By Ryan Aliman
Impunity Watch Reporter, Africa

NAIROBI, Kenya – 38 people, including 16 men, 5 children and 9 police officers died on Monday due to renewed ethnic clashes in the southeastern village of Kilelengwani.

Members from the Pokomo and Orma tribes have been attacking each other since last month in what is reportedly Kenya’s worst tribal conflict in years. Tribe members from both sides, armed with guns, spears, bows and arrows, would attack each other’s villages, burn homes and kill people. The conflict has now claimed approximately 116 people and 167 houses.

The two tribes have a long history of violence. The dispute between them has mainly been about the use of land and water in the Tana River delta, an ecologically rich area in the country. Cattle-grazing rights have also been a prevailing issue of contention between the Pokomo, a settled farming community, and the Orma, a semi-nomadic cattle-herding tribe.

What is remarkable about the current wave of hostilities between the Pokomo and the Orma is that the fighting seemed to have intensified. Phyllis Muema, executive director of the Kenya Community Support Centre observed that an influx of weapons from neighbouring Somalia has exacerbated the conflict. “This is actually a massacre. The level of killing shows very clearly that this is not just a resource-based conflict… The sophistication of the arms they are using indicates that they have acquired them, we suspect, from neighbouring Somalia,” says Muema.

Local people, meanwhile, attribute the latest violence to politics. “We were born into the conflict between Pokomos and Ormas,” Kadze Kazungu, a Pokomo, told reporters. “We have fought over land and water before. But whenever that occurs, elders from both tribes always find a way of resolving the issue. This time it is not about land. It is politics. Bad politics,” he added.

Human rights groups have received reports that politicians in the area have been involved in inciting violence as a strategy to win seats in the March 2013 election. Political parties would traditionally pit ethnic groups against each other to draw support from a specific tribe.

Next year’s election is said to have higher stakes than previous ones. Kenyans, for the first time, will be able to vote for county governors and senators making local votes more significant than before.

However, despite reports to authorities on the suspected involvement of politicians, not much has been done by the police. Robert Ndege, a political risk consultant at Africapractice, described their response as “pathetic”. “If [the security forces] can’t contain one flashpoint, what happens if this is repeated across the country,” he asked.

A dusk-to-dawn curfew has been in place since Monday. Houses continue to be raided and people killed, notwithstanding.

 

For further information, please see:

AFP – Militia behind Kenya’s Tana River killings, say villagers – 14 September 2012

The Guardian – Deadly clashes in Kenya fuel fears of election violence – 13 September 2012

Al Jazeera – Dozens killed in Kenya ethnic clashes – 10 September 2012

BBC – Kenya Tana River renewed ethnic clashes kill 30 – 10 September 2012