Ciaran’s Peculier [sic] Blog

Why oh why is it that some countries in Africa, such as the bigger, apparently more developed, cannot organise an election without the whole thing going pear-shaped and attracting the world’s media attention to the resulting mess? There are other countries, much poorer, that apparently can manage the thing pretty well. Places like Mali, Mauritania and Burkina Faso to name three. When polls are held there and they pass off peacefully no-one hears about it. Sadly that’s the way it is. Murder, mayhem, riots, disaster etc. sell newspapers and attract viewers.

While we’re on the subject of Kenya I must comment upon the indecent haste with which incumben Mwai Kibaki was inaugurated. The count was going against him and the electoral commission then calls a halt. When it resumes a short time later hey presto Kibaki’s back in the lead. It announces the “final” result and within only a few hours Kibaki is re-inaugurated. As Paul Daniels might say “Now that’s magic.” In other countries there is usually a bit of time between the results being declared and the formal “crowning.” In the United States, a country not necessarily any better at counting votes than Kenya but with much more experience there is a period of at least two months before the inauguration – plenty of time for judicial reviews and court cases challenging the result. Even in dear old sod-land – Ireland – where the president has nearly as little power as the British Monarch  a space of a m0nth is considered normal between the announcement of the results and the inauguration.

Given that there were going to be some doubts about the outcome in Kenya, to put it mildly, it might appear to some observers that President Kibaki is trying to pull a fast one.

Meanwhile the world is allowed to see a view of Africa with which it is all too familiar – Africans killing Africans. This allows so many to shake their heads as they turn their back on a continent, believing that Africans have only themselves to blame for their endemic poverty. Certain accessible terms like “tribal” are used to describe the mayhem and carnage, yet in reality much of the fighting is inspired by western-educated politicians greedy for western-style prosperity at the expense of their people.

The events in Kenya draw attention elsewhere from developments elsewhere in the Continent; apparently mindless violence in Nigeria’s Delta region; the “usual” attacks and counter-attacks in Somalia, while in South Africa not even the great and the good are free from violence, as discovered by the outgoing Tanzanian ambassador who was beaten up and robbed at his farewell party in Pretoria, while in Cameroons one of Africa’s most eggregious thieves, President Paul Biya is planning to amend the constitution (which he wrote in the first place), to allow him to run for a third presidential term. Cameroons is one of the poorest of Africa’s nations; Biya one of its richest citizens.

But not all is fire and brimstone. In Senegal the leader or caliph of the influential Mouride sect of Islam died over the weekend. The caliph is highly respected. He is also a fairly wealthy person, but neither his life nor death caused any controversy, except a deep sense of sadness at his loss felt by most Senegalese.