New Dawn Communities

GETTING TO KNOW KENYA - U.S. PERSPECTIVE

Churchgoers at the Kingdom Interdenominational Community Church in San Bernardino (Photo: Press Enterprise)

This from the Press Enterprise in Riverside, Calif.:

For most Americans, the recent unrest in Kenya, touched off by disputes over a presidential election in December, is something that pops up only occasionally, if at all, in the news these days.

But for native Kenyans living in Southern California, the violence and the anguish their families are going through back home has been a constant concern.

Martin Okoth, 46, of Chino Hills, worries about his sister whose city has seen businesses burned in tribal clashes. One of his brothers was forced from his home in Nairobi. Another brother, a well-known soccer player in the country, was forced to pay a ransom before his kidnapped son was safely returned.

“All of us have these stories,” Okoth says, standing outside the Kingdom Interdenominational Community Church in San Bernardino.

The church is Southern California’s first Kenyan church. Started in 1997, the church purchased the San Bernardino property in 2005. It has satellite churches in San Jacinto and Los Angeles.

The wooden pews in this squat cinderblock building are filled this Sunday with men, women and children singing hymns in English and Kiswahili and listening to Pastor Benson Andebe deliver a passionate sermon.

But there is more here than just a worship service. Recently, the church has been serving as a source of emotional support, information and aid for a community caught up in a crisis half a world away.

“The church has been like a refuge where you can come and vent in a more respectful manner,” says Okoth, who is the congregation chairman. “It’s like a form of therapy. Here, I’m talking to other people who are dealing with the same problem. Whatever has happened, we can come here and express our love for each other and come together.”

FULL STORY

Excerpts from church service VIDEO.

KENYA NATIONAL NEWS - IMAGES

Violence continued in Kenya, where on Sunday the police and residents tried to quell a fire set in the Mathare slum in Nairobi. (NY Times)

NATIONAL NEWS

Kenya’s MAF director reports on evacuation and supply efforts.
This from Christianity Today: 

Bernard Terlouw, Kenya director for Mission Aviation Fellowship, was in his Nairobi office on January 1, planning how to best evacuate victims of the escalating violence. Amid the fighting that had broken out after the contested win of President Mwai Kibaki over challenger Raila Odinga, MAF had begun receiving calls from desperate Kenyans in Eldoret, Kisumu, Kitale, and other western towns.

“We were trying to see who needed help and where they could be routed through,” said Terlouw. As more calls came in and the planning continued, Terlouw said he and his team began to feel optimistic “that we were going to be able to do something for some of these people.”

Then Terlouw got a call on his cell phone from a man near Lake Victoria. “He was screaming at me because he was being chased into a field. He was saying, ‘Send a helicopter! I need a helicopter! Can you come to this park? I’ll do anything for you! I’ll work for you! I’m at this park.’”

“I told him I couldn’t send a helicopter because we didn’t have any,” said Terlouw. “There was no air field nearby, and we couldn’t get there. Suddenly, there was this deadly silence in my heart. … What happened with that man, I don’t know. I don’t even know who he was. He just called me on his cell phone, a man in western Kenya.”

As the death toll and number of displaced people has mounted, Terlouw said his team has been focusing on getting people out of the most dangerous areas. They’re also delivering supplies to some of the more than 300,000 displaced people who are congregating at schools, police stations, churches, and open fields…

Read Full Story/Christianity Today

New Dawn Communities director gives message of hope during Kenya’s upheaval

This from Pastor Ron Sukut:

So many have worked so hard, for so long and have come so far. The situation in Kenya is very serious indeed, yet I am confident that the violent reaction to the recent elections can not destroy the good that has been accomplished.

This is a true and tragic test, but the people of Kenya have the spiritual depth, moral integrity, intelligent capabilities and determined fortitude to meet this challenge and emerge better than ever. Freedom and unity are too precious to surrender.

There is no turning back for Kenya, East Africa and even Africa as a unity of nations.

