Saturday, December 29, 2007
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Rioting Kenyans barricade a road with burning wood and tyres in Nairobi |
Opposition leader Raila Odinga had held the lead since vote counting began after Thursday's poll but delays have raised opposition's suspicions that incumbent President Mwai Kibaki's camp may be seeking to rig the results.
"There are riots all over the country, except a few areas, but there is sufficient security to maintain law and order," a top police official told AFP.
In western Nyanza province, a man was shot dead following a disagreement in a polling station, police said, bringing to four the number of people killed since the polls opened on Thursday morning.
An AFP correspondent said hundreds of ODM supporters faced off with riot police in the massive Nairobi slum of Kibera on Saturday morning, shouting slogans such as "No Raila, No Kenya!" and "We want our rights!"
As riots erupted, police fired tear gas in a bid to quell fighting between Odinga's Luo and Kibaki's Kikuyu tribes.
"ODM supporters are burning and stealing our property," said Paul Jacob, a Kikuyu resident of Kibera.
"We need security because we know they will return. They have machetes, clubs and they are in their thousands, they almost killed us," said Njoroge Wanyoike, another Kikuyu.
Fears of greater unrest were swelling as clusters of demonstrators regrouped in the back streets around the conference hall in the centre of Nairobi where the presidential votes were being tallied.
"They want to steal votes. They are counting votes from regions favouring Kibaki and then they want to declare him the winner. We do not want violence, we want our rights," said one protester, Peter Oduor.
"We want them to announce the results now. Police are firing tear gas at us yet we have not committed any crime," said Thomas Otieno, another demonstrator.
Odinga's party unilaterally declared victory but Kibaki's camp dismissed the move, saying only the electoral commission could announce the victor.
At a press conference later Saturday, election commission chairman Samuel Kivuitu read out results from a number of constituencies that appeared to largely cancel out Odinga's lead.
The press conference quickly deteriorated into a shouting match between party agents, notably Odinga officials accusing Kibaki's camp of rigging the results.
An AFP correspondent in the western city of Kisumu, an ODM bastion, said angry demonstrators had lit several bonfires, set up rogue roadblocks and started looting shops.
"We are monitoring the situation and we have enough deployment," regional police commander Grace Kaindi told AFP.
Police also fired tear gas at protesters in the western provincial capital Kakamega, the Rift Valley capital city of Nakuru and the western city of Eldoret, witnesses and police said.
"The government went to work last night," Mariam Oduor said in reference to allegations of state-engineered rigging, as she ran away from tear gas in Eldoret.
Polling day was described by several international observer teams, notably from the United States and the European Union, as relatively orderly and generally positive.
Source: AFP, Dec 29, 2007