Kenya: Violence of power-sharing stalemate enters third day

(SomaliNet) Since Tuesday, residents of Kenya’s Kenya\'s largest shanty town, Kiber, have vandalised the main Nairobi-Mombassa railway line to demonstrate against a lack of political progress in Kenya.

According to reports, gunshots and tear gas were fired into the air in Kibera on the outskirts of Nairobi as locals showed increasing impatience with their political leaders.

Kenya’s disputed election was in December. Since then Kenya\'s population has been waiting for their leaders to form a government.

The two men at the top, President Mwai Kibaji and opposition leader Raila Odinga, have been in talks to form a coalition government. It would see Mr Odinga take up the newly-created position of Prime Minister.

But the two parties have failed to agree on who will fill the government\'s cabinet positions.

Both sides are accused of trying to secure powerful ministries, including the department for Internal Security and the department for Foreign Affairs.

Mr Odinga insists the negotiations have not broken down. \"The talks have not collapsed, they have just been postponed, they have not collapsed at all.\"

He said in Nairobi: \"It is necessary for our people to be patient. I would like to appeal to our people not to engage in acts of hooliganism that would cause unnecessary destruction of property and lives.\"
American Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has spoken by phone to both leaders urging them to come to an agreement.
But her representative in Nairobi, US Ambassador Michael Ranneberger, played down the violence.

\"I don\'t think this is a crisis,\" he said. \"I don\'t think anybody should panic about what is going on.

\"I think people need to remain calm and they need to give leaders of this country, the prime minister designate and the president, the time and the space to work matters out.\"

Since December\'s elections more than a thousand Kenyans have died in inter-tribal violence.

The two leaders represent rival tribes. That tribal tension has forced a further 300,000 from their homes.

And while the world\'s attention is focused further south on Zimbabwe, the threat of more bloodshed in Kenya remains real.-Skynews