Wayzata World Factbook 1996/The World Factbook - 1996 Edition - Wayzata Technology (3079) (1996).iso/pc/text/humanrts/kenya.txu

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TITLE:  KENYA HUMAN RIGHTS PRACTICES, 1994
AUTHOR:  U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
DATE:  FEBRUARY 1995



remained in camps.

In October President Moi instructed the Rift Valley Provincial
Commissioner to resettle displaced persons resident in camps in
Maela.  However, local administrators proved unable or
unwilling to carry out these presidential instructions as
intended.  They actually resettled over 200 families (out of
3,000), who, once relocated to unproductive farm land, were not
given resettlement assistance.  On December 24, the Government
dismantled the Maela camps and razed the shelters without prior
notice and without the cooperation of UNDP.  It forcibly
resettled hundreds of refugees to areas outside Maela who were
left to fend for themselves.  The Government had restricted
UNDP and NGO's from entering Maela and participating in the
resettlement process.  At year's end, the status of the
displaced remained uncertain.

Section 2  Respect for Civil Liberties, Including:

     a.  Freedom of Speech and Press

The Constitution provides for freedom of expression and the
press and outlaws discrimination on the grounds of political
opinion.  Nonetheless, there are restrictions on the exercise
of free speech.  Freedom of speech is often breached by
security forces and undercut by broad interpretations of
antiquated sedition and libel laws.  In his May 31 pledge to
reconsider subversion and incitement cases, the Attorney
General cautioned that words or actions critical of the
President or that could alarm the public or disturb the peace
were illegal.  The Government has used these provisos as a
basis for denying opposition parties the right to free speech.
Similarly, it arrested several opposition leaders on the charge
that their critical commentary about the Government was
inciteful.  Despite these forms of government obstruction, the
political opposition and human rights groups continued to
present their views to the public.

Radio is the medium through which most Kenyans get their news.
The Government controls the single radio station and its
affiliate television station, the Kenyan Broadcasting
Corporation, which produces both television and radio news.
They typically avoid stories critical of the Government, give a
large share of news time to government or ruling party
functions, and neglect to give anything approaching equal
coverage to opposition activities.  The ruling party owns a
second television station, the Kenya Television Network, and a
government supporter owns a new cable television station.  The
Information Minister announced in late December that the
Government would not license any new radio and television
stations in the near future, even if the Attorney General's
Task Force on the Press, which is expected to submit its final
report by mid-1995, recommended radio liberalization.

The print media include three daily newspapers that provide
extensive coverage of national politics.  Two dailies, the
Nation and the Standard, cover political issues and print
articles critical of government policies, though at least one
former editor has charged that the papers are under pressure to
self-censor.  The third daily newspaper, the Kenya Times, more
often reflects the views of the ruling party.  Weekly
newspapers and magazines, many of which take a more strident
tone in their criticism of the Government, also have
substantial audiences.

The printed press remained vibrant and independent, and
government harassment of the press decreased noticeably after
midyear.  However, in attempts to silence its critics, the
Government arrested 18 journalists in 1994 and fined or
incarcerated them for violating antiquated libel and sedition
laws.  In the year's most notable case, the Court of Appeal in
June found Bedan Mbugua, the editor in chief of the weekly
newspaper, the People; David Makali, a People reporter; the
publishing company; and human rights attorney G.B.M. Kariuki
guilty of contempt of court.  The contempt charges arose from
an article in The People that quoted Kariuki's criticism of the
same Court of Appeal's decision in a case involving the
Universities Academic Staff Union (see Section 6.a.).  The
Court fined Kariuki approximately $10,000, fined Bedan and
Mbugua each roughly twice that amount, and required them to
publish apologies.  When Mbugua and Makali refused to
apologize, the Commissioner of Prisons elected to send them to
a maximum security prison for 5 and 4 months, respectively.
The authorities released Mbugua after serving 3 months and 20
days, and freed Makali after 3 months.

The Government continued its ban on a number of books,
including a Kiswahili play based on George Orwell's "Animal
Farm" and a number of works by emigre Kenyan author Ngugi Wa
Thiong'o.  On January 13, a truckload of armed policemen raided
Colorprint Limited, a Nairobi publisher, and impounded 15,000
copies of "Kenya:  Return to Reason," a book by the chairman of
the FORD-Asili (FORD-A) opposition party, Kenneth Matiba.  The
following day, the Government announced that the book was a
"prohibited publication."  In November the authorities arrested
a Nairobi businessman on a sedition charge for possessing a
booklet entitled "Patriotic Voices."  At year's end, the
Attorney General had not given his consent to begin prosecution.

