SEXUAL HEALING

So another political showdown has sputtered out, for now. Kenya's parliamentary speaker Kenneth Marende opted not to rule on who should be head of government business in parliament, but instead told the bickering parties of President Mwai Kibaki and his coalition partner Prime Minister Raila Odinga to sort it out between themselves, stop feuding and get back to work. In the meantime, Marende will take on the critical job himself until the parties agree on a candidate -- Kibaki wants Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka in the job, but Odinga thinks it should be his.
Marende's decision seems a smart one, and he has been hailed by some as a Kenyan Solomon. Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan praised Marende for his "wisdom and statesmanship" -- qualities that seem to be in somewhat short supply in the corridors of power these days.
But that is all old news. Nairobi is abuzz today with a much...er...sexier story. A group of 10 non-governmental organisations -- who call themselves Gender 10 -- has called on Kenyan women to deny their men sex for a week to protest at poor political leadership.
It's a great, headline-grabbing idea although perhaps not one that will find much popular support -- as one Kenyan woman told me: "If a woman does not give her man sex, she will find herself sleeping outside, or on the floor." Others have warned that the poor, deprived men will "stray". But, maybe to cover that possibility, Gender 10 has also urged prostitutes to join the sex boycott, with some NGOs saying they will pay prostitutes to stay off the streets.
Gender 10 also called on Kibaki's wife Lucy and Odinga's other half Ida to join the action.....no word yet on whether they will.
Patricia Nyaundi of the Federation of Women Lawyers (Fida) was quoted in the Daily Nation as saying: "Extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures."
Whatever the boycott's effect on the nations' bedrooms, it's a clever PR job. More seriously, it illustrates the anger fizzing across Kenyan society. Gender 10 said in a statement: "The women of this country are frustrated and most perturbed by the feuds, turns and twists of the coalition Government and particularly the lack of political leadership by the two principals, the President and Prime Minister, who have continuously shown the Kenyan people the contempt card."

THE STRAW AND THE CAMEL?

It seems Raila Odinga has finally had enough. Maybe. This weekend, Kenya's prime minister said that if the row over who is appointed government business leader in parliament is not resolved -- ie if he doesn't get the job over President Mwai Kibaki's nominee Vice President Kalonzo Musyoka -- then elections should be called. Odinga was quoted by the BBC as telling constituents in Lang'ata: "We have been pushed around enough. We have reached this point and we cannot retreat. We shall stand firm. If others do not want this then let us go back and hold elections."
But Kibaki has apparently told the speaker of parliament that there is no need for any further talks on the dispute as he has already appointed Musyoka. And members of his PNU party have accused Odinga's ODM -- their coalition partners -- of fomenting a coup.
The speaker is due to rule on the appointment on Tuesday but whatever he says, someone is going away unhappy. It's hard to see how the two sides can work together in any productive way now. Like a married couple who have had a late-night row where hasty, harsh words were traded, one wonders if too much has been said for any reconciliation to be possible. Or at least any reconciliation that goes beyond appearances and allows the government to effectively function.
Beyond the risk of violence surrounding a breakdown in the coalition or possible early elections, Kenya will suffer enormously if the government is unable to do anything other than strive to survive until the next scheduled elections in 2012. The myriad economic and social problems facing the country -- as a result of the global economic crisis, the drought, rising criminality and dangerous neighbours -- demand responses.
One example: Somalia's militant Islamist rebel group, al Shabaab, have apparently said they will invade Kenya's North Eastern province and install sharia law. This is not the first time Kenya, which is home to hundreds of thousands of Somali refugees, has been threatened by al Shabaab -- and who knows how serious they are -- but it is another problem for a government fast losing its raison d'etre.

HOW MANY CRISES IN A COALITION?

