A
Little Peace of Kenya
By Aletia Dundas
Understanding
Kenya's Violence
By David Zarembka
I
Am the Change I Want to See in the World: Impact of and Vision for
Alternatives to
Violence Project Workshops in Western Kenya June 2003 – September
2007, by Getry Agizah and Aletia Dundas
Nine Interpretations
of the Violence in Kenya in Early 2008 by David Zarembka
Current Programs in Kenya:
Due to the violence after the December 27, 2007 elections, AVP in western Kenya plans are conducting 200 basic, advanced, and training for facilitator workshops in various communities. Many of these workshops will involve the young people who were involved in much of the local violence after the election. Sites may include Kisii, Kisumu, and Bondo in Nyanza Province; Shinyalu, Kakamega, the Mt Elgon area, Lugari District, Malava District and Vihiga District in Western Province; and Turbo, Eldoret and Kitale in Rift Valley Province. Each site will have ten or more workshops so that each area can be adequately impacted.
The United States Institute of Peace has just approved a joint proposal between AGLI/FPCD and the Laikipia Nature Conservancy. There will be forty basic workshops for youth involved in the violence in eight communities. Then two males and two females will be selected from each Basic workshop to go for a week to the Lakipia Nature Conservancy. There in the mornings, after the youth have observed the original animals and vegetation of the area, they will participate in an advanced AVP workshop and in the afternoon in arts, crafts, drama, and song to promote reconciliation and peacemaking in Kenya.
The Friends Peace Centre in Lubao, under AGLI’s partner, Friends for Peace and Community Development (FPCD), has completed a 20 bed residential building and is now roofing the administrative/library building next to it.
In September, the week-long AVP International Gathering is planned for the Bishop Stam Conference Centre near Kakamega. There will be ample opportunities for participants at the conference to facilitate AVP workshops before or after the Gathering.
AGLI is also supporting reconciliation efforts on the border between the Kipsigis (Rift Valley Province) and the Kisii (Nyanza Province) where more than 30 people were killed and where hundreds of homes, a school, and numerous businesses were burned.
AVP-Western Kenya has completed 42 one-day listening workshops with the Center for Disease Control in Kisumu and others with the bicycle taxi drivers in Kakamega and the staff of the Eldoret prison.