GRAIN DE SABLE

Analyse de Gérard Prunier, professeur à l'Université de Paris et Directeur du Centre français des études Ethiopiennes d'Addis Ababa.

Jean-Luc Wasse est le secrétaire de section de Nairobi du PS (fédération des français de l'étranger). 

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To many people in the world - and even to many Kenyans themselves itself - the violence which followed the elections in Kenya on 27 December 2007 has come as a surprise. Unfortunately, it shouldn't have. The combination of economic and ethno-political factors in Kenya had created an explosive mix which was just waiting for the right - or rather "wrong" - circumstances to explode. The 2002 elections had been a lucky near-miss; this time, the favourable configuration that operated then did not repeat itself.

Kenya's "democratic" politics

To understand the Kenyan crisis in the context of its national, regional and global situation, it is necessary to examine the regime which followed independence in 1963. Britain's withdrawal from the country had taken place amidst a considerable fear that the Mau Mau anti-colonial insurrection of 1952-1960 might impinge upon the politics of the new state and lead to further violence. Nothing of the sort happened - partly because of the elevation to the presidency of the leader of the nationalist movement Jomo Kenyatta, who once in power swerved from radical nationalism to conservative bourgeois politics.

la suite http://www.opendemocracy.net/article/democracy_power/keny...