Election - 2007
In 2007, two principal leaders of the movement to defeat the draft constitution, Raila Odinga and Kalonzo Musyoka -- both former Kibaki allies -- were presidential candidates for the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM) party and the Orange Democratic Movement-Kenya (ODM-K) party, respectively. In September 2007, President Kibaki and his allies formed the coalition Party of National Unity (PNU). KANU joined the PNU coalition, although it was serving in parliament as the official opposition party.
The December 2007 elections were marred by serious irregularities, and set off a wave of violence throughout Kenya. Pre-election opinion polls placed Odinga ahead of the incumbent President Mwai Kibaki - though many surveys had them within a few percentage points of each other. On December 27, 2007, Kenya held presidential, parliamentary, and local government elections. While the parliamentary and local government elections were largely credible, the presidential election was seriously flawed, with irregularities in the vote tabulation process as well, as turnout in excess of 100% in some constituencies.
In the counting that followed, Odinga appeared to have a strong lead, and his Orange Democratic Movement declared victory on December 29. Yet as the counting continued, Kibaki's results became stronger and the gap between the rivals narrowed. On the night of December 30, behind closed doors, the chairman of the Electoral Commission of Kenya declared Kibaki the winner by some 230,000 votes - though a few days later, he admitted he "did not know" who had won.
Within minutes of the announcement of Kibaki's victory, protests in the street alleging Kibaki had "stolen" the election turned violent. The protests were banned and police moved to quash the unrest.
Violence erupted in different parts of Kenya as supporters of opposition candidate Raila Odinga and supporters of Kibaki clashed with police and each other. It remains unclear exactly what happened next - that is, whether or not politicians ordered the targeting of tribal rivals - but the violence was quickly drawn along tribal lines. Kibaki, of the majority Kikuyu tribe, and Odinga, of the Luo tribe, each claimed the other was responsible for the bloodbaths which followed.
In 2007, gun ownership in the country remained at a low level, and many of those fatalities occurred as victims were hacked to death with machetes. Gangs of youths roamed through many of Kenya's slums, torching homes, as riots spread across the country. Adding fuel to the fire of unrest, news reports emerged showing police officers shooting unarmed protesters amid the chaos. On January 1, 2008, a church in the northern Eldoret district was burned to the ground. It was packed with women and children, mostly Kikuyu, who had fled there after an attack on their village the previous night.
The Waki Commission noted: "The Commission knew that while women normally are the main victims of sexual violence when order breaks down, men too had experienced horrid types of sexual violence after the Kenyan election. These included sodomy, forced circumcision, and even mutilation of their penises. Between hearing of women who had been gang raped and mutilated, the accounts of ethnically driven sexual violence against certain men was also horrifying."
The post-election crisis left about 1,300-1,400 Kenyans dead and about 500,000-600,000 people displaced. In order to resolve the crisis, negotiation teams representing PNU and ODM began talks under the auspices of former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and the Panel of Eminent African Persons (Benjamin Mkapa of Tanzania and Graca Machel of Mozambique).
On February 28, 2008, President Kibaki and Raila Odinga signed a power-sharing agreement, which provided for the establishment of a prime minister position (to be filled by Odinga) and two deputy prime minister positions, as well as the division of an expanded list of cabinet posts according to the parties' proportional representation in parliament. On March 18, 2008, the Kenyan parliament amended the constitution and adopted legislation to give legal force to the agreement. On April 17, 2008 the new coalition cabinet and Prime Minister Odinga were sworn in. The Kofi Annan-led political settlement also set out a reform agenda to address underlying causes of the post-election violence. The focus is on constitutional, electoral, land, and institutional reform as well as increased accountability for corruption and political violence.
A mixed Kenyan-international commission appointed in 2008 to evaluate the elections found in 2013 that the results were “irretrievably polluted.” The commission also reported that the election results, and especially the presidential election results, lacked integrity. While nearly 14.3 million citizens had registered to vote, an independent review commission concluded that voter rolls contained the names of approximately 1.3 million deceased persons.
The International Criminal Court summoned six Kenyans (five high-ranking government officials and one radio executive) to The Hague on charges of crimes against humanity for their alleged roles in the 2007-2008 post-election violence. They appeared at The Hague in April 2011 to be informed of the charges. Confirmation of Charges hearings were held in September 2011, and in January 2012 the pre-trial chamber of the Court confirmed charges against four of the individuals for allegedly committing crimes against humanity: Uhuru Kenyatta, Frances Muthaura, William Ruto, and Joshua Sang. The next step was for the Court to set a trial date.
After the massive violence following the closely contested December 2007 election, many precautions were taken to prevent a similar occurrence in 2013. And Election Day and post-election violence has been greatly reduced. However, an effort to use new technology did not work as well as hoped. There were questions about the effectiveness of this election which had promised to be a technological advancement.
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