Prayers, protests as Kenyans seek end to crisis

Bloomberg

Reverend David Mwinamo spent Sunday praying with his congregation for a speedy end to Kenya’s protracted presidential election that’s cast the East African nation into crisis.
Two votes since August have failed to produce consensus on who should lead the East African economic powerhouse of about 47 million people. President Uhuru Kenyatta claims a mandate from this month’s rerun election, while opposition leader Raila Odinga is calling for a national defiance campaign against what he describes as an illegitimate administration.
“People don’t care who wins,” Mwinamo said in an interview
at the Gatina Pentecostal Assemblies of God church in Kawangware, a litter-strewn maze of wood and metal shacks in west Nairobi, the capital. “All they want is a united Kenya. Most of the people are suffering — they are skipping meals. There is a lot of poverty
and sickness.”
There is no end in sight to the crisis. Kenya has been stuck in political limbo since the Supreme Court took the decision unprecedented in Africa of annulling an Aug. 8 presidential vote after the electoral commission failed to disprove opposition claims of rigging. Odinga boycotted an October 26 rerun and has called for yet
another vote within 90 days.
The turmoil has weighed on investors, with the government’s international bonds due in 2024 climbing 30 basis points to 6.32 percent since the election outcome was declared void on September 1. Slum dwellers in Nairobi and the western city of Kisumu, most
of whom eke out a living as hawkers or doing part-time jobs, have been hard hit by a slowdown in spending and hiring.
“It is high time we as Kenyans stop following politics,” Wanja Wakoba, 37, said in an interview
at her electronics shop in Nairobi. “Politicians have not helped
us, they just drag us down. Let them deal with their issues and let us deal with how to carry on with our business.”
About 78 people have died in election-related violence since the initial vote, mostly in clashes between the security forces and opposition supporters of Odinga. Ethnic tensions have also flared between members of Odinga’s Luo community and President Uhuru Kenyatta’s Kikuyu group, raising fears of a repetition of the more widespread violence that ensued after contested 2007 vote and claimed at least 1,100 lives.
Preliminary tallies from the repeat election — which Odinga dismissed as a farce — showed Kenyatta securing a second term with about 98 percent of the vote. The electoral commission is expected on Monday to announce results that will probably be challenged again in court. The turnout in the rerun was less than 50 percent, compared with 79 percent in August, with violent protests forcing the postponement of the ballot in the western Nyanza region.