Tag Archives: Kenya

Kenyan government suspends action against rights groups

Kenyan government suspends action against rights groups

By Katharine Houreld and Humphrey Malalo

NAIROBI (Reuters) – The Kenyan government ordered the suspension of moves to shut down two rights groups that have raised concerns over last week’s election, hours after authorities raided one of the group’s offices.

Police and tax authorities on Wednesday raided the Africa Centre for Open Governance (AfriCOG), one of the organizations that has regularly highlighted problems with preparations for the Aug. 8 vote.

President Uhuru Kenyatta won the election by a margin of 1.4 million votes, according to official figures. Observers say the process was largely free and fair but opposition leader Raila Odinga has disputed the results as rigged.

In Wednesday’s letter seen by Reuters, acting Interior Minister Fred Matiang’i instructed Fazul Mohamed, head of the non-government organization coordination board, to suspend action against the organizations for up to 90 days while talks with the government are held.

Government threats to shut the AfriCOG and the Kenya Human Rights Commission drew condemnation from the United Nations, European Union and groups such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch who feared a crackdown on dissent.

The 90-day period would allow all sides to address “any outstanding non-compliance issues that may have led to the deregistration of the two organizations”, the letter said.

The NGO Board – a government-run body that registers and regulates NGOs – had said the two bodies risked being shut down for administrative and tax reasons.

Members of the targeted organizations said the crackdown was an attack on independent voices at a tense time in Kenya.

After a week where businesses were largely closed and many stayed away from work, life is back to normal across much of Kenya though people are eager to hear what Odinga’s next move will be. A call for a strike on Monday was largely ignored.

Odinga has said he will not challenge the result in court but is due to lay out his strategy later on Wednesday. Many fear any call for protest will add to the 24 already killed since voting day.

Some civil society leaders have said they may challenge the election in court.

The EU observer mission, which has broadly praised the vote so far, on Wednesday urged the election commission to publish all remaining forms showing vote tallies on its website to ensure the transparency and accuracy of the process.

“The timing of such information being made public is critical given that petitions relating to the presidential race must be filed within seven days of the results announcement,” the mission said in a statement.

Any challenge must be filed by the evening of Aug. 18.

Andrew Limo, an election commission spokesman, said about 2,900 of the 41,000 forms showing results at individual polling stations were not yet online.

“We call on the Kenyan authorities to give civil society the space and security to work towards greater democracy for Kenyans,” the EU mission added in its statement.

Earlier, Kenyan television showed pictures of the AfriCOG raid, during which civil society leaders challenged the search warrant. Human rights lawyer Maina Kiai asked why tax authorities had to bring three van loads of police.

“They say they have got a search warrant … (but) the search warrant does not name AfriCOG. The order does not specify what they are coming to do,” he said on television.

(For a graphic on Kenya’s presidential election, click http://tmsnrt.rs/2fbG3Yg)

(Additional reporting by George Obulutsa and Duncan Miriri; Writing by David Lewis; Editing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg)

Baby girl ‘teargassed, beaten by Kenyan police’ dies: doctor

Lenzer, mother of six month-old Samantha Pendo, stands next to her bed as the girl remains in critical condition in the Intensive Care Unit of Aga Khan Hospital in Kisumu, Kenya August 14, 2017. REUTERS/Baz Ratner

By Maggie Fick

KISUMU, Kenya (Reuters) – A six-month-old girl has died in Kenya, her doctor told Reuters on Tuesday, after her parents said she was teargassed and clubbed by police in a security crackdown after last week’s disputed election.

Samantha Pendo was asleep in her mother’s arms when police forced their way into their home and beat her and her parents as they searched for protesters, her parents said.

“She remained in coma throughout. She never improved one bit,” said Dr. Sam Oula at the Aga Khan Hospital in the western city of Kisumu.

The baby and her parents were beaten when police were sweeping their neighborhood for opposition protesters on Saturday, residents told Reuters journalists who investigated the incident.

Kisumu is a stronghold of opposition leader Raila Odinga, who is contesting results from last Tuesday’s presidential election. An official tally said President Uhuru Kenyatta won re-election by 1.4 million votes.

Odinga’s accusations of rigging have led to protests in Kisumu and in Nairobi slums. Residents there say police have responded with lethal force and many residents were killed in their homes.

