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Kenya Ballots to Bullets Organized Political Violence and Kenya's Crisis of Governance
HRW Index No.: A2001 March 17, 2008 Download PDF, 2400 KB, 81 pgs Purchase online Download E-Book Letting Them Fail Government Neglect and the Right to Education for Children Affected by AIDS This 55-page report is based on firsthand testimony from dozens of children in three countries hard-hit by HIV/AIDS: South Africa, Kenya, and Uganda. It documents how governments fail children affected by AIDS when they leave school or attempt to return. Churches and community-based organizations provide critical support to these children, but these groups frequently operate with little government support or recognition. HRW Index No.: A1713 October 11, 2005 Download PDF, 372 KB, 59 pgs Purchase online Double Standards: Women's Property Rights Violations in Kenya Women throughout Kenya lose their homes, land, and other property due to discriminatory laws and customs, Human Rights Watch said in a new report released today. Human Rights Watch said property rights abuses in sub-Saharan Africa perpetuate women's inequality, doom development efforts, and undermine the fight against HIV/AIDS. The 51-page report, Double Standards: Women's Property Rights Violations in Kenya, examines the devastating impact of women's property rights violations in Kenya, where the constitution condones discrimination in property matters. These violations and their impact are magnified by Kenya's high HIV/AIDS prevalence. HIV-positive women, already harmed by stigma and discrimination, are gravely threatened by property rights violations. Women's insecure property rights also hinder development by contributing to low agricultural production, food shortages, underemployment, and rural poverty. Human Rights Watch said that with a new government in office, movement toward a new constitution, and an upsurge in donor support, now is a pivotal time to improve women's property rights. HRW Index No.: A1505 March 4, 2003 Also available in 
Download PDF Purchase online Kenya's Unfinished Democracy: A Human Rights Agenda For The New Government The hotly-contested December 27 election has highlighted serious human rights shortcomings in Kenya, Human Rights Watch said today. As the election approaches and Kenya’s draft constitution awaits enactment, Human Rights Watch released a new report urging all candidates to adhere to a clear human rights agenda, which would address the iniquities and abuses that persist in the East African country. The 34-page report, “Kenya’s Unfinished Democracy: A Human Rights Agenda for the New Government,” reveals that while Kenya has gained many important freedoms since the early 1990s, and is considered a relatively free and open society– especially in comparison with many other African countries– a closed system of patronage and graft continues to undermine human rights in the country. HRW Index No.: A1410 December 12, 2002 Download PDF Purchase online Hidden in Plain View: Refugees Living Without Protection In Nairobi And Kampala "Hidden in Plain View," is based on 150 in-depth interviews with refugees from Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Rwanda, Somalia, Sudan and elsewhere. Refugees described being subjected to beatings, sexual violence, harassment, extortion, arbitrary arrests and detention. The perpetrators are criminals, persecutors trailing them from their countries of origin, and even the Kenyan police and Ugandan military. The refugees have no option but to sleep on the streets or in unsafe shelters, leaving them vulnerable to violence and illness, according to the Human Rights Watch report. Since international relief efforts are minimal, food is scarce and medical treatment is difficult to obtain. HRW Index No.: 2815 November 21, 2002 Download PDF Purchase online Playing with Fire: Weapons Proliferation, Political Violence, and Human Rights in Kenya, This 119-page report, entitled Playing with Fire: Weapons Proliferation, Political Violence, and Human Rights in Kenya, documents the dangerous nexus between arms availability and ethnic attacks in Kenya. The report highlights politically instigated armed violence on Kenya's coast during the last general election cycle, in 1997. Human Rights Watch describes in detail the armed political violence in Kenya's Coast Province in mid-1997 and the role of ruling-party officials in stoking the violence. A quasi-military force of well-organized and well-armed attackers carried out brutal attacks on civilians from other ethnic groups in areas around Mombasa, Coast Province. HRW Index No.: 275-0 May 31, 2002 Purchase online Kenya: Child Soldiers Global Report 2001 From the Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers There have been no reports of under-18s in government armed forces, but according to legislation recruits need only have the ‘apparent’ age of 18, while even younger recruits may enlist with the consent of a guardian. Recruitment of Kenyan street children by armed opposition groups from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has been reported. June 12, 2001 In the Shadow of Death HIV/AIDS and Children's Rights in Kenya Human immuno-deficiency virus/acquired immune deficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a national disaster for the people of Kenya, children and adults alike. Kenya is estimated to have the ninth-highest prevalence of HIV in the world with about 14 percent of the adult population infected. An estimated 1 million orphans in the country represent only a fraction of the population of children affected by AIDS, which includes children withdrawn from school to care for a sick relative, those in families caring for orphans, and those who have had to become breadwinners to replace the income of a sick parent. Kenya is far from alone in needing to strengthen protections of the rights of AIDS-affected children. Governments around the world have neglected the consequences of AIDS on children and have failed to provide the necessary protections of their rights to survival and development. This failure is one of the most pervasive and lasting crises of the HIV/AIDS catastrophe, and it must be addressed with the greatest urgency. June 2, 2001 Download PDF, 326 KB, 35 pgs Printer friendly version In the Shadow of Death: HIV/AIDS And Children's Rights In Kenya The government of Kenya is failing to care for millions of children