Kenya's parliamentarians are back in the house, but the Easter break does not seem to have soothed spirits much. Already, the business of running the country has come to a standstill -- yet again because of a row over power-sharing. This time, the dispute is over who should lead government business in parliament and chair the House Business Committee, which sets the agenda. So far, so predictable, but coming after weeks of increasingly vicious sparring between the coalition partners and with a rise in international calls for more action on corruption and good governance (or some kind of governance, at least), one wonders how many more crises this coalition has in it?
President Mwai Kibaki has nominated Vice-President Kalonzo Musyoka as leader of government business. Traditionally, this post has always gone to the Vice-President but this coalition government has a Prime Minister -- Raila Odinga -- and he has nominated himself.
The problem is that parliament cannot debate or pass laws until this job is filled.
On Thursday, a Cabinet meeting was cancelled -- the third cancellation in as many weeks. The House Speaker has asked for a meeting with Kibaki and Odinga to resolve the issue. The stakes may be high. The Daily Nation newspaper said that if parliament votes against the nominee for the job of government business leader, then the Business Committee cannot be formed for another six months -- effectively freezing government business. But the constitution says that if parliament does not sit for three consecutive months, it stands dissolved, which, the paper said, "would create a catastrophic constitutional crisis because there is no electoral commission to conduct an election."
Even some MPs seem to be running out of patience. I loved the suggestion from Trade Minister Amos Kimunya that parliamentarians were committing fraud by earning so-called sitting allowances without transacting business. He has offered to forgo his perks for the past three days. Agriculture Minister William Ruto tried to pass a motion that would have seen each MP lose 20,000 shillings in allowances for the four sessions since Tuesday. Laudable gestures perhaps, whatever your opinion of the individual MPs, but Kenya may need something even more dramatic now.
Finance Minister Uhuru Kenyatta was among MPs who said there should be fresh elections if the sparring between the coalition partners continues. But there is no electoral commission in place, so how to square that circle? Kenyatta also said that the government would not be able to get approval to spend supplementary funds because of the delays in establishing the House Business Committee. His finance ministry wants parliament to approve extra spending of 9.91 billion shillings for the 08/09 budget.
International concern is growing. Human Rights Watch has said it is alarmed about the number of governments in East Africa and the Horn that are using repressive tactics to stay in power and silence their opponents. On Kenya, one of HRW's researchers Chris Albin-Lackey is quoted as saying: "Kenya is so hobbled by corruption and by the quality of governance that the threat of poverty and ethnic violence boiling over again into something like what we saw after the elections is becoming more and more real."
And the US has urged the government to get reforms on track urgently. The Standard quotes American Ambassador Michael Ranneberger as saying the Obama administration has contacted the Kenyan government to criticise the slow pace of reforms and culture of impunity. Obama has said Kenya must tackle corruption if it wants to justify help from the US and other donors.
And finally this is interesting, if a little leftfield. It's perhaps unlikely, but just imagine if Kibaki were contemplating a third term? Constitutional limits are easily sidestepped -- just ask Algeria's Abdelaziz Bouteflika, Burkina Faso's Blaise Compaore, Gabon's Omar Bongo, Cameroon's Paul Biya, or Yoweri Museveni in Uganda. Something to think about.

Mungiki Massacre

Pictures don't lie but the dead don't talk and maybe that is why it is so hard to understand what happened in Gathaithi village in central Kenya on Monday night. The aftermath is clear: bloodied, battered bodies sprawled in the red earth, weeping women, blood-stained clubs discarded by the roadside.
Newspaper reports say about 30 villagers were killed by members of the criminal Mungiki sect, who were out for revenge after vigilantes killed around a dozen of their own members. As is often the case in the aftermath of violence, the details are vague: some reports say the Mungiki lured villagers to their deaths by setting fire to a house and hacking their victims as they came to help: some say Mungiki members simply came to people's homes and took away sons and fathers; some say a vigilante group set up to fight the Mungiki -- a brutal, mafia-type group whose members were exacting tolls from business people, taxi-bicycle (boda-boda) owners and matatu drivers around Gathaithi -- called itself "The Hague", other reports say the group was named "Bantu". What exactly was the role of the police? Some reports said a police patrol had just passed through the village before the killings began; some said there were rumours that the Mungiki were going to strike and so police patrols were stepped up; but others say the armed Mungiki arrived in full view of the police.
Maybe the full truth will never come to light. Maybe truth is always in the eye of the beholder -- I have been to villages in the Ivory Coast after people were massacred and heard so many different versions of what happened. I don't think anyone was lying but each witness saw different elements of the whole event and had their own interpretation based on personal experience and enmities. Perhaps that is inevitable.
But there are questions that go beyond this particular incident: why did the Mungiki exact such a headline-grabbing, brutal revenge? Have they been emboldened by official failure to crack down on their activities in central Kenya, Nairobi and beyond? Was this a desperate act by a sect that is being attacked on several fronts -- by an alleged shoot-to-kill police policy and now enraged vigilantes? Who, if anyone, gave the okay for the killings? The Mungiki reputedly have some very powerful backers and one imagines that there may be more to this than a simple though shocking act of revenge. How do we know that all the people doing the killing were really Mungiki? How do we know that all those killed by the vigilantes were really Mungiki? Is this incident a sign of anarchy spreading in the vacuum left by a rudderless administration? And what do the killings -- by both sides -- mean for the future? A land ruled by militias -- angry young men with no jobs and no prospects being manipulated by shadowy Godfathers seeking power and profit -- is a dangerous place at the best of times and a potential timebomb when the political class is riven by divisions, widely viewed as incompetent and corrupt, and seemingly desperate to cling onto power by fair means or foul.