Among the dead are an 8-year-old girl, hit by a stray bullet as she played on her balcony, and an 18-year-old student whose mother said was pulled from under the bed and beaten so badly he died the next day.

Police have promised to investigate all incidents but human rights groups say they rarely hold officers to account for extrajudicial killings.

(Writing by Katharine Houreld; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

Kenyan government attempts to close down two rights groups

Ballot boxes are stacked at a tallying centre in Mombasa, Kenya, August 9, 2017. REUTERS/Siegfried Modola

By Katharine Houreld and Duncan Miriri

NAIROBI (Reuters) – The Kenyan government is trying to shut down a rights group and a pro-democracy organization who raised queries over last week’s disputed presidential election, officials said on Tuesday, provoking international condemnation of the attempted closures.

Official letters from the NGO Board – the government-run body that registers and regulates NGOs – to the Kenya Human Rights Commission (KHRC) and Africa Centre for Open Governance (AfriCOG) said the two organizations risked punishment for administrative and tax reasons.

International and domestic observers have said the election process was largely free and fair, but opposition leader Raila Odinga has disputed the official results, which show incumbent President Uhuru Kenyatta won by a margin of 1.4 million votes.

The NGO Board did not return calls or emails seeking comment on the letters and Reuters reporters were not permitted to enter its offices.

Mwenda Njoka, a spokesman for the interior minister, said the letters, circulating on social media, were genuine. AfriCOG and KNRC said they had not received any official communication.

“This is an attack on any kind of independent voice,” said Gladwell Otieno, the executive director of AfriCOG.

Otieno repeatedly raised concerns about what she described as insufficient preparations by the election board in the run-up to last Tuesday’s elections, when Kenyans chose a new president, lawmakers and local representatives.

Both organizations also expressed public concern over the unsolved torture and murder of a key election official a week before the vote.

International rights groups Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International and the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein urged the government to respect the work of NGOs.

“The High Commissioner called for civil society actors and media to be allowed to work without hindrance or fear of retaliation,” the U.N. said in a statement from Geneva.

POLITICAL TARGETS

Odinga has not yet provided any evidence of rigging. His rejection of results triggered demonstrations and a deadly crackdown by police in his strongholds, including Nairobi slums and the western city of Kisumu.

He was due to give a much-anticipated speech to the nation on Tuesday but postponed it until Wednesday, a spokeswoman for his opposition coalition said.

George Kegoro, the head of KHRC, said his organization was compliant with all laws and was being targeted for political reasons. He denied they had failed to pay taxes, operated “illegal” bank accounts or employed foreigners without work permits.

“If you operate in the kind of environment we do, we have to be compliant. The rules are a drag but we observe them,” he said.

His organization had already successfully defended itself in High Court against the same accusations, he said, making the new letter threatening de-registration “a travesty of justice”.

“We think its got to do with the politics of the season. We’ve played a leadership role in organizing civil society participation in this election. They (the government) don’t like that.”

Otieno said her organization did not fall under rules governing non-governmental organizations and was properly registered.

Njoka denied the organizations were being politically targeted and said: “There were some issues with their auditing and accounting … If they give good accounts they may not be de-registered.”

(Additional reporting by George Obulutsa; writing by Katharine Houreld, editing by Pritha Sarkar)

Eleven dead in Kenya as post-election riots flare

Anti riot policemen clash with protesters supporting opposition leader Raila Odinga in Mathare, in Nairobi, Kenya August 12, 2017. REUTERS/Thomas Mukoya

By Katharine Houreld and Maggie Fick

NAIROBI/KISUMU, Kenya (Reuters) – Kenyan police killed at least 11 people in a crackdown on protests as anger at the re-election of President Uhuru Kenyatta erupted in the western city of Kisumu and slums ringing the capital, officials and witnesses said on Saturday.

The bodies of nine young men shot dead overnight in Nairobi’s Mathare slum had been brought to the city morgue, a security official told Reuters. The men were killed during police anti-looting operations, the official added.

Separately, a young girl in Mathare was killed by police firing “sporadic shots”, a witness said. The run-down neighborhood is loyal to 72-year-old opposition leader Raila Odinga, whose party rejected Tuesday’s vote as a “charade”.

A Reuters reporter in Kisumu, center of post-election ethnic violence a decade ago in which 1,200 people died nationwide, said tear gas and live rounds were fired. One man had been killed, a government official said.

