Tuesday, January 15th

Well, we had written a summary of today’s events, but it seems that the day is not over for the controversy.

This evening the Kenyan Parliament met for the first time after the elections. It was an interesting event. Their task was to elect a speaker. The opposition won, but only narrowly; however, that was not the real story. Why so many were concerned was that yesterday on an exclusive interview with CNN, opposition leader Raila Odinga stated that he fully intended for his party to sit on the official government side (traditionally reserved for the president’s party) rather than the opposition side. The local scuttlebutt was that it could get crazy in Parliament today. In fact, some of the roads around the city center were blocked off in anticipation. Praise God, it was not to be. Odinga and his party peacefully took a place in the official opposition’s seats and let the politics begin. Pray that this is foreshadowing of things to come. They also elected a deputy speaker. The other purpose of the gathering was to have the official swearing in of the members of Parliament. They have been meeting for about 7 or 8 hours now. It is 10:25 pm here. The debate is currently still in progress about whether the members of Parliament will pledge allegiance to the President. We do not know what the outcome will be; stay tuned, and we will add it tomorrow.

On a more negative note, however, former U.N. secretary general Kofi Annan has postponed his trip to Kenya for medical reasons. He is supposed to be coming to help mediate talks between the opposition and government here, but he has been told his efforts are not necessary by at least one government minister. Please pray that the talks will continue soon.

Tomorrow the opposition is supposed to be holding mass rallies all over the country. The opposition has stated their intention to be peaceful; however, it is a real concern whether that will be the case or not. Our employee, Samson, just returned from his home in western Kenya. He was stuck there, as there were no buses running until yesterday. While he is very supportive of the opposition, he too is worried about whether the rallies will be peaceful. He told me, “These people…they have no brains. They use the demonstrations as an excuse to loot and rob.” As I’ve thought all along, the violence has not been organized (or at least not well organized). Thugs have simply used the elections as a catalyst to carry out vendettas, burn, loot and rob.

On the home front, we are taking all precautions for tomorrow. School has been cancelled; however, the kids are loaded up with work that should keep them busy pretty solidly for the next three days. The school can count these as “home school” days, so as not to be penalized at the end of the year, having to add extra days to the calendar. We all plan on staying home for the time being, but it is our prayer that the rallies will be non-events and that life will get back to normal soon. We are all certainly ready.

Please pray for peace in our adopted country Kenya; pray for reconciliation in truth amongst all Kenyans, and finally…pray that we all keep our sanity if we have to stay in the house for three days.

Blessings,
Horace