OF CATTLE AND CAMPS

The rains have come to Nairobi .... still pole, pole though. Grey, brooding clouds glower down on the city through the sweltering afternoon, with the first drops sputtering onto the ground in the early evening. So far so good but it feels like the air is never completely cleared. A true, West of Ireland-style two-week downpour is perhaps needed.
Driving around these days, there is a new hazard to join the kamikaze matatus and pause-until-the-car-is-upon-you-then-dash pedestrians: Herds of emaciated cows meandering along the main roads, shepherded by Maasai wrapped in red blankets or less colourful cowherds in grubby T-shirts and tattered jeans. Apparently, they are coming from an area near the border with Tanzania. It's a vivid reminder of the drought which threatens nearly 10 million Kenyans with starvation in the east, south and coastal provinces. I'm not a livestock expert, but even to the uninitiated, these streetside cows are a sorry sight. Bones and little else, looking for slim pickings on the roadsides of an East African capital.
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It's easy to get caught up in the madness of the political dance in Nairobi -- all those statements, meetings, denunciations, reconciliations. The latest from the Grand Coalition is
that members of the ODM are accusing their partners in the PNU of stealing the national accord -- which ended the post-election violence -- and implementing it only to serve their interests.
It doesn't bode well for the reopening of parliament tomorrow.
Away from the daily drip-drip of political intrigues, a sad photograph on the cover of the Daily Nation last week caught my attention: It showed a woman, who was made homeless because of the post-election violence, in tears because the tent she was living in was destroyed by police officers at a refugee camp in Eldoret. Police said tents were pulled down because they were unoccupied and they were reported to have also said the camp had become a haven for criminals. The woman said she was in her tent when they came to pull it down. Whatever the real motives, the story serves as a reminder that Kenya is still home to thousands of internally displaced people -- men, women and children whose homes were destroyed during last year's violence, many of whom are still too afraid to go home to live beside those who were once neighbours and are now foes ... or could be.
It is perhaps no wonder that a recent opinion poll showed 53 percent of those questioned favoured elections before 2012. The same report revealed a staggering 97 percent of those polled did not trust their parliamentarians. On the plus side, more than 60 percent said they were satisfied with government action on supplying electricity, creating access to schools, health services and building a road network. What really struck me though were the responses of some politicians. In an article in the same paper, two politicians condemned Kenyans for being gloomy; one said an election would bring no change anyway, so why do it? Another said Kenyans suffering from drought or still in refugee camps would not want elections and that the institutions were, in any case, not ready, ie the electoral commission etc. Neither was quoted saying anything positive about the government's record.
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And finally, many are talking about an eventual movie about the American ship captain who sacrificed himself to Somali teenage pirates to save his crew. I'd rather see an intelligent film about Abdulwali Muse, the pirate who survived after having an icepick stuck in his hand. How did he end up on the Maersk Alabama, and what does that tell you about Somalia, and the resources that the international community will commit to combatting piracy but not perhaps to trying to stem the inland chaos that has helped create the teenage brigands.

THERE'S SOMETHING ROTTEN.....