The unrest erupted moments after Kenya’s election commission announced late on Friday that Kenyatta, 55, had secured a second five-year term in office, despite opposition allegations that the tally was a fraud.

Interior Minister Fred Matiang’i said the trouble was localized and blamed it on “criminal elements” rather than legitimate political protest.

Odinga’s NASA coalition provided no evidence for its rejection of the result. Kenya’s main monitoring group, ELOG, said on Saturday its tally matched the official outcome, undermining NASA’s allegations of fraud.

In addition to the deaths, Kisumu’s main hospital was treating four people for gunshot wounds and six who had been beaten by Kenyan police, its records showed.

One man, 28-year-old Moses Oduor, was inside his home in the impoverished district of Obunga when police conducting house-to-house raids dragged him out of his bedroom and beat him with clubs.

“He was not out fighting them. He was rescued by my sister who lives next to him. She came outside screaming at the police, asking why they are beating people,” his brother, Charles Ochieng said, speaking on behalf of a dazed Oduor.

More shooting was heard outside the hospital on Saturday morning. In Nairobi, armed police units backed by water cannon moved through the rubble-strewn streets of Kibera, another pro-Odinga slum.

“CRIMINAL ELEMENTS”

Interior minister Matiang’i defended the police against accusations of brutality.

“Let us be honest – there are no demonstrations happening,” he told reporters.

“Individuals or gangs that are looting shops, that want to endanger lives, that are breaking into people’s businesses – those are not demonstrators. They are criminals. And we expect police to deal with criminals how criminals should be dealt with.”

As with previous votes in 2007 and 2013, this year’s elections have exposed the underlying ethnic tensions in the nation of 45 million, the economic engine of East Africa and the region’s main trading hub.

In particular, Odinga’s Luo tribe, who hail from the west, had hoped an Odinga presidency would have broken the Kikuyu and Kalenjin dominance of central government since independence in 1963. Kenyatta, son of Kenya’s first president, is a Kikuyu.

Even before the declaration, Odinga’s NASA coalition had rejected the outcome, saying the election commission’s systems had been hacked, the count was irregular and foreign observers who gave the poll a clean bill of health were biased.

NASA provided no evidence for any of its accusations but singled out former U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and former South African president Thabo Mbeki – who both led teams of election observers – for criticism.

Top Odinga lieutenant James Orengo said NASA would not challenge the results in court – as Odinga did when he lost in 2013 – but hinted at mass action by praising the history of Kenyans in standing up to previous “stolen” elections.

“Going to court is not an option. We have been there before,” Orengo told reporters.

In addition to the thumbs-up from foreign monitors, Kenya’s ELOG domestic observation group, which had 8,300 agents on the ground, published a parallel vote tally on Saturday that conformed with the official results.

ELOG’s projected outcome put Kenyatta on 54 percent with a 1.9 percent error margin – compared to an official tally of 54.3 percent.

“We did not find anything deliberately manipulated,” ELOG chairwoman Regina Opondo said.

(Additional reporting by Humphrey Mulalo and Linda Muriki; Writing by Ed Cropley; Editing by Adrian Croft)

Kenyan opposition supporters celebrate poll victory claim, rejected by officials

A supporter of Kenyan opposition leader Raila Odinga carries a banner and shouts slogans as others run along a street in Humura neighbourhood, in Nairobi, Kenya August 10, 2017. REUTERS/Thomas Mukoya

By Katharine Houreld and Maggie Fick

NAIROBI/KISUMU, Kenya (Reuters) – Celebrations broke out in pockets of Kenya on Thursday after the opposition said Raila Odinga should be declared winner of the presidential vote, a claim rejected as “ridiculous” by an election commission official.

An opposition official said information from “confidential sources” showed Odinga had secured victory, contradicting official preliminary results released so far which show President Uhuru Kenyatta had won 54.2 percent of votes, ahead of Odinga on 44.9 percent – a lead of 1.4 million votes with 99 percent of polling stations reported.

International observers on Thursday praised the handling of the election and the European Union mission said it had seen no sign of manipulation during voting.

As they wait for final results to be tallied and confirmed, many Kenyans are nervous of a repeat of the clashes that killed about 1,200 people after the bitterly contested 2007 election.

Musalia Mudavadi, a senior official in the opposition coalition, told reporters information from “confidential sources” at the election commission showed Odinga had secured victory by just under 300,000 votes. He provided no evidence but demanded Odinga be declared winner.

