VOA常速英语2007年-Kenyan Election Highlights Political Freedom

On December 27, Kenyans will vote in their second presidential election since Daniel Arap Moi left office five years ago.  Although the election is expected to be hotly contested, one thing that voters seem to agree on is that the pervasive¹ fear of the Moi era is long gone.  Nick Wadhams reports from Nairobi.

In the city's Uhuru Park, Nairobi denizens² listen to handheld radios, lounge in the grass and take each other's pictures beside a giant sculpture of Mount Kenya.

Atop the sculpture is a giant hand clutching a torch.  The hand is supposed to be that of former President Daniel Arap Moi, who grew into a quintessential African "big man" during his 24-year rule.  He is alleged³ to have crushed dissent⁴ and jailed and tortured his opponents just 100 meters from here, in the basement of a rust-orange skyscraper⁵.

Back then, Uhuru Park was a place where women were raped⁶ and kidnapped, and anyone walking through was harassed⁷ and threatened by street children.  Across Kenya, people who spoke⁸ out against the Moi government risked jail, torture, and even death.

But, these days, in advance of the December 27 elections, the relaxed scene at Uhuru Park is a reminder⁹ of just how much Kenya has changed in the five years since Mr. Moi left office.

Sitting in the park with friends, teacher Elizabeth Nderitu has no qualms¹⁰ discussing her political views.  She says these relatively¹¹ new freedoms are one reason why she will support President Mwai Kibaki, Mr. Moi's successor, for a second five-year term.

"It used to be very difficult and people even ended up being killed," she said.  "And, what I like about Kibaki, nobody can pinpoint¹² and say Kibaki has made this person to be killed, like the way you used to hear.  Okay, we do not know if it is true, but we used to hear this person has been killed because he said this, he commented this, he questioned the government.  But in Kibaki government we have not had such cases."

It is a stunning¹³ turnaround that Kenya has gone from dictatorship to stable democracy within just five years.  There is now a vibrant¹⁴ media and a political opposition¹⁵ unafraid to question Mr. Kibaki.

Given the tension surrounding the election, the strength of Kenya's political system will be tested.  Recent polls show President Kibaki is slightly trailing his chief opponent, Raila Odinga.

A recent report from the Coalition¹⁶ for Accountable Political Financing asserted Mr. Kibaki, Mr. Odinga, and another candidate, Kalonzo Musyoka, funded nearly two-thirds of their campaigns through corrupt¹⁷ means, including extortion.

All sides have accused opponents of planning to rig the vote.  Some people fear violence will result among supporters of losing candidates.

Mr. Kibaki has failed to stamp out the pervasive corruption¹⁸ of Mr. Moi's era as he had promised.  Some opponents accuse him of perpetuating¹⁹ it by handing out favors to members of his Kikuyu tribe.

To some observers, evidence that flaws still dog Kenya's political system is the fact that one of Mr. Kibaki's most ardent²⁰ supporters in this election is Mr. Moi. 

Mr. Moi, 83, appears to be  in vigorous health and has campaigned tirelessly for President Kibaki, in stops around the nation.  He has been appointed Mr. Kibaki's special envoy²¹ for the peace process between North and South Sudan.

"I am convinced that President Mwai Kibaki ought to be given a chance to complete the constitutionally accepted two-term tenure," he said.

Yet the clearest example that Mr. Moi has left the picture, and of the changes initiated²² by Mr. Kibaki, appears to be the general consensus²³ that the election rigging the Moi administration was accused of using to assure it stayed in power for so many years would no longer work.

Mwalimu Mati is an anti-corruption campaigner.

"We still have a problem of corruption in the electoral process, but the test will be the results," he explained.  "It is not clear whether it is as effective as it once was, because there was a time when you used to buy elections outright²⁴.  But now it seems to be a bit more difficult.  Kenya is democratizing so it is harder and harder to guarantee the cooperation of all the people you would need to rig elections the way Moi, for example, was able to pull it off."

Back at Uhuru Park, the monument with Mr. Moi's hand atop it vigorously sprays water into a surrounding pool.  Tourists happily snap pictures.  But few people seem to know this monument is anything more than a slightly strange sculpture in a pretty park.  Whatever Kenya's problems and whatever the outcome of the vote, the time of the Moi era seems long past.