who have been orphaned by AIDS or whose family members suffer from the disease.HIV/AIDS has orphaned about a million children in Kenya and at least 13 million in Africa,and left millions more impoverished and marginalized in many African countries. The disease has also weakened the extended family and other communities to which orphans have traditionally turned.This report charges that the Kenyan government has failed to take responsibility for children who are at higher risk of human rights abuse when the disease ravages their families. As children are forced to become breadwinners, they are pulled out of school and often forced to take on potentially dangerous labor that is inappropriate for children. Leading Kenyan government officials have not spoken out forcefully enough to reduce the social stigma associated with HIV/AIDS, Human Rights Watch said. It called on President Daniel arap Moi to break the "conspiracy of silence" that has fostered discrimination against children affected by the HIV/AIDS crisis. Many children are also unable to inherit property to which they are entitled because they are unable to navigate legal processes that are cumbersome and ill-suited to claimants who are minors.The report focuses on Kenya as an illustrative case of a phenomenon that affects much of Africa. HRW Index No.: A1304 June 1, 2001 Download PDF Purchase online Kenya: Government Human Rights Commissions in Africa The Human Rights Standing Committee was formed in May 1996 by President Daniel arap Moi shortly before a donor meeting to discuss renewal of aid, conditioned on economic and human rights reforms. The Standing Committee on Human Rights is tightly circumscribed by executive control with questionable legal status since it was not created through the proper parliamentary procedures required by the Kenyan constitution. The Standing Committee's contribution to the protection of human rights in Kenya has been weak, and has largely consisted largely of confidential reports submitted to the president. The inactivity of the Standing Committee starkly contrasts with the vigor of Kenya's civil society groups. January 1, 2001 KENYA: Landmine Monitor Report 2000 Key developments since March 1999: The Oromo Liberation Front, a rebel group operating in southern Ethiopia, has been accused of planting antitank and possibly antipersonnel mines inside Kenyan territory. August 1, 2000 Spare the Child: Corporal Punishment in Kenyan Schools For most Kenyan children, violence is a regular part of the school experience. Teachers use caning, slapping, and whipping to maintain classroom discipline and to punish children for poor academic performance. The infliction of corporal punishment is routine, arbitrary, and often brutal. Bruises and cuts are regular by-products of school punishments, and more severe injuries (broken bones, knocked-out teeth, internal bleeding) are not infrequent. At times, beatings by teachers leave children permanently disfigured, disabled or dead. Such routine and severe corporal pnishment violates both Kenyan law and international human rights standards. According to the U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child, school corporal punishment is incompatible with the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the world's most widely-ratified human rights treaty. Other human rights bodies have also found some forms of school-based corporal punishment to be cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and a practice that interferes with a child's right to receive an education and to be protected from violence. September 1, 1999 Purchase online Spare the Child Corporal Punishment in Kenyan Schools For most Kenyan children, violence is a regular part of the school experience. Teachers use caning, slapping, and whipping to maintain classroom discipline and to punish children for poor academic performance. The infliction of corporal punishment is routine, arbitrary, and often brutal. Bruises and cuts are regular by-products of school punishments, and more severe injuries (broken bones, knocked-out teeth, internal bleeding) are not infrequent. At times, beatings by teachers leave children permanently disfigured, disabled or dead. Such routine and severe corporal punishment violates both Kenyan law and international human rights standards. According to the U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child, school corporal punishment is incompatible with the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the world's most widely-ratified human rights treaty. Other human rights bodies have also found some forms of school-based corporal punishment to be cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, and a practice that interferes with a child's right to receive an education and to be protected from violence. September 1, 1999 Download PDF, 477 KB, 62 pgs Printer friendly version Failing the Internally Displaced: The UNDP Displaced Persons Program in Kenya Between 1993 and 1995, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) administered a program to return an estimated 300,000 persons who were driven off their land by state-sponsored “ethnic” violence. The Kenyan government instigated the violence after being forced to concede to a multiparty system in order to punish and disenfranchise ethnic groups associated with the opposition, while rewarding its supporters with illegally obtained land. Throughout the UNDP program, and since, the government has obstructed efforts to return the displaced to their homes. The government is responsible for harassing the displaced and those who assist them, while allowing the perpetrators of the violence to enjoy complete impunity. In terms of offering effective assistance, protection and reintegration to the thousands of internally displaced Kenyans, the UNDP’s record fell far short of what it could, and should, have been. Ultimately, the manner in which the program was run resulted in the greatest attention being placed on that part of the program that was relatively the easiest and least politically controversial to administer—the relief part—and a neglect of the protection, human rights, and long-term needs of the internally displaced. Failing the Internally Displaced confirms the fundamental importance of incorporating human rights considerations into international programs for the internally displaced, and identifies ways that UNDP, and the United Nations as a