Word: uhuru
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...Kenya's wabenzi just got downgraded. Thanks to a government cost-cutting program aimed at saving taxpayers some $27 million, Finance Minister Uhuru Kenyatta announced this summer that government ministers, along with assistant ministers and permanent secretaries, must turn in their ubiquitous Mercedes-Benz for Volkswagen Passats, which not only cost about two-thirds the price of a new Benz in Kenya, but are, says the government, cheaper to run and maintain. (See the 50 worst cars of all time...
Lawmakers and ministers from the two main parties in the coalition government are cited in the report for allegedly organizing meetings to gather gang militias who then evicted rival communities. Among those named are Kenya's Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Uhuru Kenyatta, a member of the Party of National Unity, and William Ruto, Agriculture Minister and an influential lawmaker from the Orange Democratic Movement. Kenyatta has not commented on the specific allegations. Ruto accused Western powers such as the U.S and the E.U. of interfering in Kenya, and said the nation had been subjected to constant intimidation. "Kenyans...
...among their allies. While Kibaki's team retained most of the powerful posts, including finance and foreign affairs, Odinga's allies in the Orange Democratic Movement got several choice spots as well. Musalia Mudavadi, Odinga's No. 2, was named deputy prime minister, as was a prominent Kibaki ally, Uhuru Kenyatta, son of independent Kenya's first President, Jomo Kenyatta...
When he announced the three days of protests, Odinga called on supporters to meet him for a mass rally in Nairobi's Uhuru - or Freedom - Park. On Wednesday, Odinga's chief advisers, known as "The Pentagon," got as far as a few of Nairobi's finer hotels before police with truncheons and shields barred their way to the park. Eventually, they gave up and went home. The main police targets just across from the park were journalists, who were repeatedly tear-gassed and charged by police on horseback...
...toll had risen from just more than 300 to 346, according to media reports. But fears of far more bloodshed were averted when, faced by hundreds of riot police, the O.D.M. called off plans for tens of thousands of its activists to march to Uhuru Park in the center of Nairobi to "inaugurate" their leader, Raila Odinga, as the "people's president." Party workers said the protest was merely being postponed, either until Friday or Tuesday...