Washington Week: Student Voices (O)

For some at NYU, conflict in Kenya hits home
By Chris James
Washington Square News (NYU)
01/28/2008

(U-WIRE) NEW YORK — One night, Wagner graduate student Wanijiru Ndichu's relatives were ambushed in the Rift Valley region of Kenya. Protesters burned their home to the ground.

Ndichu, in her final year at NYU's Wagner School of Public Service, is from Kenya. She spent a month at her home in the capital city of Nairobi during winter break.

"It was very volatile, and very tense," Ndichu said. "With each day that passed you never knew what was going to happen. There were some days you literally couldn't do anything, or go anywhere. It was depressing."

Her relatives were airlifted to Nairobi by humanitarian forces.

While Americans begin a politically charged election year, the citizens of Kenya are fighting to maintain democracy and prevent chaos from sweeping their country, which was once considered one of the most stable African nations.

During the Kenyan presidential elections last month, incumbent president Mwai Kibaki, of the dominant Kikuyu tribe, won in what many observers are calling a rigged election. Opponent Raila Odinga of the Luo tribe had rallied together Kenyans eager for a change in leadership.

A delay in announcing the results of the Dec. 27 race brought the first signs of tension to Kenya. Commissioners in charge of tallying votes around the country were unable to be reached for over 36 hours, allegedly giving Kibaki's government ample time to rig the election results and secure another term in office.

NYU sophomore De Han Kong was in Kenya during the election.

"As soon as I landed at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport, my parents took me straight to Namanga [a small town next to Mt. Kilimajaro], and we stayed there for 10 days," Kong told WSN. "My friends and family who were in Nairobi at the time told me that the televised ballot counting process stopped showing due to government requests, and random gun shots started going off all over."

Kong, along with many others in the international arena, remarked that Kibaki used a great political strategy in securing power.

"Kibaki scheduled the election during Christmas so that people could vote" in their hometowns, Kong said. "However, he announced his presidency at the end of the holidays, so that it would be harder for the opposition party members to rally together and demonstrate."

Infuriated, Odinga's supporters began attacking Kikuyus across the country, leading to tribal warfare.

Four weeks of unrest have ensued, with little sign of stopping. According to The New York Times, police officials said a mob burned to death at least 19 people, including 11 children. In another incident, 50 women and children were burned alive while seeking refuge in a church.

At least 750 people have now been killed - more than 100 in the past four days - and over 250,000 Kenyans have fled their homes, fearing for their safety.

The United States and Britain have warned their citizens against traveling to Kenya. More than 5,000 tourists who were expected to arrive at the coast earlier this month canceled trips at the last minute.

CAS freshman Valerie Prosper was one of the many whose trip was abruptly canceled.

Prosper attended the International School of Kenya for three years prior to her arrival at NYU and calls the country "home." Her parents told her when she was planning the trip that the elections could possibly cause problems.

"I never thought this would happen," Prosper said. "Kenya was the one country everyone had hope in. When people talk about Africa, it's always about AIDS or hunger, never progress and development. I guess I just felt like Kenya was a democracy that proved all those people wrong. It seemed things were getting better there."

Romeo Mendes, an SCPS senior, is the secretary of the African Students Union. A native of Cameroon, Mendes knows firsthand the complexity of the political situation in Africa. The unrest did not particularly surprise him.

"There are many tribes in Kenya and they have been fighting for power a long time before this election," Mendes said. "Tribal tension after an election is to be expected, but this violence is shocking."

The two political rivals met last Thursday in Nairobi to begin negotiations, led by former U.N. Secretary General Kofi Annan. But the hope of cohesion was short lived; Kibaki gave a subsequent speech calling himself the "duly elected president." Opposition leaders then issued their own statement denouncing Kibaki as a fraud.

Ndichu is deeply saddened at the current state of her country, and she said she's still in "shock mode."

"I think it's clear that this situation will be indefinite," she said. "The country is totally polarized. Those dying and suffering are the poorest of the poor, while these two politicians go home to their large, lofty lives."

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