In August the Government withdrew sedition charges against four
journalists from the Standard newspaper.  It had accused the
four of publishing a seditious story in March about ethnic
clashes in the Rift Valley security zone of Molo--a story that
was later proven untrue.

In 1994 the Government streamlined procedures for accrediting
representatives of the international media, who by and large
operated unfettered in Kenya.

In previous years, the Government pressured university students
and faculty to support the ruling party, but since the
professors' strike closed down institutions of higher learning
for the better part of the year, the degree of academic freedom
was difficult to gauge.  The authorities fired 26 professors
because of their participation in the walkout, and in March the
Court of Appeal upheld the firings, effectively denying the
professors tenure.  Police posted on university campuses
monitored student and faculty activities.  On several
occasions, police peaceably dispersed gatherings of professors
on university grounds but used force to disrupt student
assemblies (see Section 1.d.).

     b.  Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and Association

Freedom of assembly is provided for in the Constitution, but is
seriously limited by the Public Order Act, which gives the
authorities power to control public gatherings.  The Act
prohibits unlicensed meetings of 10 or more persons without
approval from the district commissioner.  In theory the law
does not apply to persons meeting for "social, cultural,
charitable, recreational, religious, professional, commercial,
or industrial purposes."  In practice, meetings under almost
all categories fall under the jurisdiction of the Public Order
Act.

Throughout 1994, but particularly in the early part of the
year, the Government restricted the right of peaceful assembly
by refusing to register meetings.  Between January and May, it
refused the FORD-K opposition party permits for public rallies
six times and also disallowed gatherings planned by
nonpolitical organizations.  In March the district commissioner
refused the NCCK a permit for a seminar regarding start-up
business loans for community development projects.

The Government also frequently broke up both licensed and
unlicensed meetings.  On March 27, administrative police fired
into the air and used tear gas to disperse people gathered for
a free eye clinic, just as opposition M.P. George Nyanja began
to address the crowd.  The parliamentarian had obtained a
permit for the gathering, but an officer on the scene announced
that the provincial administration had withdrawn the permit,
rendering the assembly unlawful.

Armed police dispersed 400 people attending a seminar hosted by
the FORD-A party at the Limuru conference and training center
on April 23.  Police entered the conference center's dining
hall while the participants were at breakfast and ordered them
to leave the premises immediately.  When arguments ensued
between the police and the FORD-A leaders, the police used tear
gas to scatter the crowd.

The authorities were no less forceful in preventing opposition
leaders from publicly meeting their constituents.  On April 4,
antiriot police stopped seven FORD-K parliamentarians from
addressing a large crowd in Homa Bay, forcing them to leave the
town at gunpoint.  When James Orengo, the party's first vice
chairman, then attempted to walk back through the town, he was
blocked by police and forced into his car.  Later in the day,
police again dispersed crowds in the Rangwe and Ndhiwa
townships before the seven parliamentarians had an opportunity
to address them.

In late May, several government officials, including the
Minister for Education and the Rift Valley Provincial
Commissioner, announced that the Government would be more
forthcoming on permits for public assemblies.  The Government
accordingly licensed a united opposition public meeting held in
Nairobi in early June.  Individual opposition parties also
conducted campaign rallies prior to the June 27 parliamentary
by-elections without government interference.

The Societies Act governs freedom of association; it states
that every association must be registered or exempted from
registration by the Registrar of Societies.  Ten political
parties are currently registered under this statute:  KANU,
FORD-K, FORD-A, the Democratic Party, the Social Democratic
Party, the Kenya National Democratic Alliance, the Kenya
National Congress, Labor Party Democracy, the Kenya Social
Congress, and the Party of Independent Candidates of Kenya.
The Government has refused to register the Islamic Party of
Kenya (IPK), even though the Societies Act nowhere prohibits
religion-based parties.  The Attorney General has argued that
registering sectarian parties would contradict the spirit of
the Act, which proscribes organizations "incompatible with
peace, welfare, or good order in Kenya."  A secretive
organization known as the Mau Mau Posterity Party, which claims
responsibility for anti-Asian propaganda in Kenya's urban
centers, has not attempted registration.

     c.  Freedom of Religion

Kenya has no state religion, and the Constitution acknowledges
freedom of worship.  The Government generally does not infringe
upon religious activities, except to require registration by
new churches.

     d.  Freedom of Movement Within the Country, Foreign
         Travel, Emigration, and Repatriation

By law, citizens may travel freely within the country.
However, ethnic clashes and the establishment of security zones
restricted the ability of many Kenyans to travel, particularly
to those parts of the Rift Valley most affected by the violence.