Minutes later, hundreds of Odinga supporters, mainly young men, poured onto the streets of the opposition stronghold of Kisumu in celebration. At least one truck of anti-riot police followed them, a Reuters witness said. Some older men tried to convince the youth not to join the crowds.

There were pockets of similar celebrations in opposition strongholds in Nairobi as well.

After complaining of fraud, Odinga told Reuters he believed most of more than 20,000 polling station result forms uploaded to the election commission’s website were fake.

Odinga said results were being filled out by agents working out of a Nairobi hotel but he did not provide any evidence. He previously said the election commission’s computer network had been hacked and that results were “fictitious”.

A senior official in the election commission rejected the opposition’s claims.

“They have done their own additions and they think Raila has 8 million (votes), which is ridiculous, there is nothing,” Abdi Yakub Guliye said. “As far as we are concerned, we don’t believe they have any credible data.”

Kenyatta, a 55-year-old businessman seeking a second five-year term, and Odinga, loser of Kenya’s last two elections amid similar claims of fraud, are the heads of Kenya’s two political dynasties.

Earlier in the week, Odinga urged his supporters to remain calm but warned: “I don’t control the people.”

NO “MANIPULATION”

In its first assessment of Tuesday’s poll, the European Union’s election observer mission said it had seen no signs of “centralised or localised manipulation” of the voting process.

Marietje Schaake, head of the mission, said the EU would provide an analysis of the tallying process in a later report.

John Kerry, the former U.S. Secretary of State heading the Carter Center observer mission, said the election system, which is ultimately based on the original paper ballots cast, remained solid and all sides should wait for electronic tallies to be double-checked against hard copies.

“The process that was put in place is proving its value thus far,” Kerry said. “Kenya has made a remarkable statement to Africa and the world about its democracy and the character of that democracy. Don’t let anybody besmirch that.”

The election commission said it hoped to have all results centralised by midday on Friday and would announce a winner soon after that. It said there had been an attempt to hack into its system but said it had failed.

Thabo Mbeki, the former South African president in charge of the African Union observer mission, praised the poll so far.

“It would be very regrettable if anything emerges afterwards that sought to corrupt the outcome, to spoil that outcome,” he said.

PROTESTS

Reuters TV footage showed police firing live rounds as they clashed with youths throwing stones in Kawangware slum in Nairobi. One injured or dead person was rushed from the scene in a sack.

But most of the capital and the rest of the country were calm after four people were killed in violence on Wednesday.

Traffic flowed on Nairobi’s usually gridlocked streets but an increasing number of businesses opened.

Earlier in the day, some market stalls and shops had opened in Kisumu and more vehicles were on the street than a day earlier.

A group of men said they were eager for daily life to return and could not afford the consequences of violence in their city, which saw some of the worst clashes a decade ago.

“We don’t want to fight,” said driver Evans Omondi, 28, wearing a polo shirt and jeans. “We want to go back to work.”

In 2007, tallying was halted and the incumbent president declared the winner, triggering an outcry from Odinga’s camp and waves of ethnic violence that led to International Criminal Court charges against Kenyatta and his now-deputy William Ruto.

The cases against them collapsed as witnesses died or disappeared.

(Additional reporting by David Lewis, George Obulutsa, Rajiv Golla and Ed Cropley in Nairobi, Writing by David Lewis; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

Kenya opposition leader says election website hacked to show president in lead

Riot policemen deploy after demonstrators supporting opposition leader Raila Odinga, burned tyres after their political leader claimed "massive" fraud in this week's elections, in Kisumu, Kenya August 9, 2017. REUTERS/James Keyi

By Humphrey Malalo and Duncan Miriri

NAIROBI (Reuters) – Kenya’s opposition leader Raila Odinga said on Wednesday the election commission’s computer system was hacked and fake results posted to show President Uhuru Kenyatta with a strong lead in a case of massive fraud.

The election commission said Tuesday’s vote was free and fair and it was investigating whether or not its computer systems and vote-tallying database had been compromised.

Odinga’s comments raised concerns of unrest over the results in Kenya, East Africa’s leading economy and a regional hub. Around 1,200 people died in violence after a disputed election in 2007.

