Odinga can fight Kibaki in Parliament
Jan 06, 2008
EDITOR—I would like to comment on WBS’s talk-show, Face Off which featured Stephen Ochieng Chief Executive Officer of the Pan-African Movement and Chris Obore, a journalist. The talk-show was about what lessons Uganda could learn from the Kenya elections. I learnt a lot from Ochieng’s views.
EDITOR—I would like to comment on WBS’s talk-show, Face Off which featured Stephen Ochieng Chief Executive Officer of the Pan-African Movement and Chris Obore, a journalist. The talk-show was about what lessons Uganda could learn from the Kenya elections. I learnt a lot from Ochieng’s views. He pointed out that there are three options for Raila Odinga which can ensure normalcy returns to Kenya: Court redress.
fresh elections
Odinga settling as head of opposition in parliament. Court redress might drag on for too long while fresh elections are too costly.
The most viable option Raila Odinga can take to ensure that peace prevails in Kenya is use his position in Parliament. since he is the head of the opposition and his party ODM has the majority members in Parliament, he can fight the Kibaki dictatorship from there. Chris Obore was bent on why Odinga should be denied the presidency yet he won the poll.
Ochieng reasoned that the Electoral Commission of Kenya had declared Mwai Kibaki the winner and unless there was another election, he is the current head of state regardless of how he won the presidency. Obore is aware this is the trend of elections across Africa. Election fraud for sitting presidents is very common.
And it is not restricted to the banana republics only. It happened in Florida during the last presidential elections in the USA. What our brothers and sisters in Kenya need is reconciliation. We should not encourage fellow Africans to butcher each other because a sitting president has manipulated the elections. Mr Ochieng, thank you very much for your brilliant ideas.
George Murungi Nyakaana
Kampala
EDITOR—Kenya Attorney General Amos Wako’s call for an independent accounting of all the ballots actually cast in the disputed presidential election is the only way to restore public trust in the electoral process.
Now that Kenyans know their votes did not count on December 27, 2007, they must be urgently be reassured that President Kibaki’s evident theft of the election was an isolated incident which will never be allowed to happen again. With a declining 53 percent voter turnout following the rigging which declared Governor George Bush the winner with less votes than Vice President Al Gore’s, public distrust for the electoral process is the major reason participation in US elections has nosedived since 2000.
Short of an independent inquiry into the evidently stolen Kenyan ballot, reversal of all vote-tallying irregularities and declaration of the people’s winner without delay, turnout in future elections will drastically drop in Kenya as has happened in the US.
The people and the rule of law must prevail: all those in the Kibaki administration, the Party for National Unity (PNU), the Electoral Commission and the opposition itself involved in rigging this vote must be arrested, prosecuted and jailed. President Kibaki, Internal Security Minister John Michuki, Justice Minister Martha Karua and Police Commissioner Ali Hussein must be charged with murdering hundreds of unarmed protesters.
Under a shoot-to-kill order directly or indirectly originating with the above-named Kenyan officials, the police are the ones who started shooting without provocation and caused the murder of peaceful opposition demonstrators.
The same arrest warrants by the West against President Robert Mugabe and his officials must now be issued against Kibaki and his retinue of corrupt ministers and security chiefs.
Bosire Mosi
United States
The most viable option Raila Odinga can take to ensure that peace prevails in Kenya is use his position in Parliament. since he is the head of the opposition and his party ODM has the majority members in Parliament, he can fight the Kibaki dictatorship from there. Chris Obore was bent on why Odinga should be denied the presidency yet he won the poll.
Ochieng reasoned that the Electoral Commission of Kenya had declared Mwai Kibaki the winner and unless there was another election, he is the current head of state regardless of how he won the presidency. Obore is aware this is the trend of elections across Africa. Election fraud for sitting presidents is very common.
And it is not restricted to the banana republics only. It happened in Florida during the last presidential elections in the USA. What our brothers and sisters in Kenya need is reconciliation. We should not encourage fellow Africans to butcher each other because a sitting president has manipulated the elections. Mr Ochieng, thank you very much for your brilliant ideas.
George Murungi Nyakaana
Kampala
EDITOR—Kenya Attorney General Amos Wako’s call for an independent accounting of all the ballots actually cast in the disputed presidential election is the only way to restore public trust in the electoral process.
Now that Kenyans know their votes did not count on December 27, 2007, they must be urgently be reassured that President Kibaki’s evident theft of the election was an isolated incident which will never be allowed to happen again. With a declining 53 percent voter turnout following the rigging which declared Governor George Bush the winner with less votes than Vice President Al Gore’s, public distrust for the electoral process is the major reason participation in US elections has nosedived since 2000.
Short of an independent inquiry into the evidently stolen Kenyan ballot, reversal of all vote-tallying irregularities and declaration of the people’s winner without delay, turnout in future elections will drastically drop in Kenya as has happened in the US.
The people and the rule of law must prevail: all those in the Kibaki administration, the Party for National Unity (PNU), the Electoral Commission and the opposition itself involved in rigging this vote must be arrested, prosecuted and jailed. President Kibaki, Internal Security Minister John Michuki, Justice Minister Martha Karua and Police Commissioner Ali Hussein must be charged with murdering hundreds of unarmed protesters.
Under a shoot-to-kill order directly or indirectly originating with the above-named Kenyan officials, the police are the ones who started shooting without provocation and caused the murder of peaceful opposition demonstrators.
The same arrest warrants by the West against President Robert Mugabe and his officials must now be issued against Kibaki and his retinue of corrupt ministers and security chiefs.
Bosire Mosi
United States