The Government does not generally prohibit emigration of its
citizens and, in contrast to previous years, did not prevent
travel abroad by its critics in 1994.  The Government does not
regard provision of passports to its citizens as a right and
reserves the authority to issue or deny passports at its
discretion.

There are 240,000 refugees, mostly from Somalia and Sudan
living in camps and 100,000 living outside the camps in cities
and rural areas.  Somalis account for about 80 percent of the
total refugee population.  Kenya has accepted most asylum
seekers, though sometimes entry is delayed.  None of these
refugees has been granted legal permanent residence status.

Following a series of formal warnings, in July the Government
gave the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
3 days' notice to close a large refugee camp near a tourist
area in Mombasa.  Although the Government did not follow
through with its demand, official pressure to close the camp
remained strong at year's end.  The UNHCR accepted in principle
the Government's right to close the camp.

According to Africa Watch and the UNHCR, there continued to be
credible reports by UNHCR and other relief agencies of rapes of
Somali refugee women in the North Eastern province.  Unlike
1993, when most of the rapes took place inside the confines of
the camps, those reported in 1994 took place outside the
camps.  They have been directed mostly at young girls herding
goats or collecting firewood.  Most of the rape incidents are
believed to be committed by other refugees or bandits operating
outside the camps.  The incidence of rape decreased
dramatically in 1994, from an average of 27 down to 9 per
month, after the UNHCR increased assistance to the women and
improved security in the camps.  The Government, initially
stung by allegations of government security involvement and of
not taking the issue seriously, arrested two individuals in the
camp identified by the victims.

Refugees living outside the camps are vulnerable to arrest, and
those who purchase false identification documents and visas put
themselves even further at risk.  In August the police raided
Somali communities in an effort to ferret out "illegal
aliens."  There were credible reports that Somali refugees, as
well as ethnically Somali Kenyans, were targets for extortion
and that some were arrested following these sweeps.

Section 3  Respect for Political Rights:  The Right of Citizens
           to Change Their Government

Kenyan citizens have the legal right to change their government
through free and fair elections, but their ability to do so has
yet to be demonstrated fully.  The presidential and
parliamentary elections of 1992 were marked by violence,
intimidation, fraud, and other irregularities, but opposition
candidates nevertheless won 63 percent of the vote.  Diplomatic
observers viewed the 10 by-elections held in 1994 as generally
free and fair, despite minor irregularities.

However, the Government continued to harass and intimidate the
political opposition.  The President exercises sweeping powers
over the local political structure as well as the National
Assembly, and the KANU party he heads controlled 118 out of the
200 National Assembly seats.  The President appoints both the
powerful provincial and district commissioners, as well as a
multitude of district and village officials.  At the district
and village level, these political appointees are responsible
for security as well as the disbursement of federal development
funds.

At the national level, the Constitution authorizes the
President to dissolve the legislature and prohibits Assembly
debate on issues under consideration by the courts.  This law,
in conjunction with the Speaker of the Assembly's ruling that
the subject of the President's conduct is inappropriate for
parliamentary debate, has severely limited the scope of
deliberation on many controversial political issues.  M.P.'s
are entitled to introduce legislation, but in practice it is
the Attorney General who does so.  As the head of KANU, the
President also influences the legislative agenda.  He also
bolstered KANU's majority by acting on his constitutional
authority to appoint 12 M.P.'s.

Three opposition parties--the DP, FORD-K, and FORD-A--hold the
majority of the opposition's 82 seats.  KANU used a variety of
pressure tactics to entice opposition M.P.'s to defect to KANU,
and by year's end six opposition M.P.'s had done so.  As a
result, there were 10 by-elections, including 2 forced by the
death of two M.P.'s.  During the seven by-elections held in
June, there were credible reports that government and KANU
officials bribed voters, purchased voter cards, and forcibly
removed an election observer from a polling station.  There
were also violent incidents at public rallies prior to the June
elections involving both opposition and KANU supporters.
Street skirmishes between supporters of contending parties also
broke out on the day of two by-elections in October.  A U.S.
Embassy observer witnessed an assault in front of a polling
station on a FORD-A candidate, who was later hospitalized.  The
assailant, who struck the candidate to the ground with repeated
blows as armed police looked on, came to the polling station in
a convoy of vehicles escorting the KANU Secretary General.
Following the announcement of the October election results, in
which two opposition candidates won parliamentary seats, fights
erupted again resulting in the deaths of at least six people.

