iR2P

Kenya’s National Commission on Human Rights has released its report into January’s post-election violence. Entitled On the Brink of the Precipice, the report (promised to appear on the KNCHR website shortly) concludes that some of the violence was premeditated, financed by local politicians and business people, and included crimes against humanity. Naming planners and perpetrators, and making recommendations on changing the prevailing culture of impunity, it warns that the prerequisites for genocide were in place, and continue to pose risks for Kenya:

Kenya presently exhibits characteristics which are prerequisites for the commission of the crime of genocide. One such feature is the dehumanisation of a community using negative labels or idioms that distinguish the target group from the rest of society. Communities such as the Kikuyu and Kisii resident in the Rift Valley were referred to by some Kalenjin politicians as “madoadoa” (stains) before and during the post?election violence. Another characteristic present in Kenya is the impunity subsequent to which past acts of violence in 1992, 1997 and 2005 have gone unpunished. Consequently, unless the state and Kenyans take remedial measures, the probability of genocide happening in Kenya at some future point in time is real.

Over four months of research, and using leads from a public hotline as well as reports from other sources (e.g. HRW), the Commission gathered over a thousand statements describing more than 7,500 episodes of violence or incitement to violence. The Commission has compiled a list of more than 200 named individuals for the police and the International Criminal Court to formally investigate. The list includes five cabinet ministers, current and former Members of Parliament, senior police officers, provincial officials, religious leaders, radio station bosses and ordinary citizens.

While, in general, “Kenya’s political leadership failed to prevail on their supporters not to perpetrate violence against other Kenyans“, the report notes that:

In instances where leaders intervened, violence did not escalate to the levels experienced elsewhere. This was the case in Narok where elders prevailed on the Maasai community not to involve themselves in violence, and Mombasa where religious leaders and the Police prevailed on local youth to desist from violence.

Kenya’s security forces were found to have used excessive and lethal force in efforts to quell the violence, although in some cases the police showed proper restraint and helped to protect victims of the violence.

The report applauds Kenyan civil society calls for unity as well as the role of the Kenya Red Cross and other humanitarian organisations in reducing the suffering of people displaced by the violence.

The report will be presented to the President, the Attorney General, Parliament, and an independent commission established by the mediation process. Earlier this year, in a March press release (PDF) the Commission said,

At this historical moment, the current generation must say no to impunity; our leadership must bold enough to “follow truth wherever it may lead” unless we want to go through the same again or worse in 2012 and beyond. Kenya as a whole has been the victim of the post-election violence: let us now not also be the victim of impunity.