Dave's Jan 10 report:
Dear All,
This morning six out of the seven members of the Lumakanda Church
committee met at the church. They got a local police vehicle to carry the
goods--two 50 kilo bags of rice, two 20 kilo bags of salt, five 20 liter
containers of cooking oil, and ten boxes of soap--to Lumakanda School.
They were very warmly received and the Red Cross gave them a receipt for
the good delivered. Gladys requested that the rice be used for the small
children because it is difficult from them to eat corn (maize) and beans
day after day. I took pictures of them with the "Friends in Peace"
T-shirts, but I could only send the thumbnail picture since the regular
one was to large for my internet system. I think I'll try again early in
the morning when the connection is faster.
When I went out for my afternoon walk, I met Silas Njoroge, the leader of
the Kikuyu in the IDP camp. He is perhaps my age (64) since he has a lot
of white hair. He has lived here since the days when the British settlers
controlled Lugari District in colonial times--perhaps he was born here.
He had a large farm and a tractor, trucks, and other vehicles. His house
has been thoroughly looted and burned since he is without doubt the
wealthiest Kikuyu in the area. When I met him today, he thanked me very
graciously for the assistance that Lumakanda Church gave to the IDP's.
Many people seemed to know, even though I was not part of the
delegation--I was wearing my "Friends in Peace" T-shirt.
One need that we did not meet is vaseline. Except for a few light showers
it has not rained here for about 2 and a half months . The sun is
extremely hot now (great for my solar panel) and the wind howls all day.
Consequently people's skin is cracking and they need vaseline to make it
smooth. We tried to get some in Kakamega when we were there, but we could
not find any wholesale.
The big question is what will happen to the IDP camp when school opens
next Monday, only 4 days away. The Red Cross wanted to move the people to
the large IPD camp in Turbo, but the people refused. It is too far away
(more than 5 miles) and there is cholera in that camp as it has 20,000 or
so people in two sites. If the school is evacuated for the opening of
school on Monday, all the classrooms will have to be washed with
disinfectant. Gladys knows the Head of the school who is the son of a
member of Lumakanda Friends Church.
Today our electrician, Justus, came by. He is the youth leader for the
ODM (Raila's) party in Lugari District. I asked him if it was true that
he got beat up by the youth of one of the opposing candidates and he
confirmed this. He and four other of his youth were going around the
district, hanging up pictures of his candidate when two pick-ups blocked
them, one in the front and one in the rear. Justus said he ran as fast as
he could and was only hit a few times--he still had to go to the
hospital. Others in the group were not so lucky as one perhaps broke his
arm and another had a big bruise on his ribs. Both of these were
hospitalized.
He confirmed that many of the looters in the community were the local
bicycle taxi drivers. Many have had their bicycles confiscated by the
police as there is a big pile of them at the police station. Some of
these were voluntarily put there by the Kikuyu bicycle taxi drivers. He
feels that there were at least 100 people killed in the district, the
vast majority being youth shot by the police. He knew of only 4 Kikuyu
who were killed in Matunda where 6 youth were also killed by the police.
Sometimes, he said, the police, when they kill someone, put them in their
vehicles and dump them in out of the way places. Officially there are 486
deaths--these are the ones recorded in the hospitals--62 of these were in
Western Province and I know myself of 9, all youth shot by police.
According to Justus, no youth or Kikuyu were killed in Lumakanda itself.
The African Union head, John Kufuor, who is the President of Ghana, came
to Kenya to mediate. He failed. Now Kofi Anon, the former UN General
Secretary, is coming to mediate between the two sides. It looks to me
like this is going to be long and drawn out--procrastination is to
Kibaki's advantage as he retains total power.
Peace,
Dave
Dave's Jan 11 report:
Dear All,
The major news of the day is that the internally placed people at
Lumakanda School were being moved today to the IDP camp at Turbo. There
are already 15,000 to 20,000 people there at two sites. The Lumakanda
folks will be there together at the Turbo police station. I'll be able to
visit them there, but this will be difficult because it is at least 5
miles down the road from us. So I'll have to go to the junction at the
main road and take a matutu to Turbo and back. So there won't be two
times a day visits. The school classrooms, as expected, are extremely
dirty and I hope that someone will clean them up before school opens on
Monday.
The biggest break through for us today is that we (rather Gladys) has
made personal contact with the Kikuyu side. Gladys's best friend over the
years is Jacinta Latki who is a Kikuyu married to a Swede and lives in
Sweden. Gladys worked for her brother, a member of the Kenyan foreign
service, for twelve years including 3 in Pakistan and 2 in Zambia. We
visited Jacinta in Nakuru where she grew up in September (I think) where
she has started an orphanage for 40 children and a school for 110
children on the ten acres of her parent's plot (Phyllis Wambui Children's
Home). She phoned Gladys today and told us the following: She was coming
from Sweden to Kenya over the New Year's and when she reached Germany,
everyone was in a panic and would not let her continue on to Kenya. I
think she stayed at least a week in Germany. She arrived last night and
is now camping out with her orphans at the Nakuru fair grounds in an IDP
camp there. Here orphans are of various tribes including two Kalenjin
girls whom she was protecting from female circumcision. So now we have
personal contact with the Kikuyu in an IDP camp. We will get more reports
from her as time goes on.
