Jan 29, Report 23, David Zarembka

From: David Zarembka
Sent: Tuesday, January 29, 2008 4:28 AM
Subject: AGLI--Report from Kenya--Jan. 29

Dear All,

I am feeling very discouraged.

Over the weekend (which now seems so far in the past) I was at the
Quaker Leadership Peace Conference in Kakamega. If you would
like to see the documents from the conference, please ask Dawn at
dawn@aglionline.org or by reply email.

[Note: you have received the two documents pasted into one of
these emails dated 1/27. If you would like the documents as an
attachment then contact me, Dawn.]

It was an excellent gathering. Almost every yearly meeting and
Quaker organization sent their representative(s). There is no
doubt that Quakers inKenya will now give prominence to the
Peace Testimony in this time of chaos, destruction, and death.
The participants were very concerned about the situation and
serious in their efforts to respond to Kenyans, to Christians, and
to all Quakers. They affirmed that the Quakers needed to be
neutral in the political situation. I was surprised to find that I
was appointed to the Coordinating Committee for current and
long-term actions since Gladys and I played a rather quiet role
during the conference. But AVP is on everyone's lips. Getry
Agizah, the AVP coordinator, was also put on the committee,
along with Hezron Masitsa (AVP coordinator in Nairobi). The
committee is supposed to meet in Kakamega on Friday but
who knows if we will be able to travel.

On the way to the conference those who took the bus
through Nakuru saw the Total gas station on fire. This was
the beginning of major fighting in Nakuru which later spread
to Naivasha and then on Monday to western Kenya. This
morning on the BBC news, I heard the spokesman for the
Kenya Police say that everything is calm now, while the next
report was the BBC reporter in Kisumu talking about all the
tires burning, total lack of movement, roads cut, etc. Is the
Kenyan Government in the same country that I am in?

I was going to report some news from last week when my
laptop crashed. Kaimosi (the major Quaker center in
western Kenya) has been quiet as I have reported before.
It is along the boundary between the Tiriki (a Luhya group)
and the Nandi (a Kalenjin group). But on Wednesday
someone stole a cow; the other group retaliated by burning
some houses, including the kiosks by the road leading into
Kaimosi, and everything got out of control. Six people were
killed and at least 70 houses were burnt. Kaimosi Hospital
was receiving lots of people with cuts from machetes,
arrows stuck in people's bodies, and other injuries from
the violence. There is absolutely no political explanation
for this violence since both of these groups voted
overwhelming for ODM, the opposition party.

Yesterday Gladys told me that one of her relatives was
going to Eldoret to take another relative who had a broken
leg. When they reached Turbo he was forced to show his
ID card (by name, people can tell he is not a Kikuyu). He
put his relative on the side of the road while he was forced
to dig up the road until he got tired. He was then required
to return to Lumakanda with the relative with the broken
leg rather than proceed on to Eldoret.

Only eight people out of 40 showed up at the listening
session in Kisumu yesterday and they were distracted by
the events going on around them. We have cancelled the
workshops for today. Otherwise the Sunset Hotel where
the workshops are taking place and the facilitators are
staying is quite safe and they have not experienced any
violence nearby.

We were supposed to go to Kaimosi tomorrow to talk to the
Friends Theological College students about organizing AVP
workshops in their home churches during the April vacation,
but we have put this off until next week. We have been making
a weekly delivery to the Lumakanda IDP's now living in Turbo,
but I don't see how we can do it this week. Florence Machayo
who lives only about 5 miles from us wants to have a meeting
tomorrow of all the AVP coordinators and others involved in
peace work in Lugari District, but I don't know if Gladys and
I will be able to go even that short distance!

So you can see why I am so discouraged.

Peace,
Dave

David Zarembka, Coordinator
African Great Lakes Initiative of the Friends Peace Teams