It's been made into a movie.
Posted on 01/21/2008 9:26:11 PM PST by neverdem
KERINGET, Kenya — At first the violence seemed as spontaneous as it was shocking, with machete-wielding mobs hacking people to death and burning women and children alive in a country that was celebrated as one of Africa’s most stable.
But a closer look at what has unfolded in the past three weeks, since a deeply flawed election plunged Kenya into chaos, shows that some of the bloodletting that has left more than 650 people dead may have been premeditated and organized.
Leaflets calling for ethnic killings mysteriously appeared before the voting. Politicians with both the government and opposition parties gave speeches that stoked long-standing hatred among ethnic groups. And local tribal chiefs held meetings to plot attacks on rivals, according to some of them and their followers.
As soon as the election results were announced, handing a suspiciously thin margin of victory to Kenya’s president, Mwai Kibaki — whose policies of favoring his own ethnic group have marginalized about half the country — all the elements lined up for the violence to explode.
Thousands of young men swept the countryside, burning homes and attacking members of rival ethnic groups. The killings go on. On Friday, six bodies arrived at a morgue in the town of Narok, northwest of Nairobi, some with deep spear wounds. On a strip of white medical tape affixed to the victims’ foreheads was written their names, dates of death and the cause: “Post-elections violence.”
“It wasn’t like people just woke up and started fighting each other,” said Dan..
--snip--
A few villages away and a couple of hours later, Kikuyu farmers scanned the hilltops with a pair of old field glasses that never seemed quite in focus. They carried homemade guns built of wood, water pipes and umbrella springs, highly illegal but highly necessary, they said.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Thanks!
The sensitivity is warranted - but that does not diminish the message.
Unfortunately, when things get “bad enough” it’s usually too late. People are remarkably good at creating normalicy out of any situation, toughing things out instead of getting out. I have missionary friends in Darfur; that he risked his own neck serving there when single was fine, but taking subsequent wife & kids there seems ill-advised ... yet the fact that they’re still breathing indicates how a way will be found even in the harshest conditions.
We do see things there thru the microscope of news: mundane existence may be the norm, but it’s the few freak events that dominate our perception thereof.
Interesting that wherever in the world you find war, killing and cruelty there you find Islam.
A interesting article about “The Kenyan Jihad”.
And plenty of “to the contrary” comments posted below at that site.
http://www.spectator.co.uk/melaniephillips/433766/the-kenyan-jihad.thtml
You can’t blame it all on Islam. Africa is a violent place. Anywhere you find tribal social structures, you find violence.
And talk of Uganda troops in Kenya: it’s a loaded situation...and that Idi Amin fellow was Moslem.
African problems can clearly be tribal, poverty-crime and of course, religious as Nigeria has had plenty of.
Curious trials in Liberia right now, with that oddly named individual.
Sensitivity is warranted but perhaps Obama himself bills himself in certain ways, I don’t know. But if he is taking sides back there, it was good we found out after all. Tonight at home, I will have to go through all of the Kenya threads for the past 2 months.
Google “obama kenya”. A whole lot becomes very clear very quickly:
- His father is Kenyan.
- He recently made a 4-country trip in Africa, with Kenya the centerpiece.
- Other actions show he intended Kenya a key rhetorical point in his campaign.
As one wag put it: “Obama can’t vote ‘present’ on Kenya.”
Sounds like Rwanda redux is starting there. If he wants to be leader of the free world, now’s the time to show it.
If he can ‘end climate change’ he can fix Kenya too.
It's the libs who came up with the term.
My husband and I have been googling the Internet almost everyday for news of Kenya. The articles on this thread have been very interesting.
In our correspondance with our relatives, we have not heard one word about Obama from them. Instead we just have heard about the bloodshed and the displaced peoples (refugees). They’re work is in Nairobi and the area of the Kibera slums. I don’t think Obama has a big influence there. Instead they talk to us about their thankfulness of the international bodies that are exerting pressure on the Kenya goverment to resolve the conflicts. Hopefully, things will be resolved. It just amazes me how this conflict has not been reported on like it should be!
It's been made into a movie.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/7206995.stm
The two opposition leaders met: things already happened at a boiling point but some places take a lot of that kind of trouble.
Flawed or not, nobody deserves this, and we should be supporting the government against these goons. All out.
Can you imagine the spectacle of an American president being intimately involved with a mess like this?
Scotland?
Alba Go Bragh!!!!!
LOL.
Seriously though, Obama is partly to blame for fanning the flames of tribal violence. He went into a tribal tinder box, and tried out his Western , Huey Newton black nationalist neocolonial schtick on the Kenyan "savages" and surprise , surprise, look what happened.
What kind of president WOULD Obama make?
I 'd say he'd have us in wars on 3 fronts by his third year.
And none of them righteous.
Western Kenya continues to be hit by sporadic violence and the government has accused the opposition of fomenting unrest. In a report on Thursday, Human Rights Watch said some attacks on members of the president’s Kikuyu ethnic group in Rift Valley province had been organised by opposition officials and local elders.
Odinga's intent is to undermine the government, and institute sharia law - and with Kofi Anan's help, the situation can only become more dire.
So, when a man like Raila Odinga is linked with Abdulkader al Bakri, you are not making a minor connection, but one directly into al Qaeda. Such are the vagaries of making political bedfellows in other Nations.
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