whole, can strengthen future implementation. HRW Index No.: ISBN 1-56432-212-2 June 1, 1997 Purchase online Juvenile Injustice Police abuse and detention of street children in Kenya Human Rights Watch Children's Rights Project Street children in Kenya face innumerable hardships and danger in their daily lives. In addition to the hazards of living on the street, these children face harassment and abuse from the police and within the juvenile justice system for no reason other than the fact that they are street children. Living outside the protection of responsible adults, street children are easy and silent targets for abuse by police and society at large. On the streets, they are subject to frequent beatings by police as well as monetary extortion and sexual abuse. They are subject to frequent arrest simply because they are homeless; Avagrancy (being without a fixed abode) is a criminal offense under Kenyan law. Once arrested, often by plainclothes police in roundup operations, street children are processed through the revolving doors of the Kenyan juvenile justice system, where children pass back and forth between remand detention centers and court before a final disposition is reached in their cases. After spending indefinite periods of time on remand, where they are further neglected and abused, they may be finally sentenced to institutions called approved schools, borstal institutions or adult prisons, which do little to improve their lives. Further, the procedures by which street children are deprived of their liberty and are committed to these institutions do not comply with the due process standards of international law. This report documents the treatment of street children by the Kenyan police, and in the juvenile justice system as a whole, following street children from an all too frequent route from street to police station lockup, from lockup to court, from court to detention in remand institutions, and finally from remand to confinement in correctional institutions. June 1, 1997 Download PDF, 806 KB, 215 pgs Printer friendly version Juvenile Injustice: Police Abuse and Detention of Street Children in Kenya In addition to the hazards of living on the streets, street children in Kenya are subject to frequent beatings, extortion, and sexual abuse by police. In violation of international law, they are rounded up and held for days or weeks in police lockups under deplorable physical conditions, commingled with adults and often beaten. Those who are brought to court are usually charged with vagrancy or are classified as being “in need of protection or discipline.” Pending adjudication of their cases, they are committed by courts to crowded remand institutions where they languish until their cases are decided. Without legal representation, these children may be finally committed by courts to correctional institutions called approved schools and borstal institutions, and prisons. Based on interviews with sixty children, this report documents the treatment of street children by police and in the juvenile justice system as a whole. Upwards of 40,000 street children live in Kenya. With their numbers on the rise, they are likely to continue to suffer violations of their rights, unless measures are taken to ensure better training and strict accountability of police, the judiciary, and staff of remand and correctional institutions. HRW Index No.: ISBN 1-56432-214-9 May 1, 1997 Purchase online Old Habits Die Hard: Rights Abuses Follow Renewed Foreign Aid Commitments Since December 1994, there has been a notable deterioration in the human rights situation in Kenya, evidenced by Pres. Moi's crackdown against human rights activists, opposition politicians and internally displaced persons. The escalation of human rights abuses has come in the wake of new commitments of foreign aid, pledged without strong human rights conditions, at the last consultative group meeting of Kenya's donors in December 1994. Since 1991, when aid was suspended on economic and human rights grounds, donors have failed to sustain pressure for the respect of human rights, in large part due to the justification that the government had taken significant steps toward economic reform. July 1, 1995 Multipartyism Betrayed in Kenya: Continuing Rural Violence and Restrictions on Freedom of Speech and Assembly After winning the first multiparty election since 1963 in December of 1993, the government of Daniel arap Moi has increased its harassment of the political opposition, bringing spurious criminal charges against opposition politicians, forcing unwarranted restrictions on their freedom of association, and arresting them without charge. Perhaps of most concern, however, is the political violence that erupted during the year leading up to the election that continues to affect some rural areas. July 1, 1994 Divide and Rule: State-Sponsored Ethnic Violence in Kenya President Daniel arap Moi of Kenya confidently predicted that the return of his country to a multiparty system would result in an outbreak of tribal violence that would destroy the nation. His prediction has been alarmingly fulfilled. One of the most disturbing developments in Kenya over the last two years has been the eruption of violent clashes between different ethnic groups. However, far from being the spontaneous result of a return to political pluralism, there is clear evidence that the government was involved in provoking this ethnic violence for political purposes and has taken no adequate steps to prevent it from spiralling out of control. So far, we estimate that the clashes have left at least 1,500 people dead and 300,000 displaced. If action is not swiftly taken, there is a real danger that Kenya could descend into civil war. HRW Index No.: ISBN 1-56432-117-7 November 1, 1993 Download PDF Purchase online Seeking Refuge, Finding Terror: The Widespread Rape of Somali Women Refugees in North Eastern Kenya While the tragedy in Somalia made daily news, the plight of thousands of refugees in neighboring Kenya remains unpublicized. Since 1992, approximately 300,000 Somalis have fled across the 800 mile Kenya-Somali border, most of them women and children. Many were the victims of violence, including rape, as they fled war-torn Somalia. They came to Kenya to escape these dangers only to face similar abuse while enroute to or living in the refugee camps. October 1, 1993 Purchase online |
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