Kenya leader’s rival whips up fury over disputed poll
Kenyatta regime has ‘blood on its hands’, says Raila Odinga after 24 protesters allegedly killed by police
KENYA’S opposition leader yesterday accused the government of having “blood on its hands”, after police killed more than 20 people protesting over the disputed re-election of Uhuru Kenyatta, the country’s president.
Speaking for the first time since Mr Kenyatta accepted victory on Friday, Raila Odinga called for a general strike as he toured slums in the capital Nairobi that have been at the heart of Kenya’s worst political violence in nearly a decade.
Mr Odinga showed no sign of yielding to growing international pressure to concede defeat as he sought to build momentum for a challenge to the result – rigged, he says, to deny him victory – on Kenya’s streets.
Winding his way through vast crowds in the slums of Kibera and Mathare, Mr Odinga did little to calm the anger of his furious supporters as he pledged to remove Mr Kenyatta and his ruling Jubilee party from power.
“They killed our people and they stole our votes,” he said. “The government of Jubilee cannot carry the day through theft. We are telling Jubilee they have spilt innocent blood. They will pay. The blood of all these people is on their hands.”
Groups of Luos, Mr Odinga’s tribe, and the president’s fellow Kikuyus fought each other with clubs and bows and arrows after the opposition leader left the slum, witnesses said. The violence followed claims that Kikuyu property had allegedly been set on fire. There was no word on casualties.
The government appointed human rights watchdog says 24 have been killed since violence erupted after the election, the vast majority shot dead by the police, who deny the claim.
There were also reports of looting and attacks by Luos on properties belongig to Kikuyu members.
Mr Odinga promised to unveil a strategy to overturn his rival’s victory on Tuesday, but there are growing signs that his options may be limited.
His campaign has already ruled out a legal challenge – an avenue that failed when he was first defeated by Mr Kenyatta in 2013 – and it is far from clear that he has enough support or momentum to mount a sustained uprising on the streets.
“When we call you to action, peaceful action, don’t stay behind,” James Orengo, Mr Odinga’s firebrand campaign manager, urged the crowds in Kibera.
But although supporters responded enthusiastically, chanting “Uhuru must go” and “revolution!”, others outside the slum seemed more fatalistic.
“We are used to Odinga being cheated,” said Grace Wanzala, a member of an opposition-supporting tribe. “We know there is nothing we can do. Our people will never be allowed to govern, so we must just get on with our lives.”
Mr Odinga was on the losing side of an election he is widely acknowledged to have won in 2007, triggering ethnic bloodshed and police killings that claimed more than 1,300 lives. Five years ago he was narrowly denied a
‘They killed our people and they stole our votes. The government cannot carry the day through theft’
run-off against Mr Kenyatta in another questionable poll.
But the opposition this time has failed to mount a credible defence of its rigging claims – despite unanswered questions over missing documentation from a quarter of polling stations – and the international community has largely thrown in its lot with Mr Kenyatta.
Boris Johnson, the Foreign Secretary, warmly congratulated the president over the weekend, pointedly ignoring allegations of police brutality towards opposition supporters as he placed the onus on Mr Odinga to restore peace.
Whatever the outcome of the impasse, Mr Kenyatta, the scion of Kenya’s most powerful and richest family, will struggle over the next five years to heal the divisions of an ethnically polarised nation.
Many fear that signs of repression in his first term could grow more marked over this second as a result.
♦zambia is to drop treason charges against its main opposition leader and free him from prison today under a deal brokered by Baroness Scotland, the Commonwealth secretary-general, sources told Reuters. The United Party for National Development leader Hakainde Hichilema and five others were arrested in April and charged with treason after Mr Hichilema’s convoy failed to make way for President Edgar Lungu’s motorcade. Mr Hichilema’s trial had been due to begin today in Lusaka.