CRC Establishes Special Team to Monitor Violence in Kenya

With several of their staff members in harm’s way, Christian Reformed World Relief Committee officials on Monday called into action a special Emergency Response Team to monitor the unstable, and increasingly violent, situation in Kenya.

As of Monday afternoon, 125 people had been killed in the clashes and protests across the East African country following the announcement on Sunday that President Mwai Kibaki was declared the winner of the closest presidential election in the country’s history.

Charging that the election was rigged, Raila Odinga, the opponent, has refused to concede defeat and has instead called for a massive march on Nairobi by his supporters on Thursday. 

“Right now, our people are in their homes and are safe. We have no plans to evacuate. Our strategy at this time is to lay low and monitor the situation,” said Andrew Ryskamp, director for CRWRC.

Meanwhile, Mark Fackler, a Calvin College communications professor, has postponed, at least for a week, a trip that he and other faculty members were to lead starting this week in Kenya. More than 20 Calvin students were scheduled to go with them. In addition, two Calvin College students who planned to leave this week to attend school in Nairobi, the country’s capital, are staying home.

Calling an Emergency Response Team into action is a precautionary, and yet serious, development. It is part of coordinated plan to put staff in Kenya on alert to stay at home and to have the funds and documents available to evacuate the country if necessary.

The ERT will function as the group that decides on how to best communicate the situation in Kenya to the media and to the wider church, as well as whether or not CRC personnel need to leave the country, said Ryskamp.

Ryskamp is asking for prayers for the safety of CRWRC’s five full-time staff members in Kenya. The country is also the base for the CRWRC’s HIV/AIDS coordinator for the East/South African region. Partners Worldwide, a CRC business-development ministry, also has a staff person in Kenya.

In addition, Christian Reformed World Missions had just sent two missionaries to Kenya to work at a seminary library in the town of Eldoret. The couple reportedly arrived in Kenya Monday and were likely to be confined to Nairobi for the time being.

One CRWRC staff member told Ryskamp by phone on Monday afternoon that two rival tribes in his community were destroying homes and starting to fight, making it necessary for the staff member ask local police to escort him and his family to a safer part of Kenya on Tuesday morning.

“We would ask the United States to extend a hand to help settle the problem,” said the staff member. The best solution, said the staff member, would be to call for a re-count of the vote. “That would bring peace to the country right away,” he said.

Fackler at Calvin said he has been in contact with friends and colleagues in Kenya who are concerned that widespread violence could erupt if the march that Raila Odinga has called for takes place on Thursday. “If Odinga holds the march, he could be leading his lambs to the slaughter,” given that President Kibaki will likely send in government forces to stop them, said Fackler.

CRWRC is a Christian, non-profit organization of the Christian Reformed Church in North America providing a ministry of development, relief, and justice education to people in need around the world.  CRWRC is currently active in 30 countries and has an international reputation for "helping people help themselves."                                      

CRWRC works with other faith-based organizations in Kenya on a range of public health and agricultural projects. These include programs to establish organic farms and to create sustainable water conservation and management projects. Bringing food, scholarships for education and other assistance to HIV/AIDs orphans is another focus of the ministry’s outreach. Addressing environmental and social justice issues are also part of the work.

Partners Worldwide works with other faith-based organizations to support computer-training and job-creation centers, as well as to encourage the growth of small businesses through loans and fund-raising events.

For more information about CRWRC, visit www.crwrc.org or call 1-800-55-CRWRC. In Canada, call 1-800-730-3490.  

 -