Kenya’s IDPs exposed to war

Kenya’s tribal leaders are preparing for war. If they succeed, the people who will suffer most will be the remaining internally displaced people, whom the politicians have now forgotten and the Government is doing nothing to resettle. Instead, political leaders in Kenya are engaged in a bitter war of words in preparation for the 2012 elections. At the centre of the verbal conflict are tribal leaders who won the 2007 elections by mobilizing their ethnic groups into militia forces that engaged in ethnic conflict that saw the death of over 1,000 people and the displacement of over 300,000 others. That bloody trick by the tribal war lords has now been fully exposed by the international intervention that has brought the ICC’s prosecutor, Luis Moreno-Ocampo, into the picture. The internationalization of the post election ethnic violence in Kenya has opened the eyes of Kenyan voters who now seem to realize the folly of being manipulated by ambitious leaders, who only want to use the people as clusters of tribal cocoons, for their own selfish political benefits.

The next election, therefore, will see the ganging up of tribal leaders against nationalists who have the interest of the country at heart. Among the tribal leaders are William Ruto, who will try to mobilize the Kalenjin people against the Kikuyus in the Rift Valley, and Uhuru Kenyatta, who will try to terrorize whoever opposes him in the Central Province by the use of Mungiki terror gangs. The outcome of that will be a surprising rejection of Ruto by the Kalenjin and a total rejection of Uhuru by the new forces of Gema leadership under Marta Karua.

As the country’s political mobilization against the repetition of the post 2007 election violence gains momentum, terrible mistakes of forgetting the fate of the remaining IDPs have been made by all the Kenyan political leaders. While the debates of reforms in the police are prioritized, no steps seem to be taken in line with Kofi Anan’s Agenda One to enhance security and protection of the population. His recommendation of measures to increase police presence and rapid response measures to protect the vulnerable groups in the IDP’s camps, don’t appear to be visible to independent observers.

According to Anan’s report on status of implementation matrix on progress, between February 2008 and today, 35 new police stations have been constructed in the affected areas of the Rift Valley. But this has not led to the protection of the Kikuyus IDPs from getting constant threats from Kalenjin, who are still frustrating the returning of the farmers to their destroyed homes. The farmers in the IDP camps are particularly scared of returning to their pre 2007 election homes because their Kalenjin neighbours who destroyed their properties after the elections are still there enjoying the country’s impunity and inability to prosecute post election violence offenders. Despite the noise made by politicians about the need to return the country to peace and prosperity, the IDPs are suffering in silence and without any defenders.

The current preoccupation of the debate on whether or not Moreno-Ocampo should start prosecuting the planners and financiers of post election violence soon has made the whole country forget Kofi Anna’s Agenda Two which called for immediate measures to address the humanitarian crisis and promote national healing and reconciliation. The report on the status of implementation shows that the Government ignored international guidelines on establishing a framework for national responsibility to resettle the displaced people. Though the Government raised 1.96 billion Kenyan Shillings of the required 31.4 billion Shillings budget, the resettlement programme is still hindered by inter-ethnic hostility and sporadic violence in some return areas of the Rift Valley.

There are also allegations of the use of force and corruption in administration of IDPs’ funds. The report says the resettlement programme focused on IDPs who were land owners and in camps to the exclusion of integrated IDPs and those from several other ethnic communities apart from the majority Kikuyus. Although 295 of 296 camps are officially closed there is a proliferation of what is known as “transit” sites in return areas by IDPs who are unable or unwilling to return to their farms because of insecurity.

According to the progress report of the fate of IDPs, hawkers, squatters, business people, landless IDPs without start-up capital or prospect to lease land or premises, remain in closed camps. The report also says that self-help groups of IDPs have established their own camps in safer areas. But these camps lack any basic service which leads into the proliferation of slums or what the report calls ‘new cities’ exclusive to IDPs. The report says the closure of official camps is not an end to displacement and that there is a need for a strategy on transit camps, since displacement is becoming more protracted.

When the country is as politically alert as Kenya happens to be, politicians will never get away from the tidal wave of evolutionary change that is currently witnessed everywhere. The catalyst of this change has been the visit of the American Secretary of State, Hilary Clinton, who has elaborately identified a number of Anan’s Agenda Four reform items, which must be accomplished before the next general election. But even more serious than the Agenda Four items are items in Kofi Annan’s Agenda Two on humanitarian crisis caused by the post election disputes. The continued suffering of people in the remaining IDP camps is the most shameful thing to happen in this country. Now hat the country is facing very difficult times caused by drought, which will most likely be followed by food shortage, Agenda Two must be taken very seriously. When that horrible situation of countrywide hunger comes, the people in the camps will suffer even more.

The progress report says there are too many transit camps which are so remote and too far apart making the delivery of aid difficult or impossible. The report also says other emergencies resulting from drought and food insecurity, and high food prices have diminished the significance of IDPs as a vulnerable group in need of special assistance. It says attention to IDPs is on the decline yet transition from emergency to early recovery has not been easy due to abrupt closure of camps and inability of IDPs to fully return to their homes.

The report recalls that after the signing of National Accord the President and Prime Minister made symbolic tour of the Rift Valley and called for peace. At that time the principals and various groups of politicians and Government officials preached peace at various functions. Unfortunately the importance of the joint peace rallies was reduced by protocol wars between the Prime Minister and the Vice President. Since Raila has now established his importance as the country’s most functioning and relevant leader, the protocol wars have ended. Given the fact that his relationships with Mwai Kibaki have considerably improved, the peace rallies should resume with a view of demolishing transit camps so as to fully resettle the IDPs. If Ruto does not join Kibaki and Raila in these peace missions, then he will be committing political suicide and should be given a long rope to hang himself.