Speaking at a news conference, Odinga urged his supporters to remain calm, but added: “I don’t control the people”. His deputy Kalonzo Musyoka also called for calm but said the opposition might call for “action” at a later date. He gave no details.

Shortly after Odinga spoke, police fired teargas to scatter a group of around 100 supporters in the western city of Kisumu, an opposition stronghold. The unarmed men had been chanting “No Raila, no peace”.

As of 1100 GMT, the election commission website put Kenyatta in front with 54.3 percent of votes counted to 45 percent for Odinga – a margin of nearly 1.4 million ballots with more than 95 percent of polling stations reported.

Odinga published his own party’s assessment of the count on Twitter, saying he had 8.1 million votes against 7.2 million for Kenyatta.

The main local election monitoring group said its parallel vote tally was incomplete so it could not comment on the differing figures. Foreign observer missions declined to comment.

Kenyatta, a 55-year-old businessman seeking a second five-year term, had held a steady lead of around 10 percent since the start of counting after the peaceful vote, the culmination of a hard-fought contest between the heads of Kenya’s two political dynasties.

Odinga, 72, a former political prisoner and self-described leftist, described the reported hack as an attack on Kenya’s democracy and published 50 pages of computer logs on his Facebook page to support his claims.

POLLING STATIONS

Despite its multimillion dollar electronic voting system, the crucial evidence on voting comes from the paper forms signed at each of the country’s 41,000 polling stations.

Results in each polling station are recorded on a form – known as 34A – that observers from each party must sign. These should then be scanned, sent to the election board and posted on a website.

The measure is designed to ensure the elections cannot be rigged and parties can cross-check results.

On Wednesday morning, the commission said it had received 28,000 forms so far and was working to make all forms public. Neither the commission nor Odinga supplied forms to back up their numbers.

The Kenya Human Rights Commission, a well-known non-governmental organization, said it had discovered some discrepancies between provisional results on the election commission website and the paper forms.

It cited five examples, including a polling station in western Nandi county where the electoral board’s website recorded 439 rejected votes but the paper form only showed four.

Odinga ran in Kenya’s last two elections and lost, blaming vote rigging following irregularities at both polls.

In 2007, tallying was stopped and the incumbent president declared the winner, triggering an outcry from Odinga’s camp. The ethnic and political violence that followed killed 1,200 people and displaced 600,000.

International Criminal Court cases against Kenyatta and his now-deputy, William Ruto, for helping direct that violence, collapsed as witnesses died or disappeared.

In 2013, Odinga took his concerns to court. This time, he invoked the unsolved torture and murder of a top election official days before the vote to justify his fears of rigging.

“We fear this was exactly the reason Chris Msando was assassinated, so this could happen,” he said.

Hackers may have used Msando’s identity to access the electronic tallying system, Odinga said. The election commission said its password access system was secure.

Kenya’s shilling firmed and bond prices rose on early results, but analysts said gains could be fragile.

“Kenyatta’s provisional win will soothe those investors who feared a leftist shift in economic policy,” said Hasnain Malik, global head of equities research at Exotix Capital.

“The most important issues are ahead of us: Does Odinga concede peacefully? His initial rhetoric suggests there is a risk he does not.”

Kenya’s B+ credit rating and stable outlook won’t be affected by its election as long as there is no repeat of the 2007 violence, the S&P Global agency said.

(Additional reporting by Maggie Fick in Kisumu and Katharine Houreld, George Obultusa, John Ndiso and Rajiv Golla in Nairobi and Marc Jones in London; Writing by Katharine Houreld and Ed Cropley; Editing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg)

Kenyans stockpile food, police get first aid kits ahead of vote

An election clerk organises polling material a day ahead of the presidential election in Mombasa, Kenya, August 7, 2017.

By Maggie Fick

KISUMU, Kenya (Reuters) – Nervous Kenyans stockpiled food and water on Monday and police prepared emergency first aid kits as families headed to their ethnic heartlands on the eve of an election many fear could descend into violence.

Opposition leader Raila Odinga, 72, who lost elections in 2007 and 2013, has already said President Uhuru Kenyatta, 55, can only win if his ruling Jubilee party rigs the vote, a stance that increases the chances of a disputed result and unrest.

Opinion polls before Tuesday’s presidential election put the pair neck-and-neck. Kenyans will also be voting for members of parliament and local representatives.

In 2007, Odinga’s call for street protests after problems with the vote count triggered a widespread campaign of ethnic violence in which 1,200 people were killed and 600,000 displaced.

