Kenya protests

MW �tell us what happened today in the Kibera slum.� DM �When we got there, there were hundreds of riot police marching right into the center of the area, there was automatic gunfire going on constantly, back and forth with the protesters. From what we understand talking to other colleagues, they did see several dead bodies. And we talked to one man who actually approached the police lines, absolutely wailing in tears, completely distraught, asking them to take his life, his 15 year old daughter had been shot dead by the police. Doctors Without Border, the charity, has an office in Kibera and one of their doctors said what was going on there was a complete massacre, that the police were literally shooting at unarmed protesters, and this is a pattern that’s been building for the past couple days now.� MW �have organizations like Doctors Without Borders made any sort of overture or plea to the government and the army to kind of dial it back?� DM �yeah, they have and certainly a number of the embassies in Kenya here today including the Canadians and the British and several Europeans basically condemned the use of lethal force on unarmed protesters and basically they say that the two sides sit down and work out something. They say the footage that’s been seen of protesters being killed by the police is disturbing. So it’s been some very strong language coming from the embassies.� MW �this was the third and final day of protests called by Rila Odinga’s opposition Oranga Movement but there was also news today that Rila has changed his party’s tactics. What is the new strategy?� DM �the new strategy is to start a boycott of businesses owned by government ministers and several of the ministers in the government are quite wealthy men with interests in banks and dairy industries and bus companies.� MW �if this becomes a strikes and boycotts rather than protests strategy, couldn’t that reduce the inter-ethnic nature of this crisis?� DM �that certainly would be perhaps a good reason why they’ve done this and I think it’s perhaps too it’s just an effort to calm things down before Kofi Annan’s visit so he can get ahead with things while having to deal with a rising death toll every day. We’re now over 23 dead from these three days of rioting.� MW �gauge for us how things have gone with the kind of ethnic component of these riots? Has it gotten worse in recent weeks?� DM �yes, it’s really bad. It’s bad and you talk to people where it’s been bad in the past and they say it’s gotten much worse now than it’s ever been, certainly in post-independence Kenya. One region of Kenya, it is essentially ethnic cleansing that’s gone on up there. Kikuyus are being forced out of their homes, their homes are being burnt and many of the people I’ve talked to when I was up there, many of them say they’re not going back home ever.� MW �finally, the Kenyan National Commission on Human Rights today held a press conference when it presented more damning evidence that last month’s presidential elections were seriously flawed. What is the gist of what they said?� DM �Well basically they said they were severely flawed and it’s not clear who the winner was. This is a state funded body, it is a government body so for them to be saying this is not without some weight and certainly people have been paying a lot of attention to it.