I believe in the emerging Kenyans! This unrest will only serve to bring to the forefront the positive character qualities of the responsible and caring Kenyan to seek for and find lasting solutions to their problems. The end result of this struggle will be to insure a better life for all Kenyans, and thus set the stage for a better life for all Africans. With the prayers and encouragement of the rest of the world, a good Kenya will prevail.

“Pamoja Tutashinda” Together we will suceed!

GETTING TO KNOW KENYA - NATIONAL NEWS 

As I learn more about Kenya, I’ll continue to post news stories. I pray for strength to the many Christian missionaries serving Kenya during this turbulent time. I pray for New Dawn Communities to continue being a beacon of hope, firm in the Lord Jesus.

At Kibera Lutheran Church in Nairobi, a small congregation gathers for Sunday service. The church was burned in postelection violence. (Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times)

This from the Los Angeles Times:

Thousands face starvation in Kenya
U.N. food agency says the situation is dire, with roads blocked amid tension and unrest over the disputed presidential election.

By ROBYN DIXON

NAIROBI, KENYA — Up to 100,000 people face starvation in western Kenya because of election-related tribal violence, the World Food Program warned Friday, as rivals in last week’s disputed presidential vote showed no willingness to talk.

President Mwai Kibaki and contender Raila Odinga, who had led through much of the vote-counting process, continued to hold uncompromising positions: The opposition called for a new election, and Kibaki agreed — but only if the courts ordered it.

Odinga has described the courts as packed with Kibaki’s cronies, and most analysts and diplomats do not see going to the courts as a solution, in part because cases are processed too slowly.

Opposition claims of vote- rigging triggered tribal violence that has killed about 300 people. European Union observers said the vote failed to meet democratic standards.

Read Full Story/Los Angeles Times

GETTING TO KNOW KENYA - POLITICS

This from Wikepedia:

Politics of Kenya takes place in a framework of a presidential representative democratic republic, whereby the President of Kenya is both head of state and head of government, and of a pluriform multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the government. Legislative power is vested in both the government and the National Assembly. The Judiciary is independent of the executive and the legislature.

Since independence, Kenya has maintained remarkable stability despite changes in its political system and crises in neighbouring countries. A cross-party parliamentary reform initiative in the fall of 1997 revised some oppressive laws inherited from the colonial era that had been used to limit freedom of speech and assembly. This improved public freedoms and contributed to generally credible national elections in December 1997.

In December 2002, Kenyans held democratic and open elections, most of which were judged free and fair by international observers. The 2002 elections marked an important turning point in Kenya’s democratic evolution in that power was transferred peacefully from the Kenya African Union (KANU), which had ruled the country since independence to the National Rainbow Coalition (Narc), a coalition of political parties.

Under the presidency of Mwai Kibaki, the new ruling coalition promised to focus its efforts on generating economic growth, combating corruption, improving education, and rewriting its constitution. Most of these promises have been met. There is free primary education. From next year, secondary education will be almost free, with the government footing all tuition fees. Under president Kibaki, the democratic space has expanded. The media is freer than before. Kenyans can associate and express themselves without fearing being harassed by security agents as it used to be the case during the Moi administration. In November 2005, the Kenyan electorate resoundingly defeated a new draft constitution supported by Parliament and President Kibaki. Kibaki responded by dismissing his entire cabinet. Kibaki eventually appointed a new slate of ministers.

The next general elections were held on December 27, 2007. In them, President Kibaki under the Party of National Unity ran for re-election against against the main opposition party, the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM). After a split which would take a crucial 8% of the votes away from the ODM to the newly formed Orange Democratic Movement-Kenya (ODM-K)’s candidate, Kalonzo Musyoka, the race tightened between ODM candidate Raila Odinga and Kibaki. As the count came in to the Kenyan Election Commission, Odinga was shown to have a slight, and then substantial lead. However, as the KEC continued to count the votes, Kibaki closed the gap and then overtook his opponent by a substantial margin. This lead to protests and riots, and Odinga declaring himself the “people’s president” and calling for a recount and Kibaki to resign. More information is available in Kenyan presidential election, 2007.

