Opening Statement
Chairman
Donald M. Payne
The Political Crisis in
February 6, 2008
Good morning, and welcome to the Subcommittee on
Just a
few weeks ago, at the height of the crisis, I went to
Indeed,
witnessing the violence and meeting the young victims was deeply troubling. Yet, I am confident that Kenyans will come
out of this crisis united. Kenyans of
different religious, ethnic, and economic backgrounds lived together peacefully
in a region long marred by civil wars and political chaos. Unfortunately, like the millions of Kenyans,
the more than 170,000 refugees from the Ogaden and
It was
not long ago that the people of
On December
27, 2007, the people of
Incumbent president, Mwai Kibaki, was hastily declared the winner by the Electoral
Commission of Kenya, after a series of highly irregular events which cast
significant doubt on his so called victory. Let me be blunt. The election results announced by the ECK do
not reflect the wishes of the Kenyan people.
The people of
International and domestic election observers reported serious irregularities, especially in vote tallying by the ECK. In one district, a stronghold of the president, the election result showed 115% turnout, but changed by the Chairman of the Commission to 85% without any explanation. Election results were declared even when documents were not returned or signed by officers. While the vote proceeded in an orderly fashion, the aftermath was a text book example of how to steal an election. National and international election monitors were barred from observing the vote tally in some places. Returning officers became mysteriously difficult to get in touch with before reporting the vote tally from their constituencies.
ODM candidate, Raila Odinga’s, lead, which had been reported to be nearly 376,000 votes, suddenly diminished to 38,000. The ODM won 99 seats in parliament compared to the president’s PNU 43 seats. Not only the opposition won the majority seats in parliament, but the president’s Vice President and over a dozen of his ministers were defeated in the parliamentary elections.
The E.U. observer mission declared that “the 2007 General Elections have fallen short of key international and regional standards for democratic elections. Most significantly, they were marred by a lack of transparency in the processing and tallying of presidential results, which raises concerns about the accuracy of the final results of this election.” Other observers also raised serious questions about the credibility of the electoral process.
In reaction, Kenyans went to the streets to express their frustration and anger. The protests soon turned violent and it is still unfolding. More than a thousand people have been killed, and over 300,000 displaced as a result of the unrest, including an estimated 80,000 children under the age of five. Millions more have been adversely affected. Two members of parliament from the opposition ODM were killed in January.
The instability in
It is important to point out that while the ECK and
the Kibaki government mishandled the 2007 elections,
the State Department’s response in the wake of the elections was at best
confused and at worst completely inappropriate to the
circumstances. A number of statements issued by the State Department not
only missed the point, but the actions of some
The State
Department should have waited on the outcome to determine how to respond
effectively. Our diplomatic efforts in
the wake of the elections have not been stellar. Indeed, the response to
the
Remember the 2005 elections in
What are the lessons learned? Very few. Dr. Frazer’s statement on January 31 about ethnic cleansing played right into the hands of the Kibaki camp, allowing them to portray themselves as victims of an ethnic conflict. The violence is unlikely to end without a mechanism in place to resolve the election dispute.
What is happening in
It is critical that a transitional, coalition government is established, with a clear mandate to implement necessary reforms such as a new constitution, a new electoral law, a new electoral commission, address the root causes of the crisis, and prepare the country for transparent presidential elections within two years.
.
With that I will turn to Mr. Smith for his opening statement. Mr. Smith.