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Published 31st October 2008

Vol 49 No 22

Kenya

Calling politicians to account

Image courtesy of Panos Pictures
Image courtesy of Panos Pictures

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The Waki report on post-election violence names names, tells tales and could help clear up the nation's politics

Kenyans feared another whitewash when Justice Philip Waki was appointed to head the Commission to Investigate the Post-Election Violence. Yet he has confounded the sceptics and produced a lengthy and powerful report which could spur on further investigations and prompt the prosecution of several powerful politicians. Previous commissions and government probes into corruption and murder have allowed named officials to wriggle off the hook. That will be harder this time, both because of public outrage at the findings and because other countries are involved in the process.

The Waki report

Image courtesy of Panos Pictures

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Justice Philip Waki produces a devastating critique of Kenya's political class and business elite

The mandate of the Commission of Inquiry into Post-Election Violence (CIPEV) was to 'investigate the facts and circumstances surrounding the violence, the conduct of state security...

Corruption countdown

Image courtesy of Panos Pictures

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At last President Kikwete is pushing miscreants to return monies stolen from the central bank ­ some might even be prosecuted

Judgement day is coming for those individuals and companies who benefited from a 133 billion Tanzania shilling (US$117 million) fraud at the Bank of Tanzania (Central Bank), insis...

BLUE LINES
THE INSIDE VIEW

Devastating tragedies loom in Congo-Kinshasa and Sudan. Ill-resourced United Nations peacekeepers are supposed to police both. Onlookers might be persuaded by the numbers – 17,000 troops in Congo and a projected 30,000 in Sudan – that they will be able to hold the line. In fact, the UN risks failing woefully in both countries because of what its peacekeepers lack: aerial surveillance and airlift capacity, effective intelligence and reconnaissance, and above all the political will of the cou...
Devastating tragedies loom in Congo-Kinshasa and Sudan. Ill-resourced United Nations peacekeepers are supposed to police both. Onlookers might be persuaded by the numbers – 17,000 troops in Congo and a projected 30,000 in Sudan – that they will be able to hold the line. In fact, the UN risks failing woefully in both countries because of what its peacekeepers lack: aerial surveillance and airlift capacity, effective intelligence and reconnaissance, and above all the political will of the countries that vote to send in the troops but then deny them the tools to do the job. It is no surprise that the battle-hardened Spanish General Vicente Diaz de Villegas resigned from his post as UN military commander in Congo within days of taking up the job: he says Monuc is set up to fail. UN failure in Congo and Sudan will cost tens of thousands of lives, destroy Ban Ki-moon’s reputation as UN Secretary General and signal the end of UN peacekeeping in its present form. Sudanese and Congolese civilians often protest at UN bases after peacekeepers have failed to protect them from raids by government or rebel forces. Yet the badly-equipped peacekeepers are often there as a palliative for diplomatic errors made far away. Perhaps these coming failures may finally encourage serious reform in the international system – but the price is already too high.
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