The violence also hammered East Africa’s biggest economy as regional trade ground to a halt and tourists, the biggest source of foreign exchange, canceled holidays.

Much of the killing a decade ago was in Kisumu, a city of a million people, most of them from Odinga’s Luo tribe, on the shores of Lake Victoria.

On Sunday, its open-air markets and shops were packed with customers stocking up on last-minute essentials.

“We are fearful because before there was rigging and that led to violence,” said orange seller Christine Okoth.

Wilson Njenga, a central government official overseeing the western region, said police had received disaster equipment including first aid and gloves but insisted it was all part of normal contingency planning.

“We don’t want to be caught flat-footed,” he told reporters.

On the campaign trail last week, Odinga told Reuters that Kenyatta could not win without cheating, a message that has fired up supporters in his back yard, where some talk openly of violent confrontation.

“If he doesn’t win, we are going to the streets and we’ll demonstrate,” said 28-year-old Kisumu potato seller Ruth Achieng. “The ones that die, we’ll just bury them and life will go on.”

Deputy President William Ruto, who was charged along with Kenyatta by the International Criminal Court (ICC) for organizing the 2007 violence, tweeted a prayer for peaceful and transparent polls.

The ICC cases against both him and Kenyatta collapsed.

 

INTIMIDATION ACCUSATIONS

Going back to rural roots to vote is a long-standing Kenyan tradition, driven by a desire to catch up with friends and family as well as choose a suitable local political representative.

More recently, fear of unrest has become a factor.

In all, 150,000 security personnel including park rangers have been called up to maintain order across the country, including preventing demonstrations in hotspots immediately before or after the polls.

In Kisumu, where many people feel neglected by a central government led by a president from the Kikuyu ethnic group since 2002, County Commissioner Mohamed Maalim said street protests near election day had been banned.

Such edicts are likely to fuel opposition accusations of intimidation and dirty tricks by the security forces.

“I have never seen this level of intimidation by the state against the electorate,” 71-year-old Senator Peter Anyang’ Nyong’o, an Odinga ally running for Kisumu county governorship, told Reuters.

Acting interior minister Fred Matiang’i said Kenyans had no reason to be afraid and stressed that police officers were deployed to keep the peace, not take sides.

“We have no plan in place to be violent or mistreat our people. It does not exist in our code of conduct for the police,” he told reporters. “We’ve come a long way since 2007.”

Indeed, hate-speech has been notably absent from large public speeches in both campaigns – an important difference from 2007. However, two incidents in the last week have put the nation of nearly 50 million on edge.

A key election official was found tortured and murdered a week ago, and on Friday two foreign political advisers to Odinga were arrested and deported by plain-clothes police. Their laptops were also seized.

Some Kisumu residents said they were headed to villages outside the city to vote and hunker down in case of trouble. Members of Kenyatta’s Kikuyu ethnic group headed the other direction, away from Odinga’s strongholds.

One supermarket manager who asked not to be identified said suppliers of televisions and furniture had halted deliveries over the past week due to fears of looting.

“They fear to come to this side of the country,” the manager, a Kikuyu, said. He had already sent his family to a Kikuyu-majority city and would be joining them in the evening, he added.

 

(Editing by Katharine Houreld and Alison Williams)

 

Cholera kills four in Kenyan capital since May, government shuts hotels

Cholera patients receive treatment and care inside a special ward at the Kenyatta National Hospital in Nairobi, Kenya July 19, 2017. REUTERS/Thomas Mukoya

By George Obulutsa

NAIROBI (Reuters) – A cholera outbreak in the Kenyan capital has killed four people since May and the government has shut down a three-star hotel and a popular restaurant there to control its spread, the health minister said on Wednesday.

At least 79 people with confirmed cases of cholera were being treated in various Nairobi hospitals and authorities were setting up 10 more treatment centers to cope with the outbreak, Cleopa Mailu, the minister, told a news conference.

“We have so far closed two hotels … and we shall continue to do so if there is evidence there is risk to the public,” Mailu said, after visiting some of the patients.

The government had ordered the immediate testing of about half a million people in the food handling business in the next 21 days, he said.

Mailu said local authorities in Nairobi would be required to repair all broken sewer lines, ensure all water vendors and their water sources were certified, and ban hawking of food.

