In the span of about a week, starting on December 30, 2007, the day that President Mwai Kibaki stood awkwardly in an ill-fitting suit in the backyard of the Nairobi statehouse, Bible in hand, and had himself sworn in after a rigged election, Kenya went from one of the most orderly countries in sub-Saharan Africa to a war zone. The violence was as terrible as it was swift, but the real shock was that it could happen here at all. Kenya had just held two back-to-back national elections, in 2002 and 2005, that were widely praised as free and fair. According to pre-election polls, most Kenyans were backing the opposition candidate, Raila Odinga, and they were expecting a peaceful transfer of power, which has happened only a few times in Africa, but Kenya was thought to be the happy exception, and for good reason.
This is an interesting article. Thank you for posting it. I would prefer had the author labeled citations for some of these numbers and facts. Huh? Is that a shout-out to Monsanto or some neat type of local corn? OK, that is a great line. And this is a pretty darn great article. It really picks up steam. Thanks again fo sharing.In all, at least one thousand people were murdered and about one million displaced.
[...] to miles and miles of high-quality, disease-resistant corn.
There was a famous expression from colonial-era Kenya: “Are you married, or do you live in Kenya?"
That's an interesting idea that I haven't considered. As disturbing as it might be, when a nation has to defend itself, a narrative of unity, shared experience, and sacrifice is created. It's depressing to think that we can become factious over time, just because we haven't suffered together enough.Another theory about nation-states, advanced by Paul Collier, an Oxford economist, is that it took international war to solidify the bond people have to their countries.