Rice In his Kenya diary, Guardian journalist Xan Rice reports on ...

www.marsgroupkenya.org<strong>Kenya</strong>’s Corrupt Elite Under Threat, Reports <strong>Guardian</strong> <strong>journalist</strong> <strong>Xan</strong><strong>Rice</strong>Wednesday December 2nd 2009<strong>In</strong> <strong>his</strong> <strong>Kenya</strong> <strong>diary</strong>, <strong>Guardian</strong> <strong>journalist</strong> <strong>Xan</strong> <strong>Rice</strong> <strong>reports</strong> on how adecision by the prosecutor of the international criminal court, LuisMoreno-Ocampo, to investigate the 2008 post-election violence in <strong>Kenya</strong>threatens the corrupt eliteDisputed poll...violence after the presidential election of 2008. Photograph: YasuyoshiChiba/AFP/Getty ImagesWhen someone complains about the state of <strong>Kenya</strong> today, human rights lawyer PherozeNowrojee breaks into a mischievous smile and tells a story from the 90s. President Danielarap Moi was backing out of promises to review the constitution, and Nowrojee had goneto complain to Mwai Kibaki, then the most senior opposition figure. Kibaki listened andshrugged. “<strong>Kenya</strong> yetu,” Kibaki said – “Our <strong>Kenya</strong>”.T<strong>his</strong> was meant to suggest t<strong>his</strong> was just the ways things were, so why waste time gettingangry about it? But coming from a politician it meant, for the ruling elite, the country hasalways been theirs for the taking. And aided by a weak, complicit judiciary that has sinceindependence virtually guaranteed senior politicians immunity from conviction, theyhave taken a lot.Those at the very top of the political pile usually took the most. The family of the firstpresident, Jomo <strong>Kenya</strong>tta, stole so much land they made the original white British settlerslook like petty thieves by comparison. Succeeding <strong>Kenya</strong>tta, Moi grabbed land too, butwww.marsgroupkenya.org 1

www.marsgroupkenya.orgAnother was William Ruto, the agriculture minister, who was alleged to have incitedKalenjin gangs. Both strongly deny any wrongdoing. <strong>Kenya</strong>tta had already taken theKNCHR to court to try to clear <strong>his</strong> name. Ruto subsequently announced in Novemberthat he was also pursuing legal action against the KNCHR.The two men, who both have strong presidential aspirations and are extremely wealthy,then came together to form an alliance.From outside the move may have seemed positive – leaders from the Kikuyu andKalenjin communities leading the way on reconciliation. But the alliance appears to bepurely political, meant to guarantee that one of the two is <strong>Kenya</strong>’s next leader, continuingthe Kikuyu-Kanlenjin hold on power (<strong>Kenya</strong>tta was Kikuyu, Moi is Kalenjin, Kibaki isKikuyu), to the exclusion of <strong>Kenya</strong>’s 40 other ethnic groups. Solidarity in case theyappear in Ocampo’s sights is likely to be another motivation.“Our <strong>Kenya</strong>” is under threat, but it is not donehttp://www.guardianweekly.co.uk/?page=editorial&id=1366&catID=17www.marsgroupkenya.org 3