Another round of by-elections were to be held in January 1995,
following the High Court's decision in November to nullify
opposition victories in two 1992 parliamentary elections.  The
Court overturned the results of one election because the
opposition winner had allegedly administered tribal oaths to
supporters, although the decision was based on contradictory
testimony given by witch doctors.

Merus, Kalenjins, Kisiis, Luhyas, Kambas, Taitas, Luos,
Giriamas, Maasai, Kikuyus, Pokot, and Embus are represented in
the President's Cabinet.  However, the President is widely
reputed to rely on an inner circle of advisers drawn mostly
from his Kalenjin tribe.

Although there are no legal restrictions on the participation
of women or minorities in politics, the role of women in the
political process nonetheless remains circumscribed by
traditional attitudes.  In 1994 there were six female M.P.'s,
no female cabinet ministers, and one female assistant
minister.  Within the political opposition, women figure most
significantly in the Democratic Party, where 25 percent of the
party's national office holders are women.

Section 4  Governmental Attitude Regarding International and
           Nongovernmental Investigation of Alleged Violations
           of Human Rights

Kenya has several well-organized and vocal human rights
organizations.  Two groups, the Kenya Human Rights Commission
(KHRC) and Release Political Prisoners (RPP), are particularly
active and publish regular reports that are often critical of
the Government's human rights record.  The Institute for
Education in Democracy continues to monitor parliamentary
by-elections with generally good cooperation from the Electoral
Commission.  Legal organizations, such as the Public Law
Institute, the Kenya Law Society, the International Commission
of Jurists, and the International Federation of Women Lawyers,
also cover human rights issues, and a large pool of Kenyan
attorneys handle pro bono cases for defendants and serve as an
informal source of human rights information.

President Moi continued to criticize the activities of both
domestic and international human rights NGO's, and the
Government targeted several of them for harassment in 1994.
After the KHRC sent a letter to President Clinton urging
revocation of Kenya's trade privileges because of the
Government's refusal to register the University Professors'
Union, President Moi branded the letter as "treasonous."
Authorities also intercepted KHRC mail (see Section 1.f.) and
detained persons participating in KHRC demonstrations.  In
September Nakuru police arrested 12 RPP members attending the
trial of Koigi Wa Wamwere and held them incommunicado for
several days.  When another RPP member visited police
headquarters to inquire about his colleagues, he too was put in
incommunicado detention.  The entire group was eventually
released without charge.

In contrast, human rights organizations have been successful in
efforts to cooperate with government officials on issues like
domestic violence.  In September a government-sponsored human
rights monitoring group hosted a representative from the
Kennedy Center for Human Rights, and the Kenyan Embassy in the
United States issued visas to representatives of several
U.S.-based human rights organizations interested in traveling
to Kenya.

Section 5  Discrimination Based on Race, Sex, Religion,
           Disability, Language, or Social Status

The Constitution prohibits discrimination on the basis of a
person's "race, tribe, place of origin or residence or other
local connection, political opinions, color, creed."

     Women

The Constitution does not specifically address discrimination
based on gender, and women continue to face both legal and de
facto discrimination on several fronts.  For example, women
cannot legally work at night, which disadvantages female
employees in hotels, homes, and industries in the export
processing zones.  According to Kenyan pension law, a widow
loses her work pension upon remarriage, whereas a man does
not.  When men and women perform comparable jobs, men often
receive a higher job classification and therefore better pay.
Not only do women have difficulty moving into nontraditional,
professional fields, but they also are promoted more slowly
than men and bear the brunt of retrenchments.

Kenya's Law of Succession, which governs inheritance rights,
provides for equal consideration of male and female children.
In practice, most inheritance issues do not come before the
courts.  Women are often excluded from extralegal inheritance
settlements or are given smaller shares than male claimants.
In a widely publicized trial that focused national attention on
female inheritance rights, the mother of a recently deceased
Olympic boxing hero lost her bid to inherit her son's
professional earnings.

Societal discrimination is most apparent in rural areas, where
women account for 75 percent of the agricultural work force.
Rural families are more reluctant to invest in educating girls
than in educating boys, especially at the higher levels.  The
number of boys and girls in school are roughly equal at the
primary and secondary levels, but men outnumber women almost
two to one in higher education, and literate men significantly
outnumber literate women.