In November of last year, I lent my son-in-law, Job, (Beverly's husband)
the funds to buy a motorcycle so that he could go into the motor cycle
taxi business. By now I know a lot about the motorcycle taxi business
which in calmer times I might describe. There are 58 motorcycles and 67
motorcycle drivers and he has been elected chair of the motorcycle taxi
drivers association in Lumakanda. He said that all the motorcycle taxi
drivers stayed out of the violence, partly because they were charging
double for rides and thus making a good income. Also the winning MP from
this area, Cyrus Jirongo, had met with the drivers and told them not to
participate in any tribal violence due to the election. According to Job,
most of the bicycle taxi drivers also stayed out of the looting, but of
course in terms of class, a motorcycle taxi driver is far above a bicycle
taxi driver.
He told me that during the days of no transportion he would sometimes
drive people to Webuye about 25 miles to the west of Lumakanda. He told
me that he would be stopped at Kipkarren River (and perhaps elsewhere)
and asked to show his ID and say something in his native language to
indicate that he was not a Kikuyu. He started wearing his orange ODM hat
to show where his loyalties were.
I told him that I wanted to meet with those who had done the looting in
the area. While he said that the motorcycle drivers did not participate,
he thought they would welcome a meeting. Some of the bicycle taxi drivers
who also come. He said that most of the looting had been done by the
"idlers" around who had nothing to do. So while I may not be meeting with
the actual perpetrators, I will be close. I will ask the Lumakanda
Friends Church for space, aske Malesi, Getry, and Janet for one or more
of them to help, and set a time, probably next Tuesday or Wednesday.
According so my step son, Douglas, who lives in Nairobi, there is "Lots
of tension. Things aren't good at all, though guys are going on with
routine work. We expect things to worsen next week." Parliament is
supposed to open on Tuesday and the hundred plus MP's (out of 207) on the
ODM side will demand to sit on the government side and not the opposition
side. Kibaki's party, PNU, plus allied parties, will have only 57 MP's
(one of the clear indications that ODM rather than PNU actually won the
election). This will probably lead to a battle. Then on Wednesday through
Friday, ODM has asked for rallies in fifteen towns in the country
including Kakamega. These will be banned by the government and violence
is very likely to ensue as the police attack demonstrators with tear gas,
water cannons, and shooting in the air.
This is already a long enough report today, but as things have calmed
down (at least temporarily), I have begun to see major criticisms by
Kenyans as to the international reporting on the events. I have received
enough emails to realize that even some of you have been "hood-winked."
So expect my analysis of this soon.
Peace,
Dave
Dave's Jan 12 report:
Dear All,
It's late since we went to Kakamega today. In the early morning I went to the school to see the situation. Most of the IDP's had moved to Turbo and only a few were left. The school was extremely dirty which is not at all surprising. School starts Monday!!! I hope to visit the IDP folks in Turbo on Monday. Tuesday I hope to go with Malesi, Getry, and Janet to Eldoret to meet with the AVP facilitators we have there.
Yesterday Malesi, Getry, and Janet met with about 25 of the bicycle taxi drivers in Kakamega. Here is a paragraph from her report:
"Yesterday we met the Boda boda taxi drivers (Bycircle riders) and the touts and small business young men in town. They began by being sorry and sharing how the violence had made them suffer. They slowly moved to deeper things. One said 'We are nothing in this nation. We are the ones to suffer. These rich people have fridges full of food. Even if the trouble goes on for a month they will not suffer. Let us just give up and continue with our poverty". Another said "Madam, these people here are being untruthful. The anger expressed by all of us Kenyans for one tribe out of 42 cannot be becuase of one incident. We have seen rigged elections before.The problem is the attitude of "these"people. They come to our town, to our homes and then they decide we are fools. I work in their vehicles and the way they treat you. We are just an angry lot and we hoped for change. They stole even that from us. Let us not cheat you that peace will come back. We want them out of here".Another said, "Our wound is real and deep.Then Martha Karua [Kikuyu minister] speaks as though we are nothing. When she talks we just feel like laying down our lives for change". We agreed with them that there can never be peace without justice."
Gladys and I had a meeting with Dorothy Selebwa, the Clerk of USFW (United Society of Friends Women) in Kenya. I am hoping to get them more involved in the distribution of relief aid (as a first step in reconciliation) that AGLI is receiving since this really isn't what we normally do. Since they have branches throughout the region, this will also be a good way of spreading out whatever funds we have. She will get back to me on Monday after she has contacted the USFW leaders in the 16 yearly meetings.
On the other hand I am beginning to get an overwhelming request for AVP workshops. In fact I don't think we have enough experienced facilitators to handle the load so I am thinking of inviting AVP facilitators from the US, Canada, Europe, and also English/Swahili facilitators from Rwanda and Burundi to help with the expected load.
Peace,
Dave