Kenyan partners hold peace for election day
'While there was relief that the election went peacefully, the day was also blighted by poor turnout amid a cost of living crisis and soaring unemployment.'
A grassroots organisation that works with the Quaker Turning the Tide (TTT) programme in Kenya recruited seventy-one accredited election observers to help ensure peace in the presidential elections last week.
Before the vote on 9 August, the National Council of Churches of Kenya (NCCK) called for religious leaders in late July to stay impartial. It also urged Kenyans not to lay down their lives ‘on account of elections that come and go’.
Previous elections in Kenya have seen outbreaks of violence inflamed by disputes over the validity of the results.
As the Friend went to press, the result was still unknown, although Willian Ruto, the deputy president, was reported to have a narrow lead over Kenya’s veteran opposition politician Raila Odinga. While there was relief that the election went peacefully, the day was also blighted by poor turnout amid a cost of living crisis and soaring unemployment.
AfriNov – one of the partner organisations with TTT run by Quaker Peace & Social Witness – engaged in a wide range of peacebuilding activities. Quoted on the Quakers in Britain Facebook page, Benard Agona, AfriNov’s executive director, said: ‘It was all walk and dance for peace along the streets of Kisumu which culminated in the signing of a peace treaty by stakeholders. The speeches and peace treaty signing was conducted at Kondele roundabout (an interchange of Kisumu – Kakamega Road and Nairobi – Busia Road). Kondele was chosen given its dark history re the 2007 and 2017 post-election violence. This dance and peace walk was organised by civil society organisations working in Kisumu. Kisumu County is one of the violent hotspot areas in Kenya.’
Britain Yearly Meeting said that it was holding their Kenyan colleagues, AfriNov, in the Light as Kenyans took to the polls on 9 August. AfriNov partners with Quaker Peace & Social Witness as part of the TTT programme which works in Kenya, Rwanda and Burundi. After the election, the NCCK, which includes the Anglican Church of Kenya, released a joint statement with the Kenya Conference of Catholic Bishops (KCCB), thanking people for voting peacefully.