Violence against women is a serious and widespread problem.
Police statistics released in 1994 showed that in 1992 there
were 454 cases of rape, 136 cases of attempted rape, 343 cases
of indecent assault, 407 cases of defilement (e.g., child
molestation), and 14 cases of incest.  These statistics are
probably underreported, however, since social mores deter women
from going outside their clan or ethnic groups to report sexual
abuse.  The Government has condemned violence against women,
and the law carries penalties up to life imprisonment for
rape.  Still, the rate of prosecution remains low because of
cultural inhibitions against discussing sex, the fear of
retribution, the disinclination of police to intervene in
domestic disputes, and the unavailability of doctors who might
otherwise provide the necessary evidence for conviction.
Furthermore, traditional culture permits a man to discipline
his wife by physical means and is ambivalent about the
seriousness of rape.  Organizations concerned with women's
rights charge that the Government is often apathetic and
flippant about women's issues.  The Attorney General remarked
in April that a woman could not claim rape against her husband
under current laws.

     Children

Economic displacement, a high population growth rate, and the
ethnic clashes have resulted in a large number of homeless
street children.  Media reports place the number of such
children nationwide in the tens of thousands, and the
Government estimates that their number is growing at an annual
rate of 10 percent.  According to the Attorney General's Task
Force, these children are typically involved in theft, drug
running, assault, trespassing, defilement, and property damage,
and there have been credible reports that the police have
treated these children inhumanely (see Section 1.a.).

The May report of the Task Force on Children recommended both
programmatic and legal measures to safeguard the rights of
children.  A variety of proposed legal remedies are
incorporated in a new law prospectively called the Children's
Act.  However, the Attorney General had not presented the draft
bill in Parliament by year's end.

Despite the Government's stated opposition, female genital
mutilation (FGM) remains widespread, particularly among Kenya's
nomadic peoples.  It is usually performed at an early age and
has been condemned by international health experts as damaging
to both physical and mental health.  Neither the Government nor
women's groups have reliable information about the extent of
the practice, but according to rough estimates the percentage
of females who have undergone this procedure may be as high as
50 percent.  The Task Force on Children has recommended
outlawing this practice, as it endangers the "the survival,
safety, and development" of the child.

     National/Racial/Ethnic Minorities

According to the 1989 government census, whose figures were
released in May, the Kikuyu are the largest ethnic community,
comprising 20.8 percent of the population.  The Luhya, Luo,
Kamba, and Kalenjin (an amalgamation of 9 small tribes) are the
next largest, each making up over 11 percent of the population.

The Government continued to discriminate against Rift Valley
Kikuyus.  According to the Kenya Human Rights Commission,
provincial authorities have denied national identification
cards to a substantial number of Kikuyu youths, even though
they and most of their parents have been born and raised in the
Rift Valley.  Without identification cards these youths cannot
marry, attend universities, obtain employment, or register to
vote.  In addition, the Minister for Local Government, William
Ole Ntimama, reiterated this year that Kikuyus displaced from
Enosupukia by the ethnic clashes would not be allowed to
return.  In various newspaper interviews, Ntimama characterized
the land titles held by displaced Kikuyus as illegally acquired
documents.

Asians, or Kenyans of sub-continent descent, have also been
targets of official and societal prejudice.  The secretary
general of the FORD-A opposition party, Martin Shikuku,
announced at a public rally in August that he would kick Asians
out of the country if he were chosen president.  Anti-Asian
leaflets, supposedly authored by a group called the Mau Mau
Posterity (see Section 2.b.), also circulated in Kenya's urban
centers.  The leaflets reflect a general sense of resentment
among Kenyan Africans toward the Asian community, which is more
affluent and reluctant to assimilate African culture.  An
Indian police reservist's alleged involvement in the shooting
death of an African street child in August inflamed these
preexisting racial tensions.

The Government singled out ethnic Somalis as the only ethnic
group in Kenya required to carry an additional form of
identification proving that they are Kenyan citizens.  Ethnic
Somalis, who are overwhelmingly Muslim, must still produce upon
demand their Kenyan identification card and a second
identification card verifying "screening."  Both cards are also
required in order to apply for a passport.  In August the
police made sweeps through two known Somali communities in
Nairobi, ostensibly in search of illegal aliens.  They arrested
many Somali Kenyans during these sweeps.  The presence of large
numbers of Somali refugees in Kenya has exacerbated the
problems faced by Kenyan Somalis.

     People with Disabilities

Government policies do not discriminate against people with
disabilities in employment, education, or other state
services.  There is no mandated provision of accessibility for
the disabled to public buildings or transportation.