- International Criminal Court (ICC) prosecutor
- United Nations Secretary General
- African Union chair
- President of Kenya
- Prime minister of Kenya

Dear Sirs,

RIGGING OR STEALING THE ELECTION IN 2007 WAS NO EXCUSE FOR THE POST-ELECTION VIOLENCE

Since 1963 only three elections have been genuine, all others were rigged. Shortly after the 1963 elections, President Jomo Kenyatta declared himself president for life. Thereafter President Kenyatta continued to rig elections in favour of himself, his relatives and his friends.

When President Daniel arap Moi took over from President Kenyatta, he followed in the same footsteps. The only year the Moi regime allowed for a free-and-fair election was 1979. All other elections which followed were always rigged. The worst election malpractices and rigging in Kenya's history took place in 1988. Most prominent and popular Kenya politicians lost their political positions. In a conspiracy to ensure new faces in Kenyan politics, the Moi regime rigged out most Kenyans who were in politics at the time. Despite the disappointing scenario, those affected did not resort to killing others in the name of election rigging. They rescinded and regretfully accepted to live with their fate. Whether the 2007 elections were rigged or not, there was no good reason for any person or any community to go on a killing spree of other communities. Prior to the post-election violence, there was evidence of thorough preparation for war by the Kalenjin militia. Training camps were evident in different locations in Kenya where young Kalenjin men were being trained. Was the training done before the disputed elections associated with the rigged election?

If there was election rigging, it was done by senior Kenyan politicians. Why then did the Kalenjin youth attack ordinary innocent Kenyans? How were the children and women killed involved in the stealing of an election? Ordinary Kenyans exercised their democratic rights by voting peacefully in the 2007 elections. But immediately after going home after voting, they were attacked and killed on the grounds that they stole the elections.

President Moi knew exactly why a Kalenjin militia killed more than 800 innocent Kenyans in 1991. He had strongly warned of war and chaos prior to the killings. It is believed that most of those young men who killed Kenyans in 1991 were the same people who killed innocent Kenyans in 2008. One of the suspected organisers, financiers and sponsors of the post-election killings was a senior official of KANU '92 and one of the chief actors and commanders of the 1991 killings. The similarity of the methods of the killings in 1991 and 2008 and the reality that the attackers were the same in 1991 and 2008 provide an understanding of the reasons behind the continued series of killings since 1991. The 2008 killings were alleged on the one hand to have been associated with the land problem and on the other with the stealing of elections. The previous killings since 1991 were alleged to have been associated with cattle rustling, tribal clashes and ethnic cleansing. The uncertain, indefinite classification, references and renaming of the killings are an indication that the real reason behind the killings has never been revealed and/or understood. It has been as though some people somewhere had been trying all names to see which suit the attacks and the killings best.

But going by the warnings of war and chaos by Moi for two consecutive years before 800 innocent Kenyans were killed in 1991, one would deduce the actual reasons for the killings as those of fear of prosecution for past crimes, corruption and the introduction of the multiparty system of governance. This is what led to the birth of those killings in 1991. Rigging or stealing the elections in 2008 cannot be an acceptable reason for the killing of innocent children and women, as there had been worse scenarios of election rigging and malpractice before, and never had there been such chaos and killings. Why 1991 and why 2009?

Isaac Newton Kinity
Former Secretary General
Kenya Civil Servants Union and Chairman
Kikimo Foundation For Corruption and Poverty Eradication

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