Sometimes I wonder if I'm being too pessimistic about Kenya's political situation. But then I read another newspaper article about corruption and marvel at how the country survives day-to-day. Today's addition to the graft hall of shame was a story in the Daily Nation about pension fraud. The details, as given, are mind-boggling, the incompetence bordering on the farcical and the consequences, as ever, depressing. According to the article, which drew from a report by the Kenya Anti-Corruption Commission, conmen (by which I think the paper means corrupt officials and their middlemen) may have diverted millions of shillings to "ghost retirees", undoubtedly relatives of the "ghost voters" who took part in the 2007 general elections. The paper quotes the commission's report as saying the pensions department sent 79 million shillings to pensioners in the UK in 2005/06 but no details of those receiving the money were ever produced and no one came forward to say they had got the funds. Also, more than 400 million shillings worth of pension funds are in so-called suspense accounts because incompetent staff sent cheques to the wrong addresses and then never bothered to follow up. The government hopes to launch a new contributory pension scheme in July, and the head of the pensions department was quoted as saying that the problems would be solved by a new computer system. It seems unlikely that a software programme will be able to override human impulses -- impulses that are only too visible elsewhere in Kenyan state institutions and parastatals.
This weekend, I asked a member of the Partnership for Change movement, if Kenya had alternatives to the current crop of leaders? I was told yes, more and more members of the middle-classes -- professionals like doctors and teachers -- are entering politics because of a widespread perception that action is needed to fundamentally shake up a diseased and ineffective system. These are people who would never have been involved in politics before. People who go about their business in spite of politics. But, I was told, the situation in Kenya has become so parlous that a growing number of once-apolitical people are stepping up to the plate. The question is: can you reform the system from the outside? What kind of a political earthquake would be needed to erase years of tribal -- or community -- based politics in order to allow new wannabe politicians to come to the fore? Perhaps it's just a question of how often and how deeply the people are disappointed. But disappointment, poverty, lack of opportunity and the dangerous what-have-we-got-to-lose attitude that these evils can inspire can so easily be moulded into a them-against-us stance that would simply feed the existing clique-politics. I guess civic education has a key role to play, and groups like Partnership for Change are out there on the ground trying to get people to ask questions and demand more of those in power. It's a tall order to tackle an entrenched system whose roots extend to the colonial era. But at the very least, it's a start, a sign of positive activism in a country where stagnation seems to have seeped into every corner of the administration -- a stagnation which is steeped in fear; fear of change, fear of losing one's perks, fear of the other, fear of being blamed for changing the status quo and sometimes, simply fear of speaking out. The rain that has threatened all day has come. Time to check the torches and nightlights.

TAKING A GAMBLE

I'm going to stick my neck out now and make a prediction -- I think Kenya's coalition government will collapse in the next six months. I definitely cannot see it lasting until 2012. Of course, that does not mean there have to be fresh elections. I imagine President Mwai Kibaki could call on the constitution and form a new cabinet. But this team seems to be well past its sell-by-date. (Of course, I could be wrong -- I have been in the past, most notably about the creation of the euro. I just couldn't see that working....!)
The freshest reason for my pessimism: today, Justice Minister Martha Karua resigned -- the first minister to quit the Grand Coalition. She says she was frustrated by colleagues who opposed reforms, and that she is now going to concentrate on nation-building and her 2012 presidential bid. The last straw seems to have been the naming of new judges last week without her approval or knowledge, but she had already fallen out with Kibaki, her one-time backer.
Karua, Kenya's so-called Iron Lady, was credited -- although that seems the wrong word -- with helping orchestrate Kibaki's internationally-criticised victory in the 2007 polls. She has been outspoken about corruption in recent weeks, fingering colleagues and mounting a sustained campaign against the Chief Justice. She has also never made a secret of her 2012 ambitions. Does this clever, charismatic if controversial politician feel that there is absolutely no upside to remaining with the current team because it has lost all legitimacy and standing in the eyes of the Kenyan voters? Has she seen the writing on the wall for the coalition and decided to jump ship to be free of the acrimony and mutual recriminations that are sure to follow a political collapse? Did Kibaki force her out? Whatever the real reasons, her departure is another blow to an administration that has failed on so many levels.
Karua's resignation followed a frankly farcical weekend retreat that was billed as a chance for the coalition partners to overcome their differences. They went to the Tsavo national park, but they couldn't even agree on the meeting's agenda, or indeed the sleeping arrangements. Cue sulks, walkouts, denials of walkouts, two contradictory press conferences and a full-page ad in the Daily Nation today from the PNU saying it wanted to discuss reforms but the ODM wanted power-sharing issues on the table.
"The PNU is opposed to power games at a time when the country requires a concerted effort to improve the lives of wananchi, including the resettlement of IDPs." An effort to take the high moral ground, but you have to wonder about the veracity of the first part of the sentence -- the second half is pretty spot on.
I wonder if the straw that breaks the coalition camel's back will be the question of setting up a special tribunal to judge those deemed to be responsible for the post-election bloodshed? The International Criminal Court has said when and if it steps in, it will act relentlessly and immediately ie when Kenya has shown that it cannot or will not set up a local tribunal to try the suspects. Kofi Annan still has that sealed list of suspects compiled by an independent commission and has said he will hand it over to the ICC if parliament fails to act quickly to set up a local court. He wants action by summer. Parliament is back from recess at the end of April, so things could get interesting then.
Meanwhile, the question is who is Karua going to team up with now that she has burnt bridges with her former boss? Odinga? He has spoken out in her defence today, using the opportunity to attack Kibaki as well. Her departure from government will surely have some impact on the politics of ethnicity that seems to dominate so much of public life here.

