Maybe then he gets slapped, too

The below is an open letter from Luca (Campi Ya Kanzi & Maasai Wilderness Conservation Trust):

Dear friends,
we normally send our newsletter just before Christmas.
We were too busy to do it and we were keen to do it in these days, and we certainly will.

Meanwhile it is quite important for us to address what is really happening in Kenya.

Many of you have contacted us with concerns: you have no reasons to worry.

Here is our side of the story and how we perceive events.

As always the media need to portray events in an apocalyptic manner.
There is no civil war in Kenya and there is not a tribal confrontation.

How did it all started?
The two main candidates, Raila Odinga and Mwai Kibaki, in the polls were at 2% distance from each other.
We all knew it was going to be a very close election.
The Electoral Commission of Kenya was releasing the results very slowly, as they wanted to make sure there were no mistakes in the counting.
For the first 36 hours Raila Odinga, the challenger to the President Kibaki, was quite ahead.
His supporters were already in the streets celebrating.
When all results from Central Province, highly populated and massively supporting Kibaki, were accounted for, Kibaki went ahead and was declared the winner.
The loosers felt victory was stolen from them.
Final counting and the declaration of the winner could have been handled much better by the Electoral Commission.
Were the elections rigged?
Yes, but not just from Kibaki side, also from Odinga side.
In certain constituencies votes counted were higher than voters, for both candidates.

What the media is not telling you is that Raila Odinga (a Jaluo by tribe) and Mwai Kibaki (a Kikuyu by tribe) five years ago were peacefully celebrating together their victory over Uhuru Kenyatta (a Kikuyu and the son of the first President of Kenya). Odinga and Kibaki were in the same Government for more than 2 years, only 2 years ago Odinga decided to create his own political alliance, with key members of the Government.
This is to explain you that there is no tribal issue in Kenya, but simply an issue about who wants to be power.

Safaricom is a very successful cell phone operator, about to be sold from the Government to the private sector. Value of the stocks is 1.5 billion $ (yes, you have read it properly). Just one of the reasons why being in power today is attractive.

Where we live votes split in half, for Kibaki and Odinga. The Maasai, as the rest of the Kenyans, were split 50/50, yet there is no confrontation among them and there is a total absence of animosity.

As in all electoral campaigns both candidates have been making huge promises.
Kibaki had on his side a 7% economic growth in 2007 and promised better growth, Odinga has been blinding jobless people with silly promises.

The ones who are reacting on the streets are precisely those desperate jobless people Odinga was appealing to.
They have nothing to loose and they are more interested in looting than in anything else.
They are looting small businesses, normally run by Kikuyu. Stating that this is a tribal confrontation is wrong.

Irresponsible journalists trying to sell their pieces by comparing the current Kenya situation to Rwanda are -in our minds - guilty of "journalistic terrorism". The consequences of their sensationalistic reporting can be devastating.

Yes, few jobless desperates are instigating violence, while 99% of the population is fed up with the clashes and this nonsense.
Kenyan TV stations are broadcasting interviews to hundreds of Kenyans, from different tribes, with different social status: all speak with one voice, this violence has nothing to do with us and it must be finished now.
CNN and Sky News are not interested in showing them to you. Much better showing the looting and the violence.

Kenya has a record of four decades peaceful independence that one tight election will not destroy. All Kenyans are very responsible and are all waiting for their leaders to show the necessary sense of responsibility.
14 millions Kenyans went to vote in an extremely peaceful and democratic way. 13 million 990 thousand of them are very concerns and are only interested in having their Country peacefully lead.

Odinga has lost the Presidency, but he has Parliament majority. We all expect him and Kibaki, the reconfirmed President, to find an agreement, as the Government will need a majority in the Parliament in order to govern.
We believe the agreement will be found and relatively soon.

This Country deserves better leaders, but so does many other Countries (including Italy and the USA, if you let me say so!).

Tourists are totally not effected by the confrontations which have happened in urban areas.
Our logistics have -so far - not been effected.

Of course the main concern is the impact on tourism, thanks to the bloody journalists exaggerating everything.
An example to let you understand better.
Naples is one of the most attractive Italian city, for its people, its art, its Mediterranean hospitality.
Yes there are people shooting each other on a daily base, the organized crime has a tight grip on all the city. Yet you are not told to not travel to Naples and you are not shown the violence that happens there.
Why? As it is not longer news worthy.

Much better to portray Kenya as a place where a Rwanda type genocide is about to take place.
This has nothing to do with the truth.

Are we worried for the current situation?
Of course we are, but not the for our own safety or the safety of travellers to Kenya, which are not at stake.
We are very concerned that the current unrest and the way it is portrayed will have terrible consequences for the people we employ, for the wildlife and wilderness we are commit to preserve.

At the moment there is, in our opinion, no reason to reconsider any travelling to Kenya in the months to come.
We feel that common sense will soon prevail and this nonsense will soon be forgotten in just few weeks.
We will keep you informed.

Kind regards to all,
Luca, on behalf of everybody at Campi ya Kanzi and at Maasai Wilderness Conservation Trust

Carsten:

Thanks so much for posting this. It is important for all of us to know the other side of the story.

It is also important to understand that many of the governmental people in other countries who place the travel advisories are doing it based on "news" only - and probably many of them have never been to the country they are placing the advisory on. i.e. the US advisories on Kenya over the past six years. Having traveled there twice a year since 2001, I could never understand why the advisories were there. Yes, terrorism could happen, but it could happen anywhere.

Thus I will take the advice of someone on the ground in Kenya who really knows what is going on (even though to some degree they may be protecting their business interests) than an advisory. Businesses such as safari companies and people like Luca aren't going to risk their business by putting their guests at risk. If they feel it not safe, they will make arrangements to move you to a safe area. They can't risk their business for the future by having tourists injured or killed.

Off topic, but frustrating to me - I used to regularly donate blood. Now because I go to Kenya twice a year the Red Cross and blood banks won't take my blood. Why, because they are afraid of malaria in the blood! I have always gone to Kenya in the dry season and have never once been bitten by a mosquito, so the risk of my having developed malaria is almost nil. Yet I still can't donate until I have been back in country for six months, and by then I've left on another trip. I think people in other countries assume everyone gets bitten in Africa and everyone gets malaria. They just don't understand. It seems such a waste of something that could be life-saving to others.

Original von Jan
Off topic, but frustrating to me - I used to regularly donate blood. Now because I go to Kenya twice a year the Red Cross and blood banks won't take my blood. Why, because they are afraid of malaria in the blood! I have always gone to Kenya in the dry season and have never once been bitten by a mosquito, so the risk of my having developed malaria is almost nil. Yet I still can't donate until I have been back in country for six months, and by then I've left on another trip. I think people in other countries assume everyone gets bitten in Africa and everyone gets malaria. They just don't understand. It seems such a waste of something that could be life-saving to others.

I have had Malaria in the past and ever since they don't accept my blood at all anymore.

Then again - I tend to faint when giving blood so I welcome the excuse

The early evening commercial news has just reported on the riots. During the report the voice over mentioned "Tribal War" seven times!
The reporter in Kenya never used the term once!

On a lighter note:-

I have fond memories of giving blood in the tropics,
off buxom Australian nurses,
top buttons of their uniforms undone,
leaning over,
just to fill the bottle quicker....Ready for the next macho sailor!

Original von kipper I have fond memories of giving blood in the tropics,
off buxom Australian nurses,
top buttons of their uniforms undone,
leaning over,
just to fill the bottle quicker....Ready for the next macho sailor!

I wouldn't fill any bottle like that. All the blood would be elsewhere