Crisis In Kenya

Former U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan and African statesman is in Nairobi, Kenya to try and resolve a bitter standoff between President Mwai Kibaki and opposition challenger Raila Odinga. The crisis involves a disputed poll that plunged Kenya into chaos and ethnic bloodshed. Annan is escorted by fellow mediators Benjamin Mkapa, the former president of Tanzania, and Graca Machel, the wife of former South African leader Nelson Mandela. Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni also arrived on Tuesday to join in the mediation efforts, though the opposition distrusts him because he is one of few African leaders to have congratulated Kibaki on his victory.

"We expect all parties to enter into dialogue in good faith and to seize this opportunity to end the suffering and uncertainty," Annan said. However, it remains to be seen if any progress can be made since Odinga and Kibaki have refused to speak to each other despite pressure from Western powers like the United States, Britain and the European Union. Mr. Annan's mission follows a similar attempt by African Union head and Ghanaian President John Kufuor. He failed to get Kibaki and Odinga to meet.

Clashes between Kibaki and Odinga supporters, ethnic unrest, and a brutal crackdown by the security forces have killed at least 650 people over the past month. Mr. Odinga says a December 27 poll that returned Kibaki to power was fraudulent. His supporters have taken to the streets, and mobs mostly targeting Kibaki's Kikuyu tribe have hacked people to death and burnt homes. There have also been reprisal killings.

The opposition will hold a memorial gathering starting at a mortuary then proceeding to a football field near Nairobi's Kibera slum on Wednesday for those who have died in the unrest. Police have banned all rallies and have broken up previous gatherings of supporters from both sides but said they will allow the memorial gathering to go ahead.

About 250,000 Kenyans have been uprooted by the fighting that has tarnished the country's image, cost east Africa's biggest economy more than $1 billion, and choked fuel supplies and trade to landlocked neighbors like Uganda.

As we here in the U.S. are in the mist of a presidential election year, it is a sad sight to see real political fighting in an African country. But it is also great to see Black men and women from other African countries attempt mediation between the factions.

The western media criticizes the civil fighting in African countries but somehow fails to remember that the U.S. had its own civil war at one time. After all most of the African countries have had independence for only fifty or so years. They are just following the example of their former enslavers.