THE COST OF TRAVEL

A Kenyan friend told me today how he was robbed the other evening as he headed home from work. It's not breaking news...this happens all the time, but it's the first time since I've been here that I've heard it firsthand and I thought it worth sharing. Impunity is a big, ponderous word. This is its day-to-day face.
Our friend took a matatu as usual to get home, but unbeknownst to him and the other passengers, three "gangsters" were already on board. When they had gone a little way down Lower Kabete Road, the gangsters basically hijacked the bus and forced it to make a detour towards a forest on a road that leads to Loresho. They stopped the bus and forced everyone to hand over their money and valuables. Our friend lost his mobile phone and some cash. I asked him how come the gangsters were able to board the bus undetected. "They only had little pistols .... They were young boys like me (he is about 34) ... They ask you for your money and then check your pockets but if they find some and you have not said it, then you have problems." This time nobody was beaten up and our friend made his way home on foot. "They always do it at the end of the month." He said it with resignation, no anger. I found that particularly shocking. If it happened to me, I would be livid, and dining out on the tale for month, embroidering it with each telling (that's probably the Irish in me). But he told the story in a flat voice, matter-of-factly. I asked him about going to the police, but he said there was no point. What could the police do? And you might get into more trouble as the police might actually tell the gangsters that you fingered them. "And then they would come after you. A lot of these gangsters are the sons of rich people."
I'm not trying to be falsely naive here, a wide-eyed new arrival with little nous. But what struck me is that things have come to a sad state of affairs when you can reasonably expect to be robbed at gunpoint when taking the bus home with your wages at the end of the month, and then have absolutely no recourse to justice in case the criminals find out from the police that you have had the temerity to report a robbery.
In other news, we have had rain which has brought some truly splendiferous creepy-crawlies out of the woodwork but appears not to have dampened Kenyan politicians' appetite for party politics. Fiddling while Rome burns? Another warning this week from Kofi Annan, the father of the Grand Coalition: "Kenya is at a crossroads. The time to act is now," he told a conference marking the first anniversary of the power-sharing agreement. He said Kenyans were disillusioned. "They are equally angry at widespread corruption and the lack of action to root it out ... But the situation is not hopeless ... The government can turn things around by acting swiftly and effectively on the agreed constitutional, parliamentary, judicial, police and land reforms."
But in the past week to 10 days, we have seen instead: talk of a censure motion against Justice Minister Martha Karua; rumours of a cabinet reshuffle that never happened; more press reports about possible alliances between the ODM and the PNU in the Rift Valley; President Kibaki and Prime Minister Odinga snubbing the Annan-led talks in Geneva.; and reports that human rights activists have gone into hiding, or even left the country, because of death threats after they cooperated with U.N. special rapporteur Philip Alston on his report into extrajudicial killings.
And while rain falls on Nairobi, what is happening in the rest of the country? This from the Daily Nation shows that Kenyans realise that famine should not be inevitable -- the solutions are clear -- but again where is the political appetite to tackle reform in the agricultural sector? Will it bring votes in 2012 or indeed before?
On a lighter note, I thought the Kenyan papers' April Fool articles were very good. The Nation told of how a forgotten Old Master painting had been found in State House. The "quote" from Amos Kimunya about unveiling it at a "cheese and wine party and some bitings with cocktail sausages and things" was hilarious, as was the idea that the police commissioner was sleeping in a room with the painting, Ceska pistol at the ready on the direct orders of Kibaki. Byline: Mutuma Mathiu and Ramatol Van Uppabut... The Standard ran with a piece on how Kenya had bought a Cold War sub to defend Migingo island -- the purchase carried out through an intermediary involved in Anglo-Leasing. Nice, though that particular saga does seem to be simmering away nicely despite several efforts to get Ugandan soldiers off the pile of rocks in Lake Victoria. A bizarre story but one of those ones that it might be worth keeping an eye on.