IMAGES FROM KENYA - POLITICAL NEWS

A supporter of the presidential challenger Raila Odinga in Kibera, a sprawling slum near the capital, Nairobi. (Karel Prinsloo/Associated Press)

This from The New York Times:

Riots Erupt Across Kenya as Rivals Declare Victory
By JEFFREY GETTLEMAN

NAIROBI, Kenya — With the results from Kenya’s closely contested elections still up in the air, riots erupted across the country on Saturday.

Columns of black smoke boiled up from the slums ringing Nairobi, the capital, as supporters of Raila Odinga, the leading presidential challenger, poured into the streets to protest what they said was a plot by the government to steal the election.

The demonstrators clashed with police officers in riot gear and tore apart metal shanties with their bare hands. The scene replayed itself in Kisumu, Kakamega, Kajiado, Eldoret and other towns across Kenya, mainly in strongholds of Mr. Odinga.

Just 12 hours before, Mr. Odinga, a flamboyant politician and businessman, had been cruising to victory, according to preliminary results. He was leading Kenya’s president, Mwai Kibaki, by about one million votes in an election that was predicted to be the most fiercely fought in Kenya’s history and perhaps the greatest test yet of this young multiparty democracy.

But that lead vanished overnight. On Saturday morning, the gap had been cut to about 100,000 votes, with Mr. Odinga still ahead, but barely, with 47 percent of the vote, compared with 46 percent for Mr. Kibaki.

Read Full Story/NY Times

GETTING TO KNOW KENYA - POLITICAL NEWS

This from The New York Times:

Kenya is in a position most of Africa must envy. Its economy has been humming along, with a growth rate around 7 percent and a billion-dollar-a-year tourism industry. The country is at peace, which is nothing to sneeze at in a neighborhood that includes war-racked Somalia, Sudan and Congo.

Today, there is also a free press, 2,548 candidates running for Parliament and genuine issues separating the leading parties, like strong central government versus federalism. Electoral politics here are not saddled by the deep cynicism that dogs Nigeria, Africa’s most populous democracy, or the one-party rule of South Africa, the continent’s most developed country.

Kenya’s budding democracy is a far cry from the state of things just a decade ago, when it was still under the grip of President Daniel Arap Moi, who has been widely criticized as a dictator.

On Dec. 27, Kenyans went to the polls to choose a president. The contest pitted the incumbent, Mwai Kibaki, a man who has a reputation as a courtly gentleman and economics whiz but also as a tribal politician, against Raila Odinga, a rich, flamboyant businessman who rides around in a bright red $100,000 Hummer and ran as a champion of the poor. Mr. Kibaki centered his campaign on education, having already delivered on his promise of free primary school education for all Kenyans.

But for all the country’s success, there is a strong undercurrent of frustration, which Mr. Odinga has tapped. He has campaigned on devolving power from the center of the country and granting Kenya’s rural areas more autonomy. He has also explicitly challenged the balance of power between the country’s ethnic groups. Kenya’s 37 million people are split among some 40 ethnic groups. Mr. Odinga, a member of the Luo tribe, has charged that the Kikuyus, whose members include both Mr. Mbaki and the country’s founder, Jomo Kenyatta, have long gotten more than its fair share of government benefits.— Jeffrey Gettleman, Dec. 28, 2007

This is a faith based interdenominational endeavor of those who desire to participate with God and one another in meeting the essential needs of those who are suffering in developing nations.

We are individuals in an international cooperation who are sharing our knowledge, talents, and resources with those in need, in a mutually beneficial exchange. We partner with the helpless and hopeless until they gain the essential information and skills necessary for them to initiate and sustain transformation. This process empowers them to alter their destiny and become agents for change within their community. “We lighten their load and enlighten their minds to brighten their future.”

New Dawn Communities

It is a Christ centered community within an indigenous culture, established for the purpose of personal and social transformation; emphasizing leadership development for disadvantaged youth through:

1. Spiritual Formation
2. Character Development
3. Academic Education
4. Vocational Training
5. Community Service

Equipping the graduates to be positive righteous influencers in their world.

New Dawn Communities