“Some of them (measures) will not be pleasant,” he said.

Containing cholera in Nairobi is critical, given it is a major hub, not just in Kenya, but in the region.

Mailu said the Kenya Red Cross and UNICEF were also helping to contain the cholera, a diarrhoeal disease transmitted by infected food and water. It can kill within hours unless treated with intravenous fluids and antibiotics.

Kenya has suffered several waves of cholera since 1971, according to the World Health Organization. An outbreak in March last year killed 216 people with 13,000 hospitalized across the country.

Two ministers, Henry Rotich and Adan Mohamed, sought treatment with cholera-like symptoms after eating food during a government event in the capital last week, local newspapers reported.

Rotich’s ministry of finance said he did not wish to comment. Mohamed, who is industrialization minister, was not available immediately.

(Editing by Duncan Miriri and Richard Balmforth)

Suspected Islamist militants behead nine men in Kenya

By Joseph Akwiri

MOMBASA (Reuters) – Suspected Islamist militants beheaded nine men in an overnight attack on a village in the Kenyan coastal district of Lamu, police said, days after Somali militants killed three policemen in an attack on a nearby village.

Police said there were nine bodies. A witness, who asked not to be named, confirmed the death toll.

“They raided Jima and Poromoko villages and killed nine men. They were slaughtered like chickens, using knives,” said the witness.

Villagers said a group of heavily armed attackers, many of whom appeared to be ethnic Somalis, attacked the villagers at 11:00 pm. They went house to house searching for non-Muslim men and gathered their victims together before beheading them.

Residents had called police to report suspected al Shabaab militants in the area earlier on Friday.

The attack is close to the village of Pandanguo, where al Shabaab attackers killed three police officers on Friday. Al Shabaab has frequently mounted deadly cross-border attacks on Kenyan soil.

The al Qaeda-linked militant group wants to overthrow the weak U.N.-backed government and impose a strict form of Islamic law in Somalia. They have intensified attacks in Kenya since Kenya sent troops into Somalia.

(Writing by Katharine Houreld; Editing by Janet Lawrence)

U.S. suspends aid to Kenyan health ministry over corruption concerns

FILE PHOTO: A riot policeman stands guard as doctors chant slogans after their case to demand fulfilment of a 2013 agreement between their union and the government that would raise their pay and improve working conditions, was heard at the employment and labour relations courts in Nairobi, Kenya, February 13, 2017. REUTERS/Thomas Mukoya/File Photo

By Katharine Houreld

NAIROBI (Reuters) – The U.S. government has suspended $21 million in direct aid to Kenya’s Ministry of Health amid concern over corruption, the embassy said on Tuesday, giving emphasis to an issue that is a growing liability for the government before August elections.

Support for HIV drugs and other health programs outside the ministry would continue, the embassy said, adding that the United States invests more than $650 million on health in Kenya annually.

“We took this step because of ongoing concern about reports of corruption and weak accounting procedures at the Ministry,” the statement from the embassy said. “We are working with the Ministry on ways to improve accounting and internal controls.”

The announcement adds weight to a rising number of scandals plaguing the government of President Uhuru Kenyatta, who is seeking a second and final five-year term in presidential, parliamentary and local elections on Aug. 8.

The so-called Afya House scandal, named after the building housing the Ministry of Health, was based on an audit report leaked to Kenyan media in October.

The audit showed the ministry could not account for 5 billion Kenyan shillings ($49 million) and funds meant for free maternity care had been diverted, newspapers reported.

Officials at Kenya’s anti-corruption commission did not return calls seeking comment on Tuesday, but the ministry of health issued a statement.

“The ministry has been raising matters raised in the internal audit investigations following the Quality Assurance audit by the National Treasury,” the statement said.

“Other autonomous institutions … are undertaking independent investigations.”

Last year, Kenya’s anti-graft chief told Reuters that a third of its state budget – the equivalent of about $6 billion – was lost to corruption every year.

The government disputed the figure, blaming poor paperwork. In October, Kenyatta infuriated voters by telling them he could not tackle corruption because his “hands were tied”. He criticized the judiciary and other agencies for not doing more about the problem.

Kenyan doctors and nurses say the corruption means that hospitals are often left without basic equipment, from drugs to gloves. Kenyan doctors in public hospitals went on strike from December to March, demanding a pay increase and improved working conditions.

(Editing by Larry King)