances, the current violence can best be
understood as the gradual, perpetual frustration of Kenyans with
the social ills afflicting their nation.
These include social marginalization of ethnic groups, deep-seated
corruption, income disparity along ethnic and regional lines, and
a grotesque appetite for power by politicians but, more deeply,
the failure of its political system.
The opposition, which constitutes an organized banding together of
members of the Luos, Luhya and Kalenjin tribes, representing
roughly 40 per cent of the country's population and, for a large
part, led by opposition leader Raila Odinga of the Orange
Democratic Movement (ODM), have long since insisted that they had
been discriminated against by the traditionally dominant Kikuyu
ethnic group, led by incumbent President Mwai Kibaki for decades,
and going back as far as the early post-independence days.
Although this conflict does run along ethnic lines, it is too
simplistic to blame historical ethnic grievances for the country's
current political turmoil. Rather, its seriously flawed and weak
Parliament, as well as the structure of its political system, has
been a recipe for disaster for a long time.
This has produced a situation, similar to those in other African
states with weak legislatures, where the presidential elections
are regarded as an opportunity to gain access to the state's
coffers and power structure.
The government's apparent reluctance to organize and conduct free
and fair elections, its corrupt and abusive security and safety
apparatus, its incompetent electoral commission and its continued
monopoly over power and wealth, coupled with a weak legislature,
have left the opposition all the more willing to resort to an
anarchic display of public disorder and violence. Looking at
events over the past weeks, it is clear that Mr. Odinga and his
supporters are equally to blame for the breakdown of the state's
security structures, by undermining the legitimacy of the rule of
law and due process, while maximizing the chaos among the
frustrated peasantry, eager for a piece of the country's wealth.
Given the weakness of the country's legislature and the obvious
pitfalls that are commonly associated with the centralization of
power in the presidency, it is highly unlikely that the opposition
will call off violent protests while the government refuses to
address the root of the crisis.
It is difficult to conceive a change in government policy, in
restructuring and strengthening the country's legislature, without
western-backed pressure for reform, abandoning, even momentarily,
long-standing support for the regime.
Often characterized in western media as a reliable partner in
America's war against terror, a supporter of free-market economic
policies presiding over surging economic growth in recent years,
and an opponent of corruption, President Kibaki has had the luxury
of securing western backing, despite his apparent dismal track
record on reform.
If the international community is genuinely interested in
assisting Kenyans to defuse much of the violence ripping the
country apart, it would need to substantially invest in bolstering
Kenya's capacity by strengthening its formal institutions and,
more in particular, the national legislature.
It is too early to indicate whether the new face-to-face meetings
between Mr. Kibaki and Mr. Odinga would produce the kind of
answers that Kenya desperately needs. If mediation talks do
succeed in quelling the violence temporarily, and if both sides
were to agree on a more comprehensive overhaul of the political
system and electoral process, the current crisis will undoubtedly
offer the country an opportunity to prepare the ground for a more
comprehensive social rehabilitation process.
On the other hand, failure will propel the country into a steep
decline toward utter chaos and the potential risk of ethnic
cleansing -- something that the international community would want
to avoid at all costs, given the recent memories of Rwanda and of
the Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Hany Besada is senior researcher, working on fragile states, at
the Centre for International Governance Innovation (CIGI) in
Waterloo.
Edward Kariithi is CFO of the Unified Financial Group and